Internship Experience with NGO - Shifta Amrin, Jamia Hamdard
As quoted by the Nobel Laureate Mother Teresa, If you can’t feed 100 people, then feed just one.
This quote intrigued my inner vision of helping and working in the upliftment of the needy ones of our society. And to give a break through in this vision; the call-up for volunteers of youth led registered Non-Governmental Organization “Project CLAP”, based on the 17 Sustainable Development Goals proposed by the United Nations became an ice-breaker for me.
A Law student who hails from Gumla; a small city with the tribal practicing culture, naxalite dominance and extreme lack of resources; came to the Heart of India, city of Hustle i.e Delhi to put her ideas & skills to certain productive use, to generate such output which will be benefit the underprivileged.
To bring this dream into reality I approached the organization for Internship.
In my selection interview, a series of questions and cases were put before me amongst which one of the questions was about my views on the rights of men, their hardships and social taboos faced by them.
By grace of Almighty, despite a huge number of candidates I managed to secure my position as the Team Head after clearing interview with flying colors. I invested my efforts into working hard more as co- member with the other team mates rather than just being a positional head!
My internship tenure started from October. The first task that we were asked to create a plan layout of the next 6 months. Since, my team had been allotted 4 SDGs i.e. SDG 1: No poverty ,SDG 2:Zero hunger ,SDG 10: Reducing Inequalities ,SDG 16: Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions; we prepared a layout which included both online interaction and offline impacts too.
We planned different surveys, content creation for social platforms and offline events to create large impact and serve large number of people who were in real need of help!
During this internship, I developed certain changes in myself and my thought process, which really helped me change into a better person.
My perspective to look at things changed altogether. I realised that I can definitely be a part of helping others and lessen the discomforts of the people who needed my help.
My motto behind all these offline drives was to have a personal connect with those people whose voices are being unheard, whose sufferings are going in vain since even after lot of schemes proposed by the government, the relief are not reaching to them; an even if it’s reaching then it’s not sufficient to fulfill basic needs of their children living in slums – barefoot, without proper sanitation,hygiene,shelter and food.
The on-ground survey was conducted by our team in Lajpat Nagar. The task was to ask people of all age groups regarding their thoughts and views on the topic of Discrimination, Equality and Governments output in the related issues.
Furthermore, we planned a donation drive as well for distribution of Blankets among homeless people who were barely resisting the chilly nights of Delhi in January; and also, by the End of January we also conducted a Food distribution drive, whose real-life report was heart-wrenching.
On 29th of January we visited a slum in Uttam nagar for the food distribution drive among the needy ones and there we saw stories of their hardships and miseries in their teary eyes!
From kids running barefoot to young girls merely covered in a thin dupatta to protect themselves from the chilling weather of Delhi.
We tried to talk to little kids there. We questioned them in friendly manner as to why they were not wearing footwears to which one of them replied in their native language that we’re used to living like this in dirt, we are surviving through these hardships by ourselves since the amenities provided by Government and authorities aren’t sufficient to fulfill the basic needs of 10-15 persons of each family.
In this regard, we distributed snacks and a pack of juice among 260 people and within a span of half an hour we’re able to reach this huge number of recipients.
During the drive, some of the issues discovered were as follows, related to their childrens dropping out of school due to certain issues and hygiene & sanitation for the people living there by. Also, before seeing them off when they were asked that whether they’ll join us if we want to teach them and engage them for co-curricular activities at their location, then the responses were mostly positive and each volunteer saw the enthusiasm and excitement in those kids to learn and grow more.
Another activity planned was about providing legal aid as enshrined under the Constitution of India under Article 39A defines the right of free legal aid to the poor and weaker section of the society and to ensure justice for all.
Through setting up legal aid camps, with a panel of Registered Advocates and law students as volunteers, we tried to provide for the assistance to those who aren’t able to pay the huge fees of advocates and have no knowledge about the legal discourses!
According to Gandhi ji’s vision GROWTH CAN NOT BE DONE IN ISOLATION, the way we can’t let our kith and kins be vulnerable to this world, In a similar fashion we unsee the humanitarian need of the hour which is to work for this sector which needs our utmost support in the upliftment.
I urge and request the future of our world, the youth to get engaged in these activities and make this world a better place to live upon for everyone.
