A Thumbs Up from a Champion

Vijender Singh was kind enough to send us this encouraging little note. Thanks, Vijender, and may we say that we greatly admire your work too.

Thank you, from the street school kids....

To our dear team member who doesnt want her name up here...

I would like to thank you for donating funds towards our book library for the street school kids.
She has contributed around 180 books in all three languages English,Hindi and Marathi through Pratham books.
Many of the kids will learn to enjoy reading thanks to your contribution.
Regards
Priyanka

Thank you time...

A big shout out to all you folk out there who sent in bags and bags of clothes and bed linen for the families affected by the Reay Road fire. A big thank you to each and every one of you. The bags have been dutifully dropped off at the Magic Bus office at Tulsi Pipe Road by IH volunteers. (Thank you Sangeeta, Suma). We have been informed by Magic Bus that they have enough clothes now, and will not be requiring more clothes, so please hold onto to your old clothes and bed linen till the next appeal folks.

A huge Thank You to Goonj which sent in utensils for over 20 families affected by the Reay Road fire.

Greishma has sent in a carton full of lovely, brand new clothes for Karuna's and Momina's children. Thanks a ton Greishma, they have been handed over to Suma who will ensure they reach the recepients.

A big Thank You to Arti Appachu who has paid the school fees for Meghna Heliya (a sweeper's daughter, who would have had to discontinue her education).

Some Good news!

Abdul, Shabira Khan's son had called on Sunday and needed some help finding a job. Gave him Akhila's number from the Indiahelps blog -> "News you can use" section.

He interviewed for the job today and got it!! Fingers crossed that he does well at it, and keeps it as well. Thanks Akhila and Kiran!

Please do keep a lookout for our 'news you can use' posts for any useful and relevant information that can be used in cases.

Update from Kolkata

This just in from Baisali:

1) Ankit
Santanu called this morning. He said that Phulwinder (Ankit's father) called him and the operation was a success! Ankit is in the ICU now and the doctors from Germany will be staying on till Friday to monitor his progress. Phulwinder is expected to get an estimate from the hospital this evening regarding the next lot of expenses.


2) Ahana
Yesterday, Purnima brought Ahana to Apollo Hospital to get her stomach pipe changed. My friend, Dr. Gupta checked her and then referred her to his colleagues in the Gastro dept. I was in the hospital at the time so I was there. The tube was not available initially but they sent for it and came by the evening, by which time I had left. The procedure took only five minutes and Purnima even fed Ahana there to make sure everything was ok.


From Team India Helps a big big Thank You to Panchtatva for both Ankit and Ahana.

Christmas Party for the children from the Street School

This report in from Prachi:

Hey All,


I attended the Christmas Party yesterday and I have to say, it was just wonderful. (I'm trying to give a more formal report here and not just blabber about how much fun I had.

The party was really well-planned with Priyanka having thought of each element. The place was perfect for the group of children, all the children from the pavement schools (above 5 years of age) were invited and you could see how excited they were as they arrived in perfect single-line formations with their respective teachers. I have not seen a more excited yet disciplined bunch.

As the children were seated, the party host took charge. He had the children entertained and listening to him, a few times when he needed help the proud teachers stepped in and took care that the kids were all well-behaved. Once the host started with the games, it was so much fun!All you could hear is music, laughter and claps. The kids were SO responsive and they just had a ball as they all played, won, lost and laughed; I myself couldn't stop grinning. I'm going to send some pictures soon but couldn't wait to send this mail :)

After the party games Magician Mhelly had the kids glued. He put up a really great show with some great tricks and lots of audience interaction. Especially, his trick with the lil magician doll Pappu spraying the kids with 'susu' had the kids rolling with laughter. He mentioned later that he doesn't always get such enthu kids as audience, his job was easier because the crowd was great.

As the magic show reached its finale the chief guest came in, ho-hoing all the way. Kudos to Ruchi, she was a FANTASTIC Santa. The kids all flocked around Santa and danced away, then each one shook hands and received the gift from him. Even while handing out gifts, this very lively Santa teased and entertained the kids, making each one feel special. With the last gift given the music was turned up and all the kids danced away with such vigor. It was just reallllly festive with not one dull moment. The dancing had to be stopped only so that the big chocolate cake could be cut. The Prabodhan canteen had sponsored and prepared the snack packets for everyone and these were handed out with candies, juice and cake. Priyanka the very sweet hostess made sure that there wasn't one person left out (including the one with the very upset tummy). With the party coming to a close the teachers from each of the school had the still excited children file out. I have to say this, for such a big group of SUCH enthusiatic children it was remarkably well-managed affair.

So, if the smiles, the bright eyes and the amount of fun had are anything to go by, this was one hell of a party!!

A BIG THANK YOU: Prabodh Desai for the venue, Prabhodan canteen for the snacks, Dilnavaz, Mr and Mrs Vanmali for the magic show, Ruchi for being Santa, everyone from India Helps and outside who chipped in to contribute for the cake, and gifts, all those who took time out to attend the event. And finally, a big big hurrah for Priyanka for making this possible. It was only her singleminded dedication that made this party a rocking success.

