Education is so important!
And we take it so much for granted.
Some children simply do not get this opportunity.
With the full lockdown earlier in the year maybe we all realised the importance of our children going to school regularly and we were desperate, both as individuals and as a country, to get our children back into the school environment, and learning, as soon as it was safe to do so.
Supporting Dalit Children is a registered charity set up by Dinah Findlay in 2008 to educate Dalit children (the ‘untouchables’), in a village called Manvi in Southern India. Dinah was introduced to the area while on holiday and came back knowing that she had to do something to help the children there. She is as passionate and dedicated today, 12 years on, as she was then and makes regular trips to India to see the progress that is being made.
The charity has direct links with two schools for Dalits and other low-caste children. Both schools are providing a first-class education in English that will lead to genuine life-changing opportunities in the future. Students at both schools now have a legitimate chance to escape the poverty trap and oppression they were born into.
And what about during lockdown? Instead of the children travelling to the school – the teachers have been getting on the school bus and travelling to the villages instead! Lessons have been continuing – as some of you may have seen on television with the children sat on the ground, possibly under the shade of a tree, in a circle, cross-legged and learning from their teacher. It has been heart-warming for us to know that education – which is so valuable – has been able to continue.
Donations to Supporting Dalit Children enable us to continue our direct work with these schools. Your donation makes a difference! It currently costs (just) £240 a year to put a Dalit child through school for a year. That is just £20 a month – probably what you might have recently saved from not buying a coffee each day on your way to the office!
It’s not just education that you help to support.
Tailoring classes for the Dalit women, supporting them to be more independent and giving them an alternative form of income to seasonal field work, are now available in the village. Your donations have helped purchase more than 100 sewing machines for these women who now make items of clothing such as their children’s school uniforms and other clothes that they sell in the local markets.
And, in June this year, your donations helped to buy a tractor which is used to distribute clean drinking water to the villages we support. This is vital – and shocking to think that even now, in 2020, there are families in Manvi that don’t have access to clean water. On an ongoing basis going forward, your donations will pay for the upkeep of the tractor and fund the salary of the driver. You really do make a difference to the lives of these children and their families.
Supporting Dalit Children is very grateful to The Giving Machine to be chosen as the Cause for the Month for December – thank you.
If you would like to support us in any way then please get in touch. Please talk to us about sponsoring a child, a regular or one-off donation or if you are interested in a particular project to get behind. We would love to hear from you: info@supportingdalitchildren.com We are a small charity and every pound that is donated by you makes a real and direct improvement to a child’s life. Thank you.
Our website and facebook pages are updated regularly with all our news. https://www.facebook.com/SupportingDalitChildren/?ref=page_internal
https://www.supportingdalitchildren.com/
There is a lovely video too at https://www.facebook.com/SupportingDalitChildren/videos/2423877307913256
A little bit more about our charity:
Supporting Dalit Children – www.supportingdalitchildren.com
Dalits are known as “the untouchables”. At the bottom of India’s social hierarchy, they continue to be downtrodden and victimised even today, in the 21st century. Unbelievably, their status is less than that of an animal. Supporting Dalit Children funds school places (predominantly through sponsorship) for Dalit and other marginalised children at two schools in Southern India, with whom we have direct links. There is no government funding for these schools. We also fund social projects including new water purification plants and tailoring courses for teenage Dalit girls.
Supporting Dalit Children is a registered charity that is run on a completely voluntary basis. The trustees and their families pay for any office expenses so that 100% of every donation plus any GiftAid reclaimable can be sent directly to the schools to educate another child.
Rita and I have supported the charity for a while and are most impressed.The children benefit enormously from the help and support they receive
Author: W Hill | On: 2020-12-02 10:11:24