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Grace Third World Fund |
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Helping us to help others |
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There are thousands of homeless orphan children in India. Their
parents, who cannot afford to look after them, often abandon their children;
and some of them sleep on the streets and railway stations, begging for their
food. At the end of 1999 we began a concentrated effort to raise money to
build an orphanage. As money was
raised it was sent out to India to purchase material and pay the workers.
Sometimes there was no money to pay for materials, or to pay the workers, and
when the money ran out, the work stopped.
Grace Children’s Home was finished and officially opened in January
2001. In 2004 a second floor was
added, and in March 2011 a third and final floor was completed and opened in
May 2011. There are now over 100
children in the Home, and a sponsorship scheme is in operation (see details
below). Our children will be supported right
through their school years and onto further education if they wish to
continue. A number of the older boys and five of the girls have taken up
pre-university or university courses.
Those who are not academically inclined will be encouraged in a
vocation which will suit their abilities. The Home began by admitting mainly orphans or ‘half orphans’ but over
the years the criteria has changed slightly.
Female neglect & infanticide is
a reality amongst the poor, and baby girls are often abandoned in the street,
left at the gates of orphanages, or even killed. Uneducated girls work in the
fields, factories or as a servant for just a few rupees, their only other
choice is to marry. There is no way
they would ever be able to choose their future. Some girls taken into the Grace Children’s
Home are from families whose father has abandoned them because he had no
sons. In poor families, a girl child
is not considered to be worth educating.
GTWF seeks to address this problem by giving them a home and an
education. Their future is altered for
ever because they will leave the Home with an education and the ability to
make their own decisions. Marriage or
a career — it will be their choice. Child Labour is also a reality, and now GCH is
seeking to address this problem. It is
illegal for children to work before the age of 15, but poor families will
sometimes have many children, so that they can send them to work. They see this as a way of making
money. The more children they can send
out to work, the more money comes into the family. The children will have no education because
they are at work as soon as they are old enough, often when they are 4 or 5
years of age. Some of the children in the Home have been rescued from
factories, farm labouring or domestic service. They are given a home, good food, clothing
and an education. We can only take in
as many as we can support financially, which is why we need sponsors. |
