Annapurna Pariwar Celebrates Baldin

Annapurna Pariwar recently celebrated Children’s day with slum children in Pune. A children’s day is celebrated in December every year to showcase the talents of these young children and to spread awareness about child rights to improve their welfare.

Annapurna looks after over 600 children under their ‘Vatsalyapurna’ project. It runs a unique chain of low cost Day Care Centre’s for children of poor working women. Annapurna Pariwar has been working for the empowerment of slum women since last three decades. An early childhood development intervention for slum children has thus become the focus of Annapurna.

A variety entertainment programme was organised for the kids from every centre to display their skills and enjoy by singing and dancing to the tune of local songs. In last 14 years Annapurna has set up 16 Day Care centre’s in 14 slums in Pune and 4 Day Care centre’s in Mumbai and has given an opportunity to 40 women to have self-employment. These centre’s today look after more than 600 slum children in Mumbai and Pune.

Dr. Medha Purao-Samant, MD Annapurna Pariwar said, “Slum children are almost always left unattended when parents are at work or are looked after by their eldest sibling. Children thus miss out on their childhood as a result of poverty. Poverty deprives them of the capabilities needed to survive and develop.”

She further stated that, “Around the world, poor girls and boys are victims of sexual abuse and are deprived of education. We are therefore working everyday on all fronts to provide long-term, sustainable and positive change for children, to ensure their protection, to end violence against children and to provide them with their right to education and offer good prospects for the future.”