You are invited to attend the UK Preview of Mr A.L. Nitin Kumar’s film at the John Clare Theatre, Central Library, Broadway, Peterborough, PE1 RX on Saturday 30th October at 4.00pm.
Nitin is one of the Heal India trustees and recently organised the Cycle India 2010 charity bike ride in January in Karnataka. It would be wonderful to see as many Heal UK supporters attend this preview of his new feature film.
The details are below, and click on the image to see in full size:
Tickets are free, but donations to our charity at the door will be most welcome.
Fo any further information please contact Prasad at koneru.prasad@btinternet.com
I’ve decided to share with you a few pictures and experiences I had during my recent visit to the Heal Childrens Village. I’m one of the Heal trustees and although I’ve visited the Heal Village and Bala Kuteer school a number of times, I had never stayed for more than 48 hours, so this was a chance to spend more time with the children, and see how things work.
Group Photo:
The above picture was an impromptu group photograph. You can just about see me at the back in the middle, and Steve (a Heal colleague) down near the front. In the background you can see some of the dormitories at the Heal Village. The children love spending time with visitors to the village, and having their photographs taken.
Heal also provides an education to children from neighbouring villages who have families (we call it our Poverty Trap project), but their parents wouldn’t normally be able to afford to send their children to school. I caught the school bus to see for myself the type of homes these children come from. Believe it or not, there are 120 children on this bus!
I took this picture which shows the typical type of home our Heal children go home to. They’re unlikely to have running water, an electricity supply and they’re unlikely to get good quality food when they’re at home. So, by offering a free education to these children, Heal also provides a good midday meal.
Heal children study at the neighbouring Chetana School. The school has recently been donated a number of second hand computers and a computer teacher has been hired, but I feel we need to put more focus on IT skills, and installing better hardware and software. Also the computer lab is not connected to the internet at present so definitely more work to do here.
Spending time with the children also included eating with them, although eating with my fingers is still a knack I struggle with! The Heal Children’s Village is strictly vegetarian and the children receive good portions of food every day.
Steve Sargent and I decided to do a few running repairs to the drainage from the dormitories (which was quite tough in 38 degree heat). Luckily the teenage boys at the village were keen to get involved so I ended up in more of a supervisory role.
Heal looks after children from around 3 years old and supports them right through their higher education. There’s currently 42 Heal children now in higher education, and in the summer a further 24 children will be joining them. We have now created a Higher Education Sponsorship Programme and we are actively looking for new sponsors.
You’ve got to admit, there’s some very cute kids at the village, and I must stress that these children are very lucky to looked after by the Heal India team.
I thoroughly enjoyed my visit to this Heal project and seeing the great work undertaken by the House Mothers, and the staff at Heal India.
But we must not rest on our laurels, and further improvements to the lives of the children need implementing, such as introducing more variety in their diet, and improving the teaching facilities at the school. I’m really glad I took the time to see how things work, and I’ll be reporting my findings to the Heal UK trustees in due course.
Matthew Glover
Head of Fundraising
Some more good news from the Heal Village which give an idea of the activities our children are involved with at school.
Firstly, a Heal Village team won the State Level karate tournament and demonstrates the hard work they have been putting in.
Also, two of our children were winners in a painting competition held on the occasion of World Water Day with the topic ‘Water For Life’.
Hamanth:
Venkata Rao:
Well done children!
The new academic year started for us after the summer break.
The summer was very severe with the temperatures rising to almost 45 Celsius and when the rains came in the last week of June we heaved a sigh of relief!
In India the rains are special. They come after scorching heat and bring cool showers. We love to run out to play in the rain and get thoroughly wet!
But first of all the news about the tenth class students who passed High school in first class! Fourteen of them joined Junior College. So this year there are 35 Heal Children who are studying different courses in the local colleges.
We had a lovely surprise when Dr. Sathya Prasad the founder of Heal UK, Carl Brodie, the chairman and Matthew, one of the Directors visited us in June. We spent two delightful days with them.
They are organizing a tour Cycle India which is a unique opportunity to cycle 220 miles from Hyderabad to Guntur to raise funds to build schools for poor children, from 2nd January to 11 January
We are eagerly waiting to receive 25 of these brave cyclists from UK who promised to spend at least three days with us!
We are sending you some of the news clips covering their visit
An Old Age Home was built by Dr. Manga Devi, Secretary to Heal India with the concept that the young and the old living together find solace in each other’s company.
