7 college students from Vivekananda Institute of Professional Studies, Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University are helping pave a brighter path for the kids in the slums of Gole Market. Through the initiative named ‘Barefoot Dreams’ these students thrive to be the bridge between the ability to dream and the lack of opportunities faced by these children.
For this purpose, a series of fun and interactive events have been organised by the team in the slums. One of the recent ones includes ‘Happiness Goes Barefoot’, an event organised in collaboration with Talk Happy Therapy. Keeping in mind the less-talked and concentrated on issues of Mental Health, the event included a few activities for the kids that in the hindsight focused on it. These activities were designed by special child psychologists followed by a fun dancing session. As they say “Happiness is never complete without chocolates”, Chocokart brought in lots of muffins and chocolates for a small dessert party.
The other set of events include crafts workshop, magic show, visit to Indian Rail Museum and more.
Talking about these initiatives, Adhikaar Batra one of the team members said “When we think of a slum area, we don't think of it as a happy space, but, I've recently spent some of the happiest days of my life in that area. The kids there are a bunch of small packets of excitement, who love to eat chocolates and dance on Hatt ja tau. This campaign which started as a college project, is so much more to me now, because I've been at the Jhuggi Camp area, or as I call it, the Bermuda triangle of Happiness, so many times, and the kids constantly keep dancing on my head, making a human pyramid by climbing onto my body (without even my consent), and always asking me Bhaiya, jhoola jhula do."
This campaign has been started in collaboration with an NGO named Sarvahitey which is based in Noida with the objective to cater to the underprivileged, their needs, and gradually making them self-sufficient.
Aptly christened ‘Barefoot Dreams’ we wish the team all the luck in this noble endeavour and hope they are able to give wings to the wonderful dreams these little ones see.
You can visit their Facebook page here.
{Join them for their latest event, Cite for a Cause on 9th of April at AntiSocial, Hauz Khas, which focuses on spreading awareness about the foremost cause - the welfare of children through spoken word poetry. Get the tickets here}
Images contributed by: Devashish Gaur for Barefoot Dreams