Salaam Baalak Trust

Day 8 - August 11th, 2011

Our last site visit for our social entrepreneurship group was to the The Salaam Baalak Trust (SBT). SBT became a realization after the movie”Salaam Bombay!” brought to the world’s attention the matter of street children in India. The earnings where used to start up the organization and for the last 23 years, SBT has served in assisting the street children in the areas around the Mumbai, New Delhi, and Bhubaneshwar. Helping children to be rescued from the streets up to the age of 18, SBT provides education programs, drop-in shelter services, health care services, and mental, HIV/AIDS, and TB awareness counseling. SBT has a vigilant presence with outreach points near the railroad stations where SBT outreach workers work around the clock to save girls and boys that run away due to abuse and poverty, or abandoned by their families.
In New Delhi, SBT have used guided city walk tours with their own reformed street children through the neighborhoods of Pahargani and around the areas of the railroad station. The guided city walk tours have assisted to continue to generate the attention of street children, but also illustrate the organization’s successful social entrepreneurship impact in saving the children from the streets. SBT uses all 100% of the earnings from the guided city walk tours towards the street children in creating more opportunities and the ultimate goal to be reunited with their families.
Our social entrepreneurship was very privileged to have our guided walk tour by Iqbal, a reformed street child who now works for the organization. For the street children of Delhi and all over India, their stories of how they ended up in the streets are incredible and emotionally moving. Iqbal provided us a tour of the Pahargani neighborhoods and the outreach point at the train station. At the train station, Iqbal showed us the entrance where the men would wait to pick-up the new girls that would arrive into the city. It is here where the girls are trafficked into prostitution and where the boys are recruited into gangs. The children that are picked up range from ages six years old up to the age of eighteen. When we visited the bus station where the girls and boys would be found by a SBT outreach worker, the kids are taken to the outreach point located within train station. The outreach point acts as a shelter and the children are checked by a doctor and the process of locating their families begins. The process usually takes six months and the children are once again are reunited with their families. As I enter the outreach point, a group of 6-12 boys where sitting at the front of the entrance on a rug playing games and conversing. Observing the young boys, I noticed that some of them had tattoos and some of them high on some kind of drug.
One of the workers pulled out pencils and pens and white paper and the boys began to draw. Eventually all the boys where drawing houses. As I observed these boys drawing their stick-figured houses, I suddenly began to cry. At first, I didn’t understand why I broke down crying, but I eventually realized that these boys reminded me about my father’s childhood. The life stories of these you boys are no different from the stories my father shared with me.
At the age of four, my father lost his mother after a difficult childbirth. After the death of his mother, my father along with his three brothers were left neglected after their father remarried and when their stepmother would not accept them. My father’s childhood was overshadowed with his father’s new life in creating another family. While my father was left in the care of his brothers as they struggled for years living in various homes. Eventually at the age of fifteen, my father decided to make a new life of his own and lied about his age to join the Salvadorian army. It was in the military where my father was finally able to find stability, shelter, and most importantly the infrastructure of a family.
Unlike other boys that would end up on the streets, my father strived to succeed on his own to eventually begin a new life in the United States. The street children at the outreach point resonated with my father's life. It made me realized how important it is to have organizations like SBT to continue their work in providing new opportunities for runaway and street children. Overall from all the NGO's we got to visited, SBT's experience was the most impacting not because it was really personal to me, but because it demonstrated how the income that is generated has provided optimal results and SBT's continues it's hard work in saving children from the streets.

Day 7: Salaam Balak Trust

For our last site visit in Delhi, our group met with Salaam Balak Trust, an organization that works with both young boys and girls that are runaways. Rickshaws dropped us off and two tour guides, Salaam Balak alums, met us to give an introduction to the organization as well as a tour around the area. We walked around the community as well as heard our guide’s childhood story of how he found his way to Salaam Balak. The most resonating aspect of his story was how, after years of abuse from his father and stepmother, he felt suicidal. To be so young and feel like there is no other way out of your circumstances aside from death was extremely hard to handle.

