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GOAL in India
GOAL has maintained a vibrant program in the state of West Bengal, eastern India for over 30 years. In 2008 GOAL India, with the vital support of donations, is investing 1.4 Million euros and will have extended support to 193,000 direct beneficiaries in India. GOAL carries out all its work on the ground in India through local partner organisations. Essentially the approach is that local people should be enabled to tackle the challenges that are faced in their own community.
From the programs origins in the slums of Calcutta, where GOAL India maintains 12 of its 15 projects, GOAL India has extended out to key 3 rural areas within West Bengal. The 3 rural areas where GOAL is working have been identified as the source of migrants to the wretched living conditions and social vulnerabilities of urban slums, and allow GOAL to further tackle poverty at its source. In addition to the urban and rural program, GOAL India responds to humanitarian crisis. Until August 2008 GOAL has responded to 2 catastrophic floods in India, bringing assistance to almost 20,000 people who had lost everything.
Urban Program
The population of Calcutta has swelled to an estimated 19 million and basic services of drinking water, sanitation, health and education are scarcely available for the poorest people. GOALs country program focuses on delivering services for these basic and tangible needs in a practical and cost effective manner, to those who need it most.
Education is crucial to breaking the cycle of poverty. By the end of 2008 GOAL will have supported 4298 children in 82 educational centres to be retained in formal schools. Many children in the India program are first generation learners. GOAL India focuses on enrolment and retention of children in formal schools through intensive bridging courses to enable children to get back into school at their age appropriate grade, as well as after school coaching centres to provide support in passing the next grade and thereby stay in school.
Just a few examples of education initiatives on the ground in India are as follows;
Along the railway tracks on the fringes of Calcutta, GOAL is working with our local partner organisations Sabuj Sangha urban project supporting the running of 20 educational centres which have insured the enrolment and retention of 659 children in formal education during 2008, exceeding the target set at the start of the year by assisting an additional 158 children!
In addition to education support to families, this project provides ante natal and post natal care for pregnant and nursing women by doctors through weekly clinics.
In the Brick Kilns, GOAL is working with the local organisation NMCS.
In the Kilns children work along side their mother in the back breaking work of carrying mud and moulding bricks. A woman will receive just 1 Euro for carrying 1000 bricks in a day, which is the highest paid! Others receive just 10 cents for mixing 1000 bricks. The families living in small huts at the kilns are largely from neighbouring states within India or from Bangladesh. Both parents and children are highly vulnerable to exploitation.
With the support of GOAL, NMCS are providing 878 children with the opportunity to gain functional literacy by the end of 2008 through coaching centres and are educating people as to their rights.
Preventative health is the core focus by GOAL in Calcutta. High population density, poor living conditions, lack of water and sanitation are all factors contributing to chronic health problems amongst the poor of urban slums. Preventative health is carried out through the provision of clean water, sanitation; community awareness raising and health check ups, particularly in ante natal and post natal care for pregnant mothers.
Just a few examples of health initiatives on the ground in India are as follows;
In Calcutta’s poorest schools, GOAL is working with our local partner organisation CLPOA crucially providing clean drinking water and sanitation. In 2008 alone approximately 40,000 children in 100 schools will benefit. This is an ambitious program that aims to provide 1,000 schools with such facilities. The plan is on target with water and sanitation facilities already provided in 375 schools since 2005.
In the Port Slums of Calcutta GOAL is working with our local organisation Right Track and has installed tube wells to provide clean drinking water and latrines for sanitation purposes as well as having provided solar lighting and improved safety conditions in 150 education centres. Awareness raising is carried out with community members as to basic means of disease prevention, family planning and how to access health services.
Rural Program
Within the State of West Bengal, eastern India, GOAL works in the rural areas of Sunderbans, North Bengal, and Murshidabad as identified sources of migrants shifting from the functionality of village communities to the inherent vulnerabilities of living in cramped urban slums.
GOAL India’s flag ship in rural development is the Model Villages program in the Sunderbans with our local partner Sabuj Sangha. The Sunderbans is an area of low lying islands on the Bay of Bengal and at the mouth of the Ganges. It is an ambitious program that has gone about transforming development in 24 villages since its inception in 2005. Adopting an integrated approach whereby health, education and livelihood opportunities are all components of lifting the communities out of poverty. In just 3 years, GOAL together with Sabuj Sangha, built and operate a hospital that provides access to curative services for 85,000 people in the Sunderbans, with a focus on birthing and ante natal and post natal care of mothers to tackle child mortality.
In parallel to this, a health prevention action plan is in place including the provision of clean drinking water through 58 tube wells, household sanitation for 700 of the poorest homes, and ongoing training and awareness of villagers on health and hygiene practices. 73 solar lights at public places (tubewell sites, market places etc.) are providing illumination that allows uninterrupted mobility to people to continue with their daily chores and economic activities.
In education 19 formal schools have been constructed or renovated to provide increased and improved space for children to continue with their education. 5 hostel facilities were constructed to ensure boarding facilities for school students who lived far away from schools in the islands. In 2007 187 children who were out of school were provided with accelerated learning inputs through education camps to ensure enrolment in formal schools. This is an initiative that will be continued to ensure all out of school children from the poorest of the poor families are mainstreamed into formal education.
To ensure economic development of these families, livelihoods opportunities are being explored. Till date over 300 families have received support in various forms of trade (small business, poultry, fish farming) and other agricultural activities to allow additional income to families.
Accolades to GOAL India
“Seeing what GOAL does on behalf of the street kids in Calcutta was an eye-opening experience… There’s no doubt in my mind that these people deserve everything we can do for them. Where we live on this earth is an accident of birth and we in the affluent parts have an obligation to look to the needs of those who are less well off. People like John O’Shea and GOAL do just that and our donations make it possible."
RTE broadcaster Mary Kennedy who has visited a number of GOAL projects in the field
"To really appreciate the value that GOAL gets out of every Euro, every Dollar or every Pound Sterling that they collect, you need to go to the field and see the projects in action. I saw them in Calcutta and it was a real eye-opener. The real entrepreneur works quickly. They don't dwell on an idea for a long time, how should we do this? John thinks of a way of going about it straight away. GOAL act as a bridge or a link between different strands of society."
Micheál O Muircheartaigh, commenting on John O Shea's award as Social Entrepreneur of the Year at the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award ceremony September 2005
“What GOAL does in India is inspirational, completely surpassing any ideas I had. It put a smile on my face. I think once you become involved with a charity like GOAL and see what’s being done, you just want to know ‘what next?’”
Rugby international and Lions star Gordon D’Arcy said, after visiting GOAL’s projects in Kolkata (Calcutta)
Older and bolder, D'Arcy steps out of O'Driscoll's shadow
Brendan Fanning, The Guardian, 23rd February 2007
D'Arcy enriched by working with poor in Calcutta Brendan Gallagher, The Daily Telegraph, 23rd February 2007
D'Arcy has goals in sharp focus
John O'Sullivan, The Irish Times, 22nd February 2007
GOAL do
their best to reach out and help – but it often seems
like a frustrating struggle
Gordon D'Arcy, Evening Herald,
11th September 2006
D'Arcy's Passage to India
Hugh Farrelly, Irish Independent, 21st
August 2006
"I
was a sex worker at 13. My mother was too. But I don't want
it for my child"
Ross Appleyard, The Times,
28th February 2006
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