Nav-Jeevan

Newsletter July 2016

At the end of the school year 2015-2016 we look back at an innovative year. At the beginning an extra 100 tribal children came. Most of them only spoke their own tribal language and did their needs direct in nature. Now, just a year later, they are indistinguishable from the other kids.

The school exams went well. The total result of the school is above 97%. All 11 kids from class 10 graduated for high school exam. A fantastic achievement. Thanks to the teachers who really worked very hard and took extra classes in the holidays also.
The school topper is Manish Mohabe. Also his sister Manisha graduated. Their father is dead and their mother is mentally sick. Their grandmother looks after them. It is creditable for them to do so well.

 

Manish Mohabe

Manisha Mohabe

Sahil Hood

Sahil Meshram

Vandana Bariya

Rani Korde

Anjali Vishwakarma

Nikita Katre

Vishal Uikey

Vaishnavi Walke

Satish Kangale

This year Saniya Hussain (aged 10) and her little brother Danish (8) were admitted to our school. They tragically lost their mother some years ago. The father is a bus driver and couldn't look after his little children during the day. In desperation he married again hoping his new wife could be the children's new mother. But she didn't want to look after his first wife's kids. She started ill-treating the two young children - denying them food, physically abusing them and even not sending them to school. There was nothing the helpless father could do since he was away most of the day.

When he heard of our school through our bus driver Mukesh he was very relieved.  He immediately came and enrolled his two kids in classes 4 and 5. Both the children are extremely clever and have in the course of the year caught up with their classmates. At the start of the summer holidays the warden called the children's home to ask the father to come and collect the kids for the summer. Unfortunately she got the step mother who told the warden that the children were not welcome in her home and would have to spend their vacation in the hostel. It was heartbreaking to see how sad the children looked when their friends were being fetched by their family. We immediately asked Mukesh to contact the father directly and ask him what he wanted to do about the children. The father came to the school and fetched his jubilant children and took them home. We hope the step mother is kinder this time around.

Saniya Hussain

Danish Hussain

Two other new children were dogged by tragedy before they came to our school. Saniya Pathan (aged 12) and her younger brother Samir (9) lost their father last year when he was mowed down by a speeding bus. The mother struggled to support her kids by going from house to house washing dishes. Tragically after a few months she too was hit by a truck while crossing the road and died. The two children were now orphaned and the father's sister tried her best to support them. But the family belongs to the poorest strata of society and the aunt had to support her own children. She brought them to our school and begged us to look after these helpless orphans. We took the two kids in and Saniya was admitted to class 6 and her brother in class 2. The children have assimilated beautifully in our school and they are very happy now having finally found a permanent home.  We feel blessed that we are able to help truly needy children and give them a chance to enjoy a normal childhood.

Saniya Pathan

Samir Pathan

Due to the enormous growth we had last year we got some issues.

In 2005 we successfully drilled water on our own ground. Last year there was a shortage of water. The present bore well is insufficient. We had to buy tankers of water from the municipality to supplement our water supply. The state Maharashtra has been declared a water deficit state. So this was a temporary and expensive option.
We need to sink another bore well to augment our present supply. A water diviner has pinpointed a spot where he says ample water is available underground. 

The kitchen is way too small to cook for so many children in the hostel. We want to resolve this by drawing the current food storage space in the kitchen and building a new storeroom at the back of the kitchen.

The current dining hall is too small. After the tribal children joined us we were forced to start to eat in three shifts. First the younger children, followed by the older and then finally the staff. The outcome was that particularly in the evenings the staff ended up eating way into the night and could not get sufficient rest before the next morning early shift started. We want to convert the library into an additional dining room and shift the library to one of the rooms available upstairs. 

We thank the Calder Holding. Calder Holding doubles since 2003 every euro her staff donates.

We thank our donors and hope you will continue to support us in the future.