BHUBANESWAR: Still in his early twenties, this young student has displayed exemplary enthusiasm and self-reliance by working while studying, and that too for charity. Madhumoy Satpathy, a BCom second-year student at BJB College in Bhubaneswar, has an hour to spare for leisure. Motivated to engage himself with a social organisation, Madhumoy joined a social campaign Humara Bachpan, as an intern.
Humara Bachpan is a national campaign working towards a safe and healthy environment for children living in slums.
Madhumoy, according to his mentors, shows dedication to work for educating and imparting the basics of hygiene and education to the urban poor. He has been visiting slums, interacting with the children and preparing case studies on them and their living conditions. He also leads a project in which he has been filming videos of the situation in and around the slums of Bhubaneswar.
“I understand their surrounding more when I look at it through the lens,” he says. The youngster has also participated in a project in which he and his team prepared a social map showing the exact number of houses with thatched, tiled and firm roofs and wells and number of houses with proper sanitation facilities or electricity in the slums.
“The people in the slums do not understand the children’s problems and are often unaware of the larger picture. By involving children in urban planning, we get honest feedback besides being benefitted by a number of ideas which are out-of-the-box,” he says.
This has been a great learning experience, as the work involves interaction with the children who face many challenges like lack of sanitation and electricity, and are voicing their opinion to bring change.
Madhumoy has been chosen for an orientation workshop, which will be held in the coastal town of Gopalpur in Odisha. The aim of the workshop would be to orient the entire national team of Humara Bachpan campaign and discuss plans for implementing child-led planning in the future.
Though Madhumoy has not yet started earning, his mentors strongly believe that the young intern has all potential to be absorbed into the campaign on permanent rolls once he graduates from college.
“I have been able to strike a good balance between my work and studies. During examinations, the entire focus shifts to studies. Once the tests are over, I get back to work ,” Madhumoy says.
— baibhav@newindianexpress.com