Mumbai : Till a couple of months ago, 11-year-old Krishna did nothing but rummage through the city’s garbage as his parents barely manage to earn two square meals for the family which lives in a makeshift shanty on the road leading to Kanakia complex — a posh residential locality in Mira Road.
Krishna now dreams to become a police officer. Nurturing his dreams and many kids like him are a bunch of four local youngsters who are on a selfless and noble mission.
The quartet including college students, self-employed professionals and a young housewife have teamed up to ignite the wicks of learning in underprivileged kids.
Taking turns, the four youngsters, who are from middleclass families, teach around 30 street children on the pavement outside a supermarket between 2 to 4 pm, six days a week and buy children stationery such as notebooks and pencils with money from their own pockets.
They not only impart basic education to the kids but also teach them importance of hygiene.
“Most parents prefer that their children work alongside them at construction sites, beg or pick rags. After an awareness drive, we managed to convince parents to send their children to study with us,” says Yasmeen Hussain.
“All the children are very keen to study and some of them are extra-ordinarily brilliant and talented. Unfortunately most of them are under nourished. We also try our level best to provide healthy breakfast to them,” says Akeel Vijayan, a Class XI student, who along with his team aims at getting the children admitted to formal private and civic run schools nearby.
However, with limited resources in hand, they have sought help from people in whatever little way they can to ensure that these children are not deprived of their right to learn and an opportunity to change their future.
