By

childrenindiafoundation2002
One of the oldest traditions that India has seen is the Devadasi system. It involves a ritual in which young girls, usually before puberty, are married off or dedicated to deities. It has been infamous for the sexual exploitation and discrimination against the girls and women.  Some may think that it’s an issue of the...
Surya & Karthik, two boys of ages 9 & 3, respectively, live in a semi-urban slum of Coimbatore district, Tamil Nadu. Most of the families living in this locality fall below the poverty line and meet their daily needs through their daily wage labour. They live in thatched houses while sharing one toilet every 200...
“I was once a girl living within four walls, but now I am being recognized at state-level forums as a change agent,” said Roopa*, after pausing for a moment to reflect on her life journey as a 19-year-old change agent. Previously known as a child bride, she now holds the titles of a “Movement Leader,”...
15-year-old Renu was born and raised in a village in the Koderma district of Jharkhand, India. She lives with her mother, a sister and a brother while her father works as a taxi driver in the capital city of New Delhi and sends them remittances every month. Renu’s mother takes up mica processing work to...
15-year-old Nandini would stand at the bus stop in her blue checkered tunic and red tie eagerly waiting to hop on the bus, see her friends and recite poems with them on the way. Every day she looked forward to sitting at the window seat on the bus from where she would see the birds-...
In December, at Bangalore’s Vidhana Sabha, together with the State Ministry of Women & Child Development and Ministry of Social Welfare, we held a consultation with devadasi women, children of devadasi representatives from non-governmental organizations, the Child Rights Commission and the Women Development Corporation to discuss issues pertaining to the Devadasis. The Devadasi system is...
“The worst feeling in the world is being forced into something you don’t want to do”, said a 15-year-old Sneha. In the summer of 2021, Sneha had to drop out of school and work in a Mica processing factory as the family could no longer support her education. Her parents being daily wage earners suffered...
Hidden in the forests of Jharkhand, in the small hamlets of the Koderma and Giridih districts reside communities where children as young as five-year-olds are vulnerable to working in the mica mines instead of attending school. Our Mica Project has taken more than 3000 children out of the mica mines and enrolled them in schools....
17-year-old Bhargavi* is known for her smile which lights up a room.  Bhargavi is the youngest child of her mother, a former Devadasi woman, who later began working day in and out as a porter to raise her 4 children- Bhargavi, her elder brother and her two elder sisters who are now married.  The First...
Devadasi System: An Ancient Practice  Children of Devadasi undergo discrimination, drop out of school early, face violence and abuse. Even the children who do not take the path of sex work still face society’s stigma of being a ‘prostitute’s child’ which holds them back from maximizing their potential. In many cases, it is this ostracizing...
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