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Mumbai has the highest number of street children in the world.
They are over 1 million, which is about 10% of the city's population.
These children live on the pavements
, facing starvation. They make a living without any skills whatsoever.As
a result, they are often exploited by being forced to work long
hours and are underpaid.
Therefore, there is a need to provide
these underprivileged children with certain basic skills that
could help them to stand on their own feet and integrate them
into the mainstream of society to make them responsible citizens.
It is precisely with this objective
in mind that Project Mainstream was initiated as a Rotary supported
project way back in 1994.
Over the years, Project Mainstream
has touched the lives of over 25,000 young boys & girls in
the city of Mumbai.
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Vision
The vision of the project brought a new perspective to economic
emancipation of underprivileged children and youth. It adopted an
innovative approach to impart need-based education as well as business
training and vocational skills. In addition, the much-needed micro-credit
facility was made available to street children to get training as
well as to start a mini enterprise.
Mission
We are committed to provide opportunities to poor street and underprivileged
children to enable them become economically self-reliant and join
the mainstream of society.
Benaficiaries
Project Mainstream targets children and youth between the ages of
14 & 23. Its beneficiaries comprise mainly: street children,
slum children, institutionalised children, namely, children from
orphanages, remand homes, etc., socially handicapped children, i.e.
children of commercial sex workers, leprosy patients and prisoners.
In order to reach out to the maximum
number of beneficiaries, project Mainstream networks with a large
number of NGOs working amongst the underprivileged and street
children.
Programmes
The various training programmes offered include:
Small Business Development - an
orientation to running and managing a small business. This includes
practical hands-on training of small business of the beneficiary's
choice. Care is taken to select business or products that are
easy to learn, are easily marketable and can be produced with
minimum investment. In addition to this they are taught the value
of money and the basics of communication and selling skills.
The curriculum is simple but effective
to understand; the fundamentals of entrepreneurship and the skills
they have to acquire along with the problems they are likely to
face in their day to day lives. Such a curriculum has to be upgraded
on an ongoing basis to improve contents and methods of delivery
based on felt needs. Audiovisual techniques are also a part of
the curriculum like small films on operations of various business
to provide the benefitiary with viable options.
Vocational Training-to impart adequate
skills to improve their job prospects. In keeping with the present
emphasis on the service industry the youth are trained to become
car and auto-rickshaw (a three wheeler transport common in most
cities of India) drivers, security guards, cooks, Helpers in the
Hotel Industry etc.
Here again the importance of communication
skills, peer relationships, etc. is emphasized upon to develop
their overall personality. |
