Tracking Impact on Poverty in India: One NGO’s Story at a Time

In August 2022, ConnectAID, the International Solidarity Network, sent a humanitarian team to India to check on and report on several of its NGO Members. One of these was FXB India Suraksha’s project with homeless children living near the train station in Jaipur, Rajasthan. Our team met with Mamta Borgoyary, Head of FXB India Suraksha, a woman who devotes her life to helping others and making a difference. The following is a true story of a wonderful organization saving the lives of some of the most vulnerable children in the world.

Every five minutes, a child arrives at a railway platform in India, all alone and vulnerable. Many of them are running away from poverty, abuse, and neglect. Just imagine a child hitching rides on overcrowded trains to big cities such as Jaipur, hoping to find a better life. Then picking through garbage in hopes of finding something to earn a few rupees for food. They are easy prey for child trafficking and exploitation. One of their only hopes is to be rescued by a nonprofit organization like the one Mamta Borgoyary runs in India.

FXB India Suraksha is an NGO working in 14 states in India, supporting the most vulnerable women and children. One of their projects includes a Day Care Center for street children in Jaipur, where 300 children have already been positively impacted, and 250 others have successfully returned to school thanks to FXB India Suraksha. This little haven on earth, which started in 2007, is a testament to the profound compassion with which Ms. Borgoyary and her team have helped some of the poorest children in the world.

When ConnectAID’s team toured the FXB Day Care Center and spoke with Mamta Borgoyary, what impacted them most was her story of heart-centered commitment to impacting children’s physiological and safety needs, their need for food, a safe shelter to rest, education, and recognition. “The center is essentially providing a home for the homeless children,” she said. “A physical space to sleep, eat, rest and learn. A place where they can just be themselves.”

Every day, Borgoyary’s team takes a rickshaw to the railway station to speak to the children and invite them to the daycare center. “The idea was twofold: find ways to make their lives safe…and find ways to allow them to enjoy the innocence that every child has a right to. We also nurture them so they can have a better life,” she said.

From their research and community engagement, FXB India Suraksha has now expanded its impact to influence the slum areas around the railway platform to “encourage meaningful change for the children”. They also meet with parents and schools to create a shared sense of belonging and purpose.

The idea is to ensure long-term impact by advocating with the community to ensure the children return to school with a sense of esteem while discovering a creative purpose. Mamta Borgoyary said the Day Care Center started with just offering informal education but has since evolved to teaching literacy lessons and mathematics. The children also learn about self-expression through painting, dance, and creative arts; this especially helps those who suffer from traumas or drug addictions.

“There are gems in these children, and they need to be nurtured to develop their skills,” said Borgoyary. “Change does not happen right away. This is a long-term impact, and it took ‘years and years’ to build trust with the parents and develop a relationship.”

Today, Mamta Borgoyary and her team of teachers and social workers offer after-school tutoring sessions to ensure the children continue learning and finish their education. The time spent developing relationships with the schools has increased awareness of the cognitive concerns for children who drop out and and has allowed school administrations to expand their perspective on the needs of these children, thus providing better support and education for them.

From their research and community engagement, FXB India Suraksha has now expanded their impact to influence the slum areas around the railway platform to “encourage meaningful change for the children”. They also meet with the parents and schools to create a shared sense of belonging and purpose.

The idea is to ensure long-term impact by advocating with the community to ensure the children return to school with a sense of esteem while discovering a creative purpose. Mamta Borgoyary said the Day Care Center started with just offering informal education but has since evolved to teaching literacy lessons and mathematics. The children also learn about self-expression through painting, dance, and creative arts. This especially helps those who suffer from trauma or drug addiction.

“There are gems in these children, and they need to be nurtured to develop their skills,” said Borgoyary. “Change does not happen right away. This is a long-term impact and it took ‘years and years’ to build trust with the parents and develop a relationship.”

Today, Mamta Borgoyary and her team of teachers and social workers offer after-school tutoring sessions to ensure the children continue learning and finish their education. The time spent developing relationships with the schools has increased awareness of the cognitive concerns for children who drop out and has allowed school administrations to expand their perspective on the needs of these children. These street children are going from invisible to slowly becoming future change-makers, who will in turn give back to society.

ConnectAID offers technical training and communication support to help vetted Non-Governmental Organizations like FXB India Suraksha to grow and showcase their incredible impacts on the ground. If you are an individual wanting to make a difference in vulnerable people’s lives, or if you are a non-profit organization striving for meaningful impact in tackling one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, we invite you to join ConnectAID’s network.

Together, we can

make international solidarity become a norm, and make sure non-profits like FXB India Suraksha can continue impacting the lives of our most precious resources on our planet: the children.

If you feel inspired by this impact story, please share and contribute to our actions. What we do is meaningful.