Living a Life on Purpose, Rescuing Street Children in India

Interview with Mamta Borgoyary, Head of FXB India Suraksha

During ConnectAID’s humanitarian mission to India, our founder Gaëlle Mogli interviewed Mamta Borgoyary, the head of our NGO member FXB India Suraksha. The nonprofit organization works in 14 states in India, primarily with women and children. All their work is centered around reviving the well-being and dignity of human beings.

Gaëlle Mogli: Dear Mamta, I have known you for years, and it is such a pleasure for me to be here in India with you and for ConnectAID to support your nonprofit organization. What you do deserves international recognition.

Mamta Borgoyary: Heartfelt gratitude and thank you, Gaëlle, for ConnectAID and your entire team. You have done volunteer work, and I have no words to express how much you have impacted our nonprofit. I have personally been associated with ConnectAID for the last two years, if not more. I’ve seen how ConnectAID is making an impact by providing very important things which the NGO sector and the civil society sector are not able to do:

One is connecting like-minded people with people who have a common purpose and passion. I have personally interacted with many NGO partners and SGD influencers from your network. You have provided free webinars on important technical subjects that have been very useful for an organization like ours.

Second, and most importantly, every day we work in the field, and there is always a challenge. We are making changes in the lives of the children we work for, but we are never able to share our stories with others. ConnectAID has done a wonderful job in helping us share our story with the world. Having Pablo, Arushi, and you here to teach us how to tell our stories better has been the most valuable part of this visit. The technical sessions where you showed our entire team how to capture good videos and tips on storytelling made us so grateful. Our team members on the field are already sending in more videos. So, thank you very much for what you did for us.

Gaëlle Mogli: You are more than welcome, Mamta. Your projects deserve the best, as they literally change lives. Could you please tell us more about the story of one of your projects, the FXB day care center in Jaipur?

Mamta Borgoyary: In 2007, FXB India Surashka came to Rajasthan, specifically to Jaipur. We had been working before that in Jaipur at the railway station where we found a lot of children living on the platforms in very poor conditions. They were homeless, into drugs, had no food, and were living in a very unsafe environment that had health issues showing skin diseases.

We held several health camps with those children. During these health camps, we realized what they actually need would not work through health camps. What they need is love, what they need is a place that is a home because they are all homeless. Today, our job is to go to the stations and speak to the children. We tell them to come over to the day care center where they can spend their days instead of spending them on the railway platform picking up bottles and earning money from selling them. The idea is to make their lives safe.

Gaëlle Mogli: How do you allow them to enjoy their childhood, and how do you help children so they can have a better life?

Mamta Borgoyary: This Center is basically looking at providing a home for the homeless. A home for the children who come from the railway station in the city and from different parts of the country because of abuse at home, poverty, and lack of food. As you know, they board trains and go wherever they asked me if I had any experience working in a team.

“Yes, I have experience working in a team. In my previous job, I was a part of a team responsible for developing a new software application. My role was to design and implement the front-end interface. I collaborated closely with the back-end developers to ensure that the front-end and back-end components were seamlessly integrated. I also worked closely with the quality assurance team to ensure that the application met all functional requirements and was bug-free before release.

In addition to my work experience, I have also participated in team-based projects during my academic studies. For example, I worked on a group project in a software engineering course where we developed a mobile application. My role in the team was to design the user interface and ensure that it was user-friendly and aesthetically pleasing. I collaborated with the other team members to ensure that the application met all functional requirements and that the code was well-structured and maintainable.

Overall, I believe that my experience working in a team has prepared me well for collaborative work environments. I am comfortable working with colleagues with diverse backgrounds and skill sets and am always willing to contribute my expertise to achieve our shared goals.”