Aviva Life Insurance, today, urged people to raise their voices for street children through "Louder Together" - a campaign launched by one of Aviva’s charity partners, the Consortium for Street Children to establish an annual International Day for Street Children on 12 April each year.
Aviva Life Insurance, today, urged people to raise their voices for street children through "Louder Together" - a campaign launched by one of Aviva’s charity partners, the Consortium for Street Children to establish an annual International Day for Street Children on 12 April each year. The India leg of the campaign was launched today at Bal Bhavan by Gaurav Rajput - director marketing Aviva India.
Also present on the occasion were the chief guest - Amod Kanth, chairperson, the Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights Dr Bharti Sharma, former chairperson, CWC, New Delhi; Suman Nalwa, Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police, Special Juvenile Police Unit; Sandip Mallik - director HR, Aviva India; Thomas Chandy, CEO, Save the Children.
To show their support for the International campaign, people can log on to www.streetchildren.org.uk/international-day and download the campaign "twibbon" to share on their Facebook pages and twitter accounts.
Aviva also announced the launch of additional projects with CRY and Save the Children to enrich lives of underprivileged children. With CRY projects in Giridih (Jharkhand) and Kutch region (Gujarat), Aviva Street to School programme will impact close to 19,000 children. With Save the Children, mobile libraries are being launched in West Bengal over next couple months which are likely to impact over 1,000 street and slum children.
“At Aviva, we seek to better the lives of underprivileged children and thereby contribute towards building a brighter future for the country. We believe every child has the right to fulfill their potential and this is why we’re lending our support to the ‘Louder Together’ campaign to establish an annual International Day for Street Children on 12 April each year,” said Gaurav Rajput - director marketing, Aviva India.
On this occasion, Aviva unveiled its Street to School report for 2010, highlighting the journey of its corporate responsibility programme over the last one year on the occasion. In the first year of its Street to School programme, Aviva has directly impacted over 32,000 underprivileged children through projects with CRY and Save the Children.
Louder Together aims to give a louder voice to the millions of street children all around the world so their rights cannot be ignored. The campaign is being led by the Consortium for Street Children and its 60 members in over 130 countries. Aviva, as the leading corporate supporter of the campaign, is supporting Louder Together as part of its Street to School programme, which aims to help 500,000 street children back into education and training over the next five years. Aviva is marking the day in the 28 countries in which it operates, India being one of them.
Street children from the Aviva Street to School centres with Save the Children participated in the event by performing several programmes. While some children enacted a street play highlighting a day in the life of a street child, others gave song and dance performances. Aviva employees also volunteered for the event and participated with the children in several activities.
On this day, several branches of Aviva across India tied up with local NGOs and organized similar events with street children.
Thomas Chandy, CEO, Save the Children, said: “One year since the Right to Education became a fundamental right, a legal right, we still have the situation, where in the national capital alone, thousands of children live and work on the street and have little or no access to education. This situation must change. Save the Children is proud to be part of this campaign as it strengthens our efforts to ensure that every child in this country is at school and not at work.”
Meanwhile, CRY exhibited 1,000 postcards at the event which had captured ‘children’s voices’, expressing their desires and aspirations.
Yogita Verma, director, resource mobilization, CRY said: “Our experience of working with 5,724 villages/slum communities across 20 states in India has given clear evidence of the intrinsic linkage between child labour and the absence of free, quality schooling. On the occasion of International Day for Street Children both CRY and Aviva have renewed their commitment to ensuring that children living and working in unprotected environments like the streets are able to access good quality, free, government schooling.
"Towards this endeavour Aviva, has over the past year and a half been contributing to seven CRY-projects in India and has recently added two more to its radar. Together, we have impacted approximately 28,000 Indian children through the Street to School programme in 2010, taking them closer to a holistic education and a more secure childhood.”
The Aviva Street to School report 2010 launched on the occasion highlighted the number of children impacted by Aviva over the last one year with the help of its NGO partners – Save the Children and CRY. It also showcased how the "Aviva Great Wall of Education" – a mega book donation drive launched in four cities last year impacted the lives of more than 500,000 children through close to 950,000 books collected from the drive.
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