Attendees: The teachers and volunteers. From IH, Dilnavaz, Renu, Priyanka and Prachi, Vickram Chaturvedi, Mayfrid, Raut Sir, Ramnik Bhai, Mr Nadar, Mr Mukherjee, Prabodh Desai and Mitesh.

India Helps Thanks Dr Patil once again....

http://www.punemirror.in/index.aspx?page=article&sectid=2&contentid=20091126200911260143410011f244d7&sectxslt=

Update on Sachin Singh

This update from Sangeeta:

We have an appointment with Dr Pathankar for Sachin (for his hand) at 7 pm on 26/11/2009. Dr Patil has agreed to go with the family. And we move ahead with Sachin a year after it all began.

Edited to add: We at India Helps would like to thank Dr Vaibhav Patil for his unstinting support to the Singh family.

A big thank you...

To Parul Sharma, Shivani Kagti, Gunjan Parulkar, Pravin Nair and all those who have helped out with funds for Poonam Singh's rent.
If anyone has made a direct transfer we dont know about, do mail us at indiahelps@gmail.com, to let us keep our records updated.

Momina Khatoon has a boy

For all those of you who have been following this blog, and the heartwrenching case of Momina Khatoon, who lost her husband in the Vile Parle taxi blast (he was the cab driver), the latest update is that she just delivered a baby boy this morning. This is her fourth child.
Mother and son are both healthy and doing fine, and a big thank you to Dr Manju who has been treating her pro bono through her pregnancy and delivery.
If anyone would like to send in clothes and things for the newborn, please do mail in at indiahelps@gmail.com or info@indiahelps.org.

Thank you

Revathy Sreekumar from Delhi, thank you for your cheque.

Thank you

To my dear, dear friend, Sunita Venkatachalam from Bangalore who sent in a cheque for Karuna.

Thank you

Dr Rati Godrej and the Godrej Hospital at Vikhroli for your kindness in having a physiotherapist and an ambulance visit 26/11 victim Poonam Singh for physiotherapy sessions. We hope, with your help and Gods grace, Poonam Singh will regain normal leg movement again.


Thank you Shai Venkatraman at NDTV who referred Poonam's plight to Dr Godrej. Your kindness has given us hope in a situation that, at that point, seemed hopeless.


From all of us at India Helps, a big heartfelt Thank You.

Thank You from our Street school kids

This from Priyanka, who has been holding the fort at the Pavement Schools, what with me being AWOL for the past few weeks:


Hansa ben for providing biscuits in both the schools almost on a regular basis!

N.N Chaturvedi for Rs.1,000/-

Nidhi Chaturvedi for Rs.1,000/-

Mrs. Agrawal for Rs.500/-

Namita for Rs.500/-

Ratna Dhanda for Rs.500/-

C.K Chaturvedi for Rs.500/-



Thank you all from the bottom of our hearts.
A new scholastic year is coming up and the children will now need new books, stationery, bags and the like. We request kind souls to step forward to contribute these.

More Thank Yous

To kbpm and the wonderful folk, (Prasanna Mukti, US and Rama Janardan, Mysore who contributed to her fundraising efforts for the Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon), who have sent in some funds through her.
God bless you all!

Thank you...

... To John Gray of Australia who has transferred funds directly to Karuna.



It is also time for fee paying for the next scholastic year for Karuna's and Momina's children.



We appeal to kindhearted folks to help these children out with fees paid directly to their schools or contribute towards uniforms, books and school essentials. If you would like to help, write in at indiahelps@gmail.com and we will supply you the details.

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Update on Shabira Khan

This came in from Serendipity:


Abdul (Shabira's older son) collected the cheque of Rs 10,000 which I collected from Aarif Malik last evening. That's Rs 22, 500 that we've raised so far!

Coming to the online transfer details which I had asked him to ask his Bank last evening, he's pretty clueless since he went to the bank but wasn't sure what to ask etc, so I've written an application explaining what we need which he just needs to go and show his Manager and hopefully he'll be able to guide him.

So those details could take a while.



Edited to add: A big thank you Aarif, from the IH team.

Thank You

This from Serendipity:

Thank you Rohan Monteiro and Neha Gahlaut for the money they sent for Shabira Khan.

From the entire IH team, thank you.

Thank you...

Tony Leslie and Melinda Johansson from Australia for your cheques for Karuna. They will be handed across to Karuna in the course of the next week.

And Thank You Trevor Bormann of ABC for the report and the segment on Karuna Waghela.

Hypercity takes up IH pavement schools as CSR

This report from Priyanka should have been up last week:



Hi



On Saturday Hypercity volunteers came to the pavement school as part of CSR.This is a culmination of IH talks with them to come and participate in the pavement school.They have kindly agreed to come every Saturday from 8am to 10am to spend time in the school.I have attached a few pics from that day.

Hoping we manage to get more corporates who take CSR seriously to come and be a part of this endeavor!

--



Priyanka



And this from today:



Five of Hypercity volunteers were there today.They distributed notebooks and pencils in school 1.



From Team IH: A big Thank You to Hypercity for supporting this initiative!



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