Society Matters | Volume 30 No. 2 | Winter 2020

Volume 30 No. 2 | Winter 2020 4 Mobile school reaches out to street children at risk in Pune Street children constitute one of the most vulnerable groups in India. Deprived of appropriate protection, education and health-care, they survive in the unsafe environment of city streets. But an SVD project is reaching out to those children to help equip them for a better life. The Sarva Seva Sangh Centre in Pune, part of the SVD’s Mumbai Province, is committed to the rehabilitation and empowerment of children at high risk. Pune has witnessed huge growth in recent years, due to rapid development and industrialisation, which has resulted in a huge inflow of migrant workers and children from across the country, many of whom live on the streets, at railway stations and slums, etching their livelihood through begging or collecting scraps. Sarva Seva Sangh has been working for the rehabilitation and empowerment of street and working children for the past 20 years. “Through our empowering presence, we try to transform the lives of street and working children, and children living with and affected by HIV-AIDS, says Fr Mathew Korattiyil SVD. “Sarva Seva Sangh has been reaching out to nearly 1500 children a year, of whom around 1200 children have been helped to pursue formal education.” One of the strategies used to reach out to the street children is the running of a ‘school-on wheels’, the Mobile Doorstep School. The mobile school is run from a van, converted into a classroom, which reaches out to slum and pavement children and children at construction sites. It goes to four or five points every day, to gather the children and teach them for an hour. “The aim of this informal education is to inspire both children and parents to enrol their children for formal education,” Fr Mathew says. The van is equipped with facilities such as a television and DVD player, which help make the classes more child- friendly and interesting.