Our guide also informed us of the high amount of drug use amongst runaway children in order to numb the pain from the frequent beatings they receive from law enforcement. The substance abuse issue is also very apparent in the eyes of the youth in the area. I couldn’t help but think of the extreme importance of mental health in these situations. These children grew up without a familial support system and most lack any relationship with their parents. They’ve grown up facing the challenges of survival every day and Salaam Balak provides a solid network for children with similar backgrounds. I couldn’t help but think of the importance of mental health in these situations as well. Salaam Balak provides a great opportunity for these children but I might incorporate an additional mental health service/substance abuse rehabilitation program.

At the end of our tour we had the chance to sit in with a group of the young boys staying at Salaam Balak. They sang and danced for us and it was incredible to see the similarities of children across cultures and backgrounds. It was also interesting to witness how the young boys interacted with one another and the brotherly relationships within the group. You could sense the trust within the group of young boys, which is so important for childhood development. I was extremely impressed with our tour guide’s English speaking skills and charisma as he guided us through the community. He captivated us with his story as well as generated some profit for the Salaam Balak through the cost of the tour. He was able to cultivate his skills during his time at the organization and now has the ambition to further his education. Spending time with the young men of Salaam Balak Trust was a fantastic way to end our long journey through India and to really see the potential for street children to improve their lives through organizations like Salaam Balak.

The Eternal Hope of Youth

On the penultimate day of our trip, and our third in New Delhi, the GWU team visited the Salaam Baalak Trust (SBT). Started by Mira Nair, the director who made the movie Salaam Bombay in the 1990s, SBT works with runaway children who leave home due to abuse, poverty, abandonment and make their way to the streets of New Delhi in search of a better life. Each day approximately 30-40 children arrive on the platforms of the New Delhi railway station. Many of the girls are immediately picked out by canny predators for a life of prostitution and the boys end up living on the streets. SBT is committed, along with the Delhi Police and other Indian governmental programs (ChildLine 1098), to rescuing as many of these children as possible, providing medical assistance, daytime food, and short term shelter, attempting to reunite them with their families if they can be traced and if the child wants it, providing long term support like education and a home for the children who cannot be reunited with their families.

Salaam Baalak Trust receives about 40% of its funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), 50% from individual, private donations, and about 10% from the Indian Government. Recently, the USAID grant ran out and SBT is looking to submit applications to continue the funding.

SBT also functions as key partner with the Indian Government as part of the ChildLine Program, by serving as the social worker service center for the Central Delhi Zone (one of 86 such service centers nationwide).

We spent the bulk of our site visit participating in a tour provided by Iqbal, a young man who was himself a runaway child and was picked up by the Salaam Baalak Trust. Iqbal now functions as a roving ambassador with the SBT City Center Walk Program and conducts tours for visitors among other activities. Iqbal took us through the process a runaway child undergoes from arriving at the Delhi railway station to encountering SBT services through Contact Centers, some of the street life options the children experience such as working as ragpickers for the recycling industry, spending their money on video games or movies, getting into smoking and drugs, and finally joining a shelter home and abiding by its strict rules.

Our visit to a short-term shelter to meet with the 80-90 children living there temporarily was the most heartbreaking part of the site visit. The children range in ages from 4 to 18. The older children sat by the back wall of their classroom, quietly observing the strangers in their midst. Many of the younger children were still young enough to be excited about engaging with the GWU students, playing with our digital cameras, taking photographs, playing hand games, and generally talking a mile a minute and loudly sharing stories with us! The very youngest children were somewhat shy but had the sweetest expressions. All it took was one smile or an outstretched hand and they immediately responded with faces wreathed in smiles. Coming from a culture of plenty and a throwaway society, it also gave one pause to see these children in relatively good spirits despite their somewhat meager living and school conditions.

