Ishwagram - Karunagram Shelter Home
Karuna Gram is a well-managed shelter home for street children (now for boys only) It shelters 16 boys from various places in Gujarat. These are children who could not be reunited with their families. Karuna Gram believes that quality inputs and exposure to the outside world helps their education process. The children are taken on excursions, workshops and to academic institutions of repute.
Vishwa Gram recently organised a Bal Mela (Children’s Fair) at Modasa, which had around 50 educative and entertaining stalls for children. Some of the stalls were run by the children themselves. The best part of the Bal Mela was that some 200 children from different parts of the State who came to Modasa, were hosted by carefully selected host families, who had their own children participating. It was a great annual event where children mingled with each other irrespective of their religion, caste or class. It was a small but concrete lesson of “National Integration” for these young minds.
A Success Story:
Karuna Gram’s two most recent residents are Samir and Sudhir (names changed). They were referred to the Home by Swapath Trust when they were found playing on the streets near the Gandhi Gram railway station in Ahmedabad. It was found that the family was uprooted from their home on the river bank due to the “River Front Development” project. This labouring family was forced to live on the streets to eke out a living as the head of the family’s work was near the city centre. The mother of the two children is disabled. The children, after lot of counselling, were moved to Karuna Gram as their life on the streets was very vulnerable. Today, the brothers are happily a part of the shelter home.
