SHILLONG: While the SOS Children Villages of India is entering 50 years of its existence, the SOS Children Village in Shillong, entering its 15th year of service, has manage to give home to hundreds of children who have lost their parents.
The SOS Children Villages, Shillong, which is a non-profit organisation is located on a beautiful hillock overlooking the picturesque Umiam lake and spread over 11.4 acres of land was establish in August 1999.
Even though the village came into being in 1999, the first batches of 8 children were brought in May, 1995 and since then 219 children have been given a home.
“This SOS, Shillong is part and parcel of worldwide network of SOS Children’s Villages in 133 countries. The organisation is entering 50 years of its existence in India,” SOS Children’s Villages, Shillong director Anoop Singh said in a statement issued here on Sunday.
According to him, the SOS Shillong works primarily for children who have lost their parents and children at a risk of losing adequate parental care or being abandoned via a curative and preventive program.
As part of its family based care programmes, he said that presently there are 12 family homes with each SOS home consists of 8-10 children who live with their SOS mother.
“Presently there are 120 children (76 girls and 44 boys) staying inside the village and 17 children are staying outside. Our main focus is holistic development including education, health and psychological development of the children till they are settled through career or marriage,” Singh said.
He said that the SOS Village is also providing family strengthening programme which aims to prevent children from losing the care of their family or being deprived of basic essentials.
He said that the family strengthening programme is a 5 year program and has a two pronged approach
Meanwhile, Singh informed that the children of the village are pursuing their graduation in various fields like hospitality, journalism, Audiology, Nursing, Social Work, Agriculture and economics.
“One of our boys is pursuing his post-graduation in the field of hotel management, from Bangalore,” the director said while informing that five of the children who have completed their Diploma in Hotel Management, Guwahati and BSC in Hospitality have got placement in Taj Vivanta hotels in Mumbai, Hotel Dream in Cochin and Hotel Trident in Mumbai.
Out of the seven children who appeared for their SSLC examination, he said that all of them successfully cleared with two of the children get a total percentage of over 60 percent.
Singh said that out of the 12 children who appeared the HSSLC examination, nine of them cleared the examination with one of the children securing a percentage of over 60.
“The children are going to various schools nearer to village and also in Shillong. This year we took admission for our children in schools nearby like Christ School (International) and Army Public School,” he said, adding that the children are undergoing vocational training in beauty culture at Guwahati, graduation in the field of Trauma and emergency, Commerce and Hotel management.