This experience was one of the saddest ones of the trip, it alternately brought out feelings of frustration and anger that children could be betrayed by their own families out of desperation and largely by society. But it also was one of the more hopeful encounters in that at least some of the children were being rescued and looked after and even supported in their educational endeavours till they were old enough to stand on their own two feet. It also demonstrated how some of the children, like our tour guide Iqbal, over the years are able to get past some of the traumatic feelings and positively contribute to SBT by supporting younger children who newly join the SBT fold.

One wishes the social conditions which give rise to the unbearable home conditions of these children could be eradicated, that all these runaway children could be rescued and helped, that these shelters and homes offered by organizations like Salaam Baalak Trust could offer more services and more spacious conditions, like more extensive counseling, anti-smoking and drug prevention programs, improving public health and environmental conditions, and that the revenue streams could be more stable to ensure continued quality of services.

A striking point was how artistically inclined and talented many of the children are and how one of the most common themes of their art was that of a beautiful home in serene surroundings. One hopes the children have in some measure found some sense of home and serenity in Salaam Baalak Trust and that they all find or eventually have their own dream homes where they feel safe and secure.

Visits to institutions like Salaam Baalak Trust also help reinforce the need for social entrepreneurship models and new ways of looking at things to tackle some of these intractable social problems. In a sense they provide the impetus for courses and study abroad opportunities like ours at GWU and challenge us to think of ways in which to apply our academic public health training and knowledge based on real-life ground conditions.

Reality Check

After meeting with Acumen on Monday and hearing about their projects, challenges and successes, it gave a great frame of reference for our following two meetings with international, American-based organizations. On Tuesday, we flew from Mumbai to Delhi and, during dinner that night, met with Nandita Chopra, a representative of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), living and working in Delhi on the NIH's India portfolio. It was really interesting to speak with her about her role and what the NIH is doing to promote health in India. She has an extensive history in HIV/AIDS research and it was amazing to hear about the work the NIH is doing, particularly for me, in the way of HIV/AIDS prevention in India.

The following day, we met with PSI – a HUGE international NGO with thousands of projects across the globe – I was definitely interested in PSI prior to the meeting, and was pleasantly surprised at the level of depth we were afforded to experience. I figured we would meet with them in a similar fashion as with Acumen or UnLtd - they would discuss their projects, provide some interesting examples and allow us to ask questions. They did that, and so much more. The PSI staff really engaged us. After a presentation of their current local women's health projects – working to increase access to low-cost intrauterine devices (IUDs) and medical abortion – they requested that each of us provide criticism of the project.

Obviously each of us would come away with thoughts about the program – the model, the implementation, the evaluation methods - but it was so refreshing to be asked, point-blank, about a real, functioning program (and then have the opportunity to go out and see it; to meet the people who take the theory and models about which we learn in class and turn them into something tangible). Amidst the craziness and uncertainty which India can breed within you, our time with PSI was the professional reality check I needed and really solidified much of my India experience thus far. Though our meetings and interactions with other organizations have been enlightening and engaging on a number of levels, I am still figuring out what social entrepreneurship means to me, and what role I can play within that sphere. Regardless of how India or social entrepreneurship strikes me, today reminded me that soon, I will be done with my degree, and will be doing work like this; work which will have the potential to make a real impact on people's lives.

Day 6: NIH dinner and PSI

Last night, after arriving in Delhi, we were given the amazing opportunity to have dinner with Nandita Chopra, the NIH Representative in India. Ms. Chopra shared her story of working for NIH for the past decade and how she eventually made her way to India. It was extremely interesting to hear her side of working for a government organization and how she paved her career path through NIH to do something more fulfilling. With all that we are experiencing within both the private and public sectors of public health in India, it was refreshing to hear the personal side of working for a government organization.

