PATHANAMTHITTA: When 13-year-old Mia, a street child, met Sakhi John under the Nizamuddin Bridge in Delhi, she asked him, “Can you help me write my name, sir?”
That was an eye-opener for him. And he began an initiative to educate street children.
But even before facing that innocent question in 2019, for the past three decades to be precise, John — a professor with the Jamia Hamdard Deemed University — has been working among the most vulnerable and underprivileged, including those living in slums.
The 49-year-old is an active member of Deepalaya, an NGO based in the national capital, working towards making underprivileged children self-reliant to build better futures for themselves.
“I have been working closely with the slum-dwellers in Delhi. The satisfaction, when you see that your efforts have equipped someone towards self-reliance, so that they can survive on their own and look after their families, is amazing. You can never grow tired of such a feeling,” says John, who works under the department of healthcare and pharmaceutical management.
He also involves himself actively in the projects taken up by his students. “As part of the NGO too, there are around 10 youngsters who want to follow my path,” he says. Belonging to Thiruvalla in Pathanamthitta district, John moved to Delhi for higher studies in 1993. Ever since, he has been pursuing the aim of uplifting the deprived, be it through awareness drives among the uneducated on HIV and AIDS, rehabilitation of sex workers, lending his voice for the rights of the transgender community, or providing education and medical help for street children.
Children of the streets, among the worst-hit by the Covid pandemic, have been a special focus for him of late. Deepalaya, which runs many schools, has launched several programmes to provide food and books to children, he says.
“After I met Mia, we started another initiative to educate street children, as not many of them can afford going to school. Our aim is to enrol street children in government schools, where they would be able to receive medical aid and a mid-day meal. Out of the 300 children we identified, we were able to put 45 in government schools in Delhi, which is a great achievement,” says John.
A meaningful change in the lives of those in the lower strata of society cannot be achieved in days or months, he stresses.
“It takes years, sometimes decades, of effort. When the pandemic hit the means of livelihood of sex workers on the streets, we inspired at least some to make masks and find a means of livelihood.
This has shown them another side of life, which they were completely unaware of. By making them self-reliant, they are being empowered to lead meaningful and satisfying lives. All such efforts should start with the children,” he says.
John has been involved in social activities, especially those on the field, from the time he was in Class VIII.
In 2016, he had saved the life of a Thrissur native by donating his kidney.