THE OTHER SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE!
- Anthony Dias, SJ

As the reel life exploits of ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ and its director Danny Boyle continued to attract the Oscars and other glories and hog media attention worldwide, the immensely successful real life achievements of Slumdog Millionaire REAP and its director Dr (Fr) Trevor Miranda of the Bombay Jesuit Province have yet to be sufficiently made known to the world! After the prestigious Opus Award it has won several other awards marking it out as an organization that has made serious and significant contribution to the cause of education, empowerment and holistic development of the weakest and most disadvantaged.

Mr. Thompson, the former Governor of Wisconsin and Secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services who was part of the Award Jury, stated something about our own Slumdog that needs to told and re-told: “REAP restored to me the lustre of the word, ‘empowerment,’ worn thin by overuse in Washington. REAP uses literacy to empower young people to become teachers, to empower women who transform their families and communities, and empower children – many of whom will go on to become teachers themselves.”

And about REAP’s inimitable, dynamic and highly successful director he says “… he combined his social vision and administrative talents to set up a pavement school for shoeshine boys and porters near a train station which eventually resulted in a model of a small, mobile, resource-light classroom replicated to teach thousands of children in almost 500 such “schools.”

The proud President of its absolutely unique ‘Footpath University’, which literally takes education to the doorsteps of the slum kids in the most difficult of circumstances, was also conferred an Honorary Doctorate by Marquette University, U.S. for his enormous contribution to the education of the marginalized.

An impact study done by the Xavier Institute of Social Research & Action (XISR) on completion of ten years of work by the organization revealed the following:

The focus of REAP’s effort has been and continues to be the marginalized, severely disadvantaged and the oppressed sections of society. Its approach to education, which it believes to be the key to empowerment and holistic development, has been one based on human rights. Among a host of innovative programmes, like the Municipal School Intervention Programme (MSIP), Village School Improvement Programme (VSIP), the boarding for tribal girls, and others of recent vintage like the Gurukuls (with their charming and enthusiastic latikas and jamals) focussing on education in the English medium.  Two main paths of intervention that have made a discernible and qualitative impact are the following:

1. Literacy Programme: This has a number of balwadis, study classes and a signature non-formal education classes for those children who must work and support their poor families. Thousands have benefited from these ‘schools without walls’ programme that does not compromise on quality education that includes a good dose of value inputs. Quite remarkably, the teachers are mainly simple and poor women from the localities who in the very process of going through the teacher training courses in the highly professionalized teacher training centres directed by Fr. Dion Lobo, and in the very process of teaching and motivating the children, experience a sense of ‘empowerment’.

This programme contributes towards eradication of child labour, the bane of our country and also her shame. Fr. Trevor understands the nexus between child labour and education and hence one of his typical comments has been: “Any child out of school is a potential child labourer.” Thanks to the programme hundreds of the children are out of the child labour market and out of the dangerous arena of child trafficking.

2. The Women’s Empowerment Programme: This programme began modestly but now boasts of more than 200 well functioning and expanding self help groups (SHGs) of women. It has now acquired the characteristic of a movement which can create a silent revolution if the potential of the women and their SHGs is fully exploited. Our study showed how simple, often unlettered women, who joined this programme have become independent, confident, literate, able to speak from public platforms, economically self reliant, are able to shake off their dependence on money-lenders, aware of their rights, able to critique society and its oppressive patriarchal foundations, support their own families, hold political parties and governmental officials accountable, able to fight societal evils like alcoholism and wife-beating and have begun to lead dignified lives. The most heartening thing was their ability to articulate the above ‘ingredients of their empowerment’ without any external promptings.   REAP truly lives up to its dream theme, ‘a literacy movement for empowerment’.

Respondents state unequivocally that REAP is serious about its commitment to the poor, to the cause of women and children, that it respects all people and their religion, is totally secular and non-discriminatory and that finally it has given an opportunity to thousands of children and women to become empowered and to enjoy the fruits of development that they could only dream of previously. The organization has become a brand in its own right and has earned credibility among various civil society groups, companies and educational institutions which seek its sites and expertise to fulfil their CSR (corporate social responsibility). REAP has demonstrated its big capacity to absorb volunteers for the CSR programme. A striking example of this has been its ability to place with ease thousands of volunteers of the Teach India programme of the Times of India group.

With a new and competent team in place and the spirit of the Magis energizing it, not to speak of the inspiring leadership of the new and markedly pro-poor General of the Society of Jesus, one can hear the reverberations of the jubilant and joyous shouts of  “Jai Ho!” emanating from the bastis, gullies and wadis where Slumdog REAP has a presence.