Dr. Sathya Prasad, Carl Brodie and Mathew inaugurated the Old Age Home.
A medical camp was conducted when Heal UK Directors were visiting Heal village.
We are signing off for the present.
We will have even more exciting things to talk about in the next news letter since a number of volunteers from UK are visiting us at various times the next six months!
Bye!
Children from Heal Village
Archive 2006
VACCINATION CAMP AT HEAL
We come to India every year for our summer vacation. This year we wanted to do something for the needy instead of spending our time enjoying with our family and having fun. To do this voluntary work we needed some kind of base, i.e. an orphanage, old age home, schools for the disabled, etc.
Srikirti then came into contact with Dr. Satya Prasad, a U.K. based doctor – the founder of HEAL (Health and Education for All). Hence we came together as a group of five, consisting of – Srikirti (As level), Prathyusha (A2), Komal (10th grade in U.S.), Abhishikth (6th grade U.K.) and Monica (B. Pharmacy 1st year Madras).
Initially we thought of volunteering in HEAL for two weeks, i.e. helping the children and management there in their day to day activities. Then as we thought about the idea, we felt that instead of lending a temporary helping hand for two weeks we wished to make a lasting impression that would help the orphans’ lives on a long-term basis.
Whilst in a train to Imperial College London, Prathyusha who does a lot of fund raising activities had the idea of raising funds for a vaccination camp for the orphans.
The five decided to implement this idea. Pratyusha and Komal went to a vaccination camp in Tadepalli Goodem (in India), which gave them an insight as to how these camps are run. Prathyusha’s mother, Dr. Madhavi a U.K. based paediatrician suggested that we give MMR vaccination to all HEAL children. The advantage of this vaccination is:
• it is a preventive measure for three deadly diseases – Measles, Mumps and Rubella
• it can be given to all age groups
• Rubella vaccine is especially important to females at the time of pregnancy as it will protect their offsprings from deformities.
To fund this project we had to raise some money. We then made an estimation of Rs.20000 which would cover the costs of vaccinations for 183 orphans. Instead of asking our parents and relatives for financial help we felt it would be a new experience if we put our effort to raise that money ourselves. Within a week we managed to collect Rs. 4000 more than our initial target making a grand total of Rs. 24000. The fundraising activity was an extraordinary experience of its own. While collecting we met people with different views towards fund raising. We were surprised when a student emptied his wallet and were startled when an auto driver had something to offer.
Then we went to HEAL to have a look and plan every thing for the camp. We were very much impressed by the hospitality we received from Mrs. Marudvathi, the headmistress of Chetana and her team. Then our ideas started to evolve. We decided to make a health database for the orphans, as this would be very useful for records and future use.
Instead of just giving the vaccination we felt that it would be useful to educate the children in HEAL and Sri Venkateswara Balakuteer about vaccinations and MMR. So we gave a Power point presentation talking about the uses of vaccinations and the risks. We planned to have the vaccination camp on Thursday 10th of August from 9a.m to 1p.m with a team of doctors lead by Dr. Madhavi, Dr. Nagesh (parents of Prathyusha and Abhishikth), Dr. Shiva Prasad (from Katuri medical college), Dr. Srikanth, Dr. Vikram and nurses.
We give our sincere thanks to Ms. Manga Devi the director of HEAL for giving us this opportunity and Mrs K. Sita (mother of Srikirti) for doing the ground work.
Hope you’ve enjoyed reading this.
Prathyusha
Srikirti
Komal
Monica
Dr. Madhavi
Mrs. Sita
Abhishikh
Report on the boys hostel opening ceremony by Kathleen Bardell Director/Secretary HEAL UK
The Boys Hostel, our latest project was completed in December 2005.
Opening Ceremony Saturday 3rd December 2005
This was a great opportunity for me to visit the Village, a dream that I had held for many years.
Together with Dr Prasad and two more Directors of HEAL UK we flew out from Heathrow Airport on the 1st December 2005, eventually arriving in Guntur on Saturday the 3rd December early in the morning following an extremely long train journey from Bangalore to Guntur.
Waiting to greet us on the platform in Guntur were Dr Manga Devi HEAL India Secretary, Vijayalakshmi Sponsor Secretary, Marudhwathi, Co-ordinating Officer and a few of the young girls from the village, looking beautiful in their colourful saris. It was a wonderful welcome and soon we were on our way to the Village.