Today we visited the India branch of Population Services International (PSI) and were introduced to their Women’s Health Initiative to reduce maternal and infant mortality in India. The program discussed involved providing IUD education and services to impoverished women throughout Delhi as well as medical abortion kits. The two objectives of this specific program were to increase the percentage of women with IUDs by 1% as well as provide 300,000 medical abortion kits via PSI trained pharmacists. Personally, the PSI presentation was one of the more interesting presentations and was very relevant for what we are learning in the public health program at GW. I was able to approach the subject objectively and critique specific aspects of PSI’s program.

There are significant cultural differences between Indian and American women and their ability to choose their own forms of birth control and family planning mechanisms. Men are the dominating forces within the family, which lead Indian women to have less control over their bodies and how many children they want. IUDs allow for women to choose not to have children without daily contraceptive use or the permanence of sterilization. PSI takes a door-to-door approach and sends out IPCs to meet with women on an individual level. They explain the concepts of family planning, how IUDs work, as well as the side effects of IUDs. Women that are interested in the idea give their contact information in order for IPCs to follow up and provide assistance. We were able to see the actual spreadsheet of women visited and the extensive record keeping of the IPCs when the group set out in the field locations… it also showed the large amount of young women that already have multiple children.

We visited one of the community health clinics where women come to receive medical services ranging from standard check-ups to childbirth. The doctor sat down with us in her office (which acted as a patient room as well) and went over the issues women face in regard to family planning and women’s health. It was fascinating to see firsthand the medical facilities and services available. Visiting the clinic really provided insight into the barriers faced by women in India as well as the huge cultural differences in women’s health.

The other aspect of the program involves training pharmacists how to properly explain and distribute PSI branded medical abortion kits. The fact that these medical abortion kits can be taken up to 2 months into a pregnancy without the assistance of a doctor didn’t settle well with me. I absolutely believe they should be available and provided by trained pharmacists but the lack of follow up after the abortion kit is distributed concerned me. The potential for emotional and mental health issues is extremely present and not addressed in this program. I would add some form of tracking aspect for the women receiving medical abortion kits and follow up as they do with the IUDs.

PSI is doing fantastic work within their Women’s Health Initiative through education and providing access to affordable modes of contraception that are not otherwise available to this population of women. It was a great opportunity to experience a public health initiative in the works and feel comfortable providing feedback for the program.

contagious passion for change

For our last full day in Mumbai, we made a site visit to the Bombay Hub. The hub is a laboratory for change that provides start up social entrepreneurs with a physical space to come together and work while discussing their ideas. The Hub provides social entrepreneurs with the opportunity to engage with others in the field that are passionate about social change. The space was incredibly welcoming not only because we walked around bare foot, but because the atmosphere in the space was filled with a contagious passion for success of the organizations.

UnLtd India is a seed fund and incubator for social entrepreneurs. They work with entrepreneurs in the start up phase by providing support to accelerate their program, develop as leaders, and prepare their organization for scaling and further investment. Within the current social entrepreneurship landscape, an individual starts with an idea, experiments with it, consolidates a model, and if all goes well the idea is fully conceptualized. The next level of support widely available is given after an entrepreneur has implemented their idea for three years. In between these two levels there isn’t much support and several ideas “die” in this phase. That is where UnLtd India comes in. Their mission is to encourage individuals to take action and not wait for the government or other non-profits to intervene. They solely work with start-ups that have a clear vision for social change by providing them with several support mechanisms within the first 0-4 years. First they provide incubation support, which includes seed funding and a package of support services. Second, they utilize a boot camp that serves as an intensive accelerator to the social entrepreneur attempting to implement their idea. The Bombay Hub serves as a third program by providing individuals with the ability to co-inhabit the same space and work towards social change. The fourth program utilized by UnLtd is the social mashup; a conference for early stage entrepreneurs to come together and discuss their ideas.

