Baramati Balbhavan?

Our award-winning Balbhavan project operates slum centers in seven centers in Ahmednagar city and one in Aurangabad and we are planning to open another in Baramati. This follows a recent visit to our centers in Ahmednagar by a group from Baramati who were inspired to start something similar to help low income families in their home town. Having examined our curricula and set up they were excited to replicate our model using our tried and tested resources and requested the support from our Balbhavan team.

For the initial set up, a team of six Balbhavan staff travelled to Baramati to conduct a survey of 240 families living in the Sathenagar Colony of the industrial city. Wasting no time, after arriving on Friday morning, our team started by meeting with the District Commissioner, Tehsildar and local political and elite groups to gather their help in conducting the survey. Information gathered included head of household, details of family members, ages, education levels, relationships with head of household, economic status and issues such as addiction.

Entering the slum areas with our local partners, our team was initially greeted with mixed reactions, from distrust and aggression to anticipation and curiosity. Residents wanted to know why they were being asked so many personal questions. As with everything, our team took the time to explain to each and every family the reasons they were there and the impact our Balbhavan would have on their community. Having the backing of Sachin Netke, the Tehsildar the team had met earlier, helped open a lot more doors.

Despite the unrelenting rain all through their first day, the team worked into the night surveying over 100 families. After a night of drying out, rest and food at the PWD, the team was ready to start by 10am the next day. The rain continued but the team were committed and managed to survey another 136 families before they left to catch their bus back to Ahmednagar at 4pm.

The results of the survey have shown us that there is a need for our support in the city and we believe our model can prove successful with the families we met with. They and we are excited to launch our Baramati Balbhavan soon…

If you would be interested in replicating any of our projects in your home town please get in touch at info@snehalaya.org.