OK, this is definitely the last blog from India (honest!) - The Salaam Baalak Trust

1st June:

I’m just sitting in the airport waiting for my flight to Hanoi and thought I would write one last blog about my tour this morning as it was really moving. I went on a walking tour with The Salaam Baalak Trust (SBT) who work with street children. The tour was led by two young men who were living proof that the Trust does great work – they were both on the streets as children and were rescued by the Trust. One, Tariq, told us that he’d run away from his home in Nepal and travelled on a bus for 13 hours to get to Delhi to see the monuments. He was 9!!!! He lived on the streets and became addicted to drugs and gambling before SBT managed to motivate him to get off the streets. He explained that most street children have run away from their families due to drugs/ alcohol/ poverty/ abuse etc. If they can’t afford the bus or train then they follow the railway line by foot until they get to a big city. The boys work day to day collecting plastic bottles from the street (called Rag Picking) to sell for money. 1kg of plastic bottles fetches 30-40 rupees (about 40- 50 pence) and this will take them all day to collect. We were taken to a shop that buys these bottles which I found particularly interesting as it links beautifully to a book that I read last month about life in a slum in Mumbai – the children in this book collected plastic and paper to sell. The girls are forced into prostitution and get 200 rupees per customer. The girls only see 50 rupees of this (about 70 pence) and they are expected to have 15 customers per day!!!! The money that they earn needs to be spent immediately or it will be stolen from them as they sleep. They usually spend this on drugs/ alcohol/ gambling or movies on a Friday (apparently a great place to do drugs and sleep for a couple of hours in the cool). Food isn’t on this list -  it’s easy to get as India celebrates lots of festivals so the children can always find food somewhere as one of the many religions is bound to be celebrating something!

The tour took us to a Contact Point next to New Delhi Station. The station is a prime place for the children to sleep at night or to work during the day. When we arrived at the contact point there were only 3 children as the rest had gone to the station to collect plastic – they knew that a train was due and they didn't want to miss out on the plastic! This meeting point is the first stage in SBT’s plan. The social worker who works for SBT goes to the station regularly to meet with the children. New children are invited to attend the contact point between 10am and 2pm every day. Here they can get food, water and a medical check. HIV tests are done twice a year as lots of these children share needles and/ or are forced into unprotected sex. Once they have managed to convince the child that the contact point is a safe place (as SBT works closely with the police the children are initially sceptical) then they can be assessed and a plan can be formulated. If the social worker can persuade the child to come off the streets permanently then they will be invited to live in one of 5 boarding houses. I was told that these children, however, take a lot of motivating and persuading to leave the streets as they are very messed up on drugs and they are afraid of being ‘imprisoned’ in the boarding house. Tariq mentioned that he was on the streets for a long time before he was persuaded to leave. He finally agreed to come off the streets due to bullying from the other children – they were better educated than him and he wanted to change this. The social worker promised him an education so he accepted.

We next visited one of these boarding houses (the boys and girls are separate and this was a boys one). 60 boys live here for up to a year and they’re given food, clothes and an education. During this year their parents are contacted and the Trust tries to get them back into the home. After the home is checked and parents are given assistance where needed, the child is returned home if they want to go. Regular contact is kept between SBT and the parents to check that everything is OK. I asked if it was quite common for children to run away again once they’re placed back at home (there was a reason that they left in the first place!). The parents are told that, if the child is found in Delhi again then they will not be returned a second time. I’m not convinced that sending the children home is always the right choice but I’m sure that the Trust has many checks in place before the child is returned. Children who cannot be returned home will stay with the Trust and get a good education.

We met the 60 boys and they were all great! They wanted to arm wrestle, have thumb wars and play clapping games. One boy, aged 14, told me that his parents had sent him to Delhi for work. When he arrived there was no job for him so he had to live on the streets. His parents will collect him soon, once they find the money for the bus fare. Another little boy was obsessed with pressing all the buttons on my watch (I think he wanted it to light up) and was playing with my necklace. All of the children looked clean and most looked happy. One little boy was missing an arm from the elbow down – I hope that this was not a result of living on the streets although we were told that the children sustain serious injuries on the streets from fighting each other when they are on drugs.

Out second guide shared his story too. He had been sent to Delhi to work in a factory by his Step-Father. He worked 18 hours a day and fell asleep at the machine once for which he was severely punished. He got fed up of his existence so he stole some money from the factory and moved onto the streets. SBT found him, gave him an education and now he’s studying for his degree at university. His English was very good and he looked pretty happy. We were told many positive stories like this – the Trust has been working since the 80’s and have made a big difference to a lot of children. They currently work with 5000 children, the funding for which comes mainly from corporate sponsorship and private donations with about 10% coming from the government.

The last interesting thing that we saw on the tour was a wall down an alley that was covered in different religious pictures ranging from Hindu Gods to Jesus Christ. We were asked why we thought this had been done and we were given the clue ‘protection’. We all thought that the children maybe slept in the alleyway or maybe prayed in the alleyway for protection. We were wrong! Apparently if you put religious pictures on the wall it protects the building from being urinated on! The men won’t pee on a wall whilst God is looking – whatever works, I guess!

http://www.salaambaalaktrust.com/