Slum kids to turn scribes

300 kids from 60 slums in the GHMC limits will undergo a 50-hour training programme and will be bringing out a monthly newsletter

For the past two years, kids from 60 slums in and around Hyderabad have been bringing out a weekly wall paper about civic issues and other news pertaining to slum dwellers. The initiative, supported by NGO Divya Disha, is now planning to take a step forward by training 300 slum kids in 50 hours. Isidore Philips, founder and director, Divya Disha, says, “Children are rarely involved in community development programmes.

The idea is to facilitate the voices of children and use journalism as a tool to reach out to authorities.” It is through the weekly wall paper that the kids at Alluri Sitaramaraju Nagar slum in Shaikpet mandal got authorities to wake up and turn the dumpyard into a playground. Egged by the success story, Divya Disha has been facilitating the concept of wall papers in other slums and now is planning to come out with a monthly newsletter.

The initiative is supported by Vanleer Foundation based out of Netherlands. The training programme starts on February 24 and senior journalists from print as well as electronic media would be helping the kids. Isidore Philips says that apart from the Divya Disha centre, even the Press Club would be used and kids would be taken to newspaper offices to get hands-on experience. The newsletter would be in Telugu and English. There would be 60 newsletters for 60 slums and a copy each would be sent to all the families in the slums.