When assessing applications for selection to receive UnLtd services, there are four criteria they are looking for in each person. First, they look at the individual’s social entrepreneur skills regarding their level of motivation, what initiated their motivation to pursue their idea, and how resourceful they are. Second, UnLtd assesses the potential for the idea to create an impact. If there is no need or demand for the idea, then it is not likely to succeed. Third, they try to match the idea, or determine how it will be put together. Finally, UnLtd seeks to determine the value that they are able to bring to the individual and vice versa. If they are not able to provide added value to the individuals efforts, it is not worth investing their time and effort. Conversely, selected individuals have to sign a contract stating if they are successful, they will give back time, money, and mentorship to UnlTd.

I really enjoyed the answer that Pooja, co-founder of UnLtd India, gave to our class when asked about her definition of a social entrepreneur. The political answer would be that it’s any individual with an idea to create change in the community and their successive ability to sustain that idea. Pooja encouraged us not to take the definition of a social entrepreneur so literally because as with most concepts in the social sector, terms lose their sex appeal as time goes on. What was once called a social worker or activist may now be categorized as a social entrepreneur. These terms and definitions are not what is important but rather the individual’s ability to create a lasting impact.

The entire conversation surrounding our discussion with the UnLtd India team was fun and inspiring. There have been times on this trip where pessimism has gotten the best of me, but I realized with each of the examples of programs UnLtd is working on that something as simple as developing a program that provides a bee box to a farm can have a significant economic and social impact on a community. I think sometimes I get hung up on my ability to think of unique and fresh ideas, but creativity does not necessarily have to be abstract if you have the passion for instituting change effectively and with persistence.

Three representatives from Acumen Fund also met with us at the Hub. Acumen was founded around the idea that there is a need for a different type of support from commercial and charity, specifically for social enterprise. Their India portfolio is primarily involved with water and sanitation, agriculture, and healthcare. When looking for potential beneficiaries, Acumen assesses the ability of the program to have a social impact, their financial stability, potential for expansion capital, and the dynamics of the management team. Of all the points we discussed with Acumen, I felt this was one of the more important ones that we have not really discussed in class. Too often I have either witnessed group failure because members are unable to work together as a team, or I have been a part of a team experiencing similar challenges. Acumen, and other potential funding sources, need to really assess this component. If a team does not have the ability to execute the plan, if they do not have the ability to follow through on the intended course of action, if they have not established appropriate partnerships- the plan may never succeed. It is crucial for organizations like Acumen and UnLtd to meet with social entrepreneurs face to face and assess the management team for the sake of the ability of the group to propel the idea forward.

PSI and Social Marketing

Blog 7- PSI – Day 7 (Wednesday August 10th)

Today our social entrepreneurship program met up with Population Service International (PSI) India. PSI is the third largest NGO in the world and it runs one of the world’s largest and oldest family planning programs in India. We had the wonderful opportunity to be presented about the Women Health Project. The goal of the Women’s Health Project is to increase the use of IUDs and to dispel myths and misconceptions about the contraceptive. India continues to haul high maternal mortality rates due to low usage of temporary methods such as IUDs, birth control pills and condoms. The goal of the Women Health Project is promote higher usage of temporary methods by an increase of 1% in the next two years.
To achieve the objective of higher usage, PSI India has really taken advantage on the opportunity of social marketing and the use of the media. What I noticed about PSI India’s marketing methods is that they take into consideration India’s conservative perspective about family planning, but provided a new twist in providing innovating solutions. For example, PSI India’s commercial about the Freedom 5 IUD contraceptive points out how providing a solution such as temporary sterilization can provide a couple the options not to have children until they are ready again. This provides the opportunity of birth spacing and another method to decrease the maternal mortality rate. The commercial has an empathetic, but a funny tone and it demonstrates that the right decision would be to use Freedom while empowering the woman on her decision, while receiving support from her husband.
Watching the commercial made me realized how the marketing methods that are used in business to sell dish washing soap for profit are now being used in public health for social impact. The commercial demonstrated the research that was put into studying the population, how to brand the Freedom 5 product, and how to sell it to the population. It illustrates that business models such as SWOT and other marketing tools can be transfer into public health to generate social impact and this is an important component of social entrepreneurship.