Having never been to India before it was an amazing experience for me, heat and dust everywhere, I found the traffic quite frightening but had every confidence in our driver on the 15 kilms. drive to the village.
Andhra Pradesh is a vast State, tucked away in 3 acres of beautifully landscaped gardens, with magnificent trees and an abundance of flowers, is The Children’s Village. I can only describe as “a little bit of heaven.”
Making a tour of the grounds and the cottages, meeting all the children, housemothers, teachers, and staff took up quite some time. I was overwhelmed with the kindness of everyone; eventually making our way to the newly built Boy’s Hostel which will house at least 50 boys.
A team of drummers and a brass band, young Army Cadets (made up from the children from the School) lined the route for this special occasion, giving it a carnival atmosphere; nothing had been spared to make this a memorable day…
The official Opening of the Boy’s Hostel took place, Dr Manga Devi gave a warm welcome to the Directors of HEAL UK and invited Dr K S Prasad, Matthew Glover and myself to unveil the Plaque.
The Hostel which was quite impressive, two rooms on the first floor complete with beds, lockers etc. ready to receive the new visitors.
After a short respite for a welcome fresh fruit drink we progressed to the arena and stage for the official welcome to us by Manga Devi and her team of Directors. The children then entertained us with dancing, a Karate demonstrations, singing and readings.
It truly was a delightful day, very moving to actually be with these children who all looked so well and happy and certainly very well cared for. One just had to look at the faces of the children – it said it all.
I felt as though I had come full circle…
Twenty five years ago I met Dr Prasad when he first came to Practice in Peterborough, England, where he used to tell me about this “dream” he had of building a village somewhere in India to make a home for destitute children. As a founder member of HEAL, I feel very privileged to be part of this dream, which is now a blue print for perhaps more villages to be built in the future
This is a credit to Dr Prasad, Manga Devi and all who look after their welfare and all the supporters and sponsors everywhere, without whom, these children would have no future.
Kathleen Bardell Director/Secretary HEAL UK
Archive 2005
These children all grew up in the HEAL Village in Guntur, India, finished High School and are now in College.
Something to be proud of!
Their names are:
Bhavani
Thurlapati Suneetha
Radhika
Gopi
Bhukya Bujji
Rama
Haritha
Archive 2005
Kolli Rajyalakshmi, an orphan was admitted to HEAL in 1993.
She and her sister both grew up here in the Village. She finished High School but did not show any interest in continuing her studies.
She was given odd jobs to do in Chethana but councillors were wondering how to settle her. Luckily one boy who joined as a physical education teacher in Chethana was willing to marry her and her marriage took place on the 18th February 2005.
Arranging a marriage to an orphan is not very easy, the councillor did a commendable job with all the arrangements.
As an orphan there would be no marriage dowry but the parents of the boy were very understanding and did not demand any dowry
The couple will be settled in in a new home and we wish them the Very Best of Good Wishes for the future.
Dr K S Prasad, Usha and Manga Devi have agreed to finance the wedding for which we are all very grateful.
Archive 2003
Letter from Vijaya to Abbott Hall School
Hello!
Greetings from HEAL India!
I am Vijaya, sponsorship Secretary of HEAL in India. I write to the sponsors sending them reports about the children they are sponsoring.
Last Saturday I went to HEAL Village and took some photos of the boys learning to play on the keyboard instruments. I am sending them to you. You donated the amount with which we bought the instruments! The boys are enjoying themselves learning the notes. Thank you very much.
We went through a severe summer this year. The temperature rose to 49 celsius! Can you imagine it? The children in HEAL were able to have cool water to drink thanks to the water cooler which we bought with the money donated by you!
The children in HEAL come from families which are very poor. Most of them have no parents. Some of the circumstances in which they come to Heal are very tragic. Recently three girls, the eldest one is hardly ten years old joined Heal. Their father, a farm hand died after eating food contaminated by some pesticide which he was spraying in a field an hour earlier. The mother also died last year while working in the fields due to snakebite. The girls were left orphaned and some of the villagers took pity on them and brought them to HEAL.
Now the girls are secure and go to school. There are many such tragic stories in HEAL but I don’t want you to feel sad. Heal children are proof of the fact that there is always hope – even in the worst circumstances.
You children are doing wonderful work. Thank you once again.
Have a wonderful Harvest Festival!
Vijaya