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 We have all had the small pleasures of school life. Of buying new notes and books every June, new shoes and bags… making new friends, sharing lunch with them during the break, doing homework together… preparing for exams and moving from one class to another… and finally into a career.
These are simple pleasures of childhood that all of us cherish. But there are children for whom this world of happiness is a distant DREAM. The school life, that most of us have taken for granted in our lives, is luxury to these deprived children, who work in factories and fields, for whom their daily sustenance is a question. Did you know that we have about 100 million children in India who do not go to school? One out of two children between the ages of 6 and 14 years has no access to primary education. 15,000,000 children work as bonded labourers. While our children are busy in school from 8 am to 4.pm, there are these children who work for their living - not because they want to, but because they don't have a choice.
How many of these children know that they also have rights? They have a right to survival, protection, development and participation. Take the case of
Prabhu.
 Prabhu suffered from burns… and fear. He suffered from loneliness too. All he wanted from life was the safety of his mother's arms around him. He had to drop out of school after V std. His mother had sold him for Rs.7000, after his father's death. The amount was huge and so were the promises made by Prabhu's employers who promised to take him to Bangalore for work and give him a bright future. But they charred his childhood. He wrote to his mother… and waited. No replies. He tried to run away, but then was unsuccessful. He wrote for the second time…this time his mother got wind of the situation. She got in touch with the nearby NGO at Dindugul - SRWD (a network member of CENTREREDA - Center for Rural Education Development Association, a project supported by CRY) who went in search of Prabhu to Bangalore only to be told that he had already run away. Soon they traced him at Dindugul and brought him back home to his mother, but only after they paid Rs.3000 to Prabhu's employer. Today Prabhu has put his scorched past behind and has enrolled in a school to continue his education.
The life of Prabhu is so very distant from the lives of our own children. But we can surely do something to change the lives of children like Prabhu.
CRY - Child Relief and You working for underprivileged children, was started by Rippan Kappur, in 1979, who believed that , "If we all do something, then together there is no problem that we cannot solve."
 Today CRY family has grown to over 100,000 people and organizations. People who felt they could make SOME difference in their own way… who shared a simple belief - "Change is possible. Because I will make it possible".
Every CRY card that you bought, every hour you volunteered, each coin you dropped into a CRY donation box, the tickets that you purchased to a CRY event, every cheque you have mailed us, each suggestion you sent in and the letters of encouragement that you wrote - have made a difference.
It is each one of our effort that is going to change the state of these children. Let us help in giving them something new - CHILDHOOD.
For more information contact CRY - Child Relief and You- 044- 4671828/ 4672241. Or mail us at
cryinfo.mds@crymail.org. or visit our Website:
www.cry.org
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