Rajpura, November 20, 2018: To commemorate Universal Children’s Day, SOS Children’s Villages of India (SOS India), one of the leading ‘Group Foster Care’ childcare options for parentless children in India, organised street plays on child rights and child protection across its 33 Family Strengthening Programme (FSP) locations across 22 states in India. The street plays were performed by members of Balpanchayat part of SOS India’s every FSP location.
To spread the awareness about child rights, the children of SOS Family Strengthening Program, Rajpura, Nehru Bal Panchayat of Chamaru Village performed a play on “Child Labour”. It was an attempt to make the children and their parents aware and alert about child rights. This event was attended by Dr. Nirmal Singh Sodhi (Director, Childline and Secretary Navjivini School, Patiala), Mrs. Baljit Kaur (Project Coordinator, Childline Patiala), Mr. Gurvinder Singh (Member Block Samiti, Rajpura), Sher Singh, Mr. Santosh Singh (Asstt. Village Director, SOS Rajpura) and Mrs. Renuka Chhabra (Sr. Coworker, FSP).
The celebrations ended with a pledge and an oath ceremony by the staff of the village, to work towards securing and providing a better tomorrow to its children.
Established in 1954, the United Nations Universal Children’s Day is celebrated on 20 November every year, to celebrate the existence of every child, and ensure his or her rights, security and welfare. This year, the United Nations is following the ‘Go Blue’ theme to mark the day. The theme aims at building a world where every child is in school, safe from harm and can fulfill his or her potential.
SOS India too has been working towards providing children, family-like care where they grow up amidst the love and affection of a mother and siblings.
SOS India under its two flagship programmes- Family-Based Care (FBC) and Family Strengthening Programme (FSP), ensures basic rights to all the children under its care. These programmes not only provide safe and secure childhood, but also strengthen families and communities as a preventive measure in the fight against abandonment and social neglect.
The Family Strengthening Programme (FSP), aims at preventing child abandonment, runs in slums and rural areas within an approximate 30 km radius of an SOS Children’s Village. This programme aims to enable families to move out of the vicious cycle of poverty, towards greater dignity and self-reliance by ensuring education of children and income generation, capacity development of caregivers.
Speaking about the relevance of child rights on the Universal Children’s Day, Anuja Bansal, Secretary General, SOS Children's Villages of India, said, “The Universal Children’s Day should be celebrated every day and every child must know his or her rights. The rights should be accessible to all children especially to parentless, abandoned and children belonging to the vulnerable families. We, at SOS Children's Villages of India, understand the importance of a family in nurturing a child for a better tomorrow. The need of the hour is to give children a secure childhood by providing them with their basic rights including good education, nutrition and a loving home. Our FSP programme aims at keeping families together and also focuses on building safe environment for children to grow.”
About SOS Children’s Villages of India
Established in 1964, SOS India is a non-government, non-profit, voluntary childcare organization. It has since been involved in providing parentless and abandoned children a ‘family-like’ environment which includes a loving mother, brothers and sisters, a loving home and a community. The aim of the SOS India is to build families for these children so that they grow up with love, respect and security. SOS India is a well-known credible organization and the first childcare NGO to get a CRISIL accreditation in India for strong delivery capability and high financial proficiency. In March 2016 and then again in March 2018, SOS India was certified by TRACE, the world’s leading anti-bribery standard-setting organization, which demonstrates a commitment to commercial transparency.
SOS India has been working tirelessly to ensure that parentless and abandoned children do not grow up alone and their lives are transformed by its specialized long-term care programme or preventive short-term care programme