SOS Children’s Villages of India launches #NoChildAlone campaign ON INTERNATIONAL DAY OF FAMILIES

SOS Children’s Villages of India launches #NoChildAlone campaign ON INTERNATIONAL DAY OF FAMILIES

• Urges individuals and corporate to partner and support the campaign

Rajpura, May 15, 2019: This International Day of Families (May 15), SOS Children’s Villages of India, a voluntary child care organisation, launches #NoChildAlone campaign.

The campaign is a call to acknowledge thedifficulties of 2 crore children without adequate parental care in India and evoke responses to ensure support for children under the care of SOS India.

These 2 crore children do not receive adequate care because they have lost both or either of their parents abandoned or their families are unable to take care of them. If not taken seriously with measures like strengthening the families, or providing abandoned children with a family-like environment in an alternate care home, this figure is estimated to rise to 2.4 crores by the year 2021.

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, in its preamble, recognises many of the principles in the declaration on the rights of the child, such as family as the best environment for a child to grow, the importance of child protection, best interest of the child, recognising child participation, etc. It states that it is convinced that the family, as the fundamental group of society and the natural environment for the growth and well-being of all its members and particularly children, should be afforded the necessary protection and assistance so that it can fully assume its responsibilities within the community. In India, concerted efforts are required to give a family-like environment to the abandoned or orphaned children.

“Responding to the need of the hour, SOS India takes pride in launching the campaign – #NoChildAlone, on the International Day of Families, with which also coincides the SOS Family Day. The need is urgent and requiresresponsible partnership from individuals and corporate besides continuous support from the government”, said Anuja Bansal, Secretary General, SOS Children’s Villages of India. 

Anyone who feels connected to the cause can take a pledge, by clicking on www.nochildalone.org or by giving a missed call on 8586996699.
 

Elaborating on SOS Children’s Villages’ work towards reaching out to children without parental or family care or at risk of losing it, Bansal added, “SOS India presently has over14 families in Rajpura, (Punjab) and 440 familiesacross India under its umbrella and we are taking care of 26,000 children through our two flagship programmes – family based care programme(FBC) and family strengthening programme (FSP). The aim of SOS India is to build families for children so that they grow up with love, respect, dignity and security. Talking particularly about FSP, the programme strives to strengthen the families by enabling capacity development of the caregivers.”

SOS Children’s Village Rajpura (Punjab), celebrated the day by honouring the family bonds of target beneficiaries, with various activities, at its FSP locations.The celebrations were aligned with this year’s theme of The International Day of Families: “Families and Climate Action: Focus on SDG13” – the role of families and communities in development.

The day included events like the lighting of the lamp ceremony, workshops on topics such as parenting skill by Ms.Shivani (block In-charge, NRLM), family values, women empowerment, health and child education, in addition to experiences by beneficiaries.

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 mother, brothers and sisters, a loving home and a community. The aim of SOS India is to build families for these children so that they grow up with love, respect, dignity 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.