Snehdeep Jankalyan Foundation

History and rational

Dire need to work in the area of health and education for the slum dwellers was felt through the experiences by running a dispensary in one of the largest communities in the city. At the same time some contacts with social organization working in the same area also helped in concretizing the idea. Thus, like-minded people came together to form an organization in 1986, with the name Snehdeep Jankalyan Foundation.

Snehdeep Jankalyan Foundation [SJF] is a voluntary registered organization working for community development since 1986 in different slum areas of Pune City. 20 years back, the situation in slums was even worse than today. The major problems faced by the slum dwellers were

* Poverty,
* Illiteracy,
* Lack of hygienic conditions,
* Poor health conditions with prevalence of anaemia and reproductive health problems in women, malnutrition in children, T.B. etc
* Lack of pre primary education and high percentage of school dropouts, etc

Not only poverty but also illiteracy, lack of awareness, misconception, and superstitions were the root causes of the problems.

Mission

Snehdeep accepts this challenge and works on the health and education issues with the aim:

Ø To promote good health by creating awareness about health and by providing basic curative health services.

Ø To create awareness about importance of child education and provide education facilities at community level.

Ø To help people to become self sustainable and confident to overcome their difficulties

Providing services is not the only aim but to motivate the people and to make them aware about the importance of childcare, education and positive health is the prime concern. To achieve this, participation and involvement of community is necessary. Thus some girls and women from the community were selected and trained to work as teachers and health volunteers. SJF was growing with activities along with the number of members of the organization. These members are teachers, Health workers, doctors, social workers, etc.

Activities

Snehdeep is implementing the Family Development program.

Geographical areas of interventions

In last 20 years the project has expanded quite a lot geographically and activity wise. We have covered a population of approximately 1, 50,000 in 12-15 different pockets in Pune City. According to the emerging needs, we have developed new activities or moulded previous activities to meet the needs.

Administrative details

Snehdeep Jankalayan Foundation

Contact Person: Managing Director, Dr BHANDARI Prakash

Address: 1st Floor, Memjade Building

545 Bhavani peth

411042 Pune – INDIA

( : (020) 2645 71 05 / 2644 88 92

Success Story

Success Story
Patil Estate: Neelava Mariappa Tupedor



In the Guidance Centre session with Leela, different objectives were identified for the family. Leela’s husband and elder son were sick with Tuberculosis symptoms. The Field Worker sent them for check ups. Doctors sent them back with general medication. The Field Worker was confident and took them again to the doctor and explained him the symptoms and insisted on tests. It was Tuberculosis and both were given proper treatment.

Leela’s 15 years old daughter, Neeta, dropped out of school as Leela did not want to send her to a school far of from home. Neeta got attracted to a young man from the neighbourhood. Sensing these feelings, the youth took undue advantage of her. Leela got helplessly worried about this and did not know how to talk to her daughter about all this.

Field Worker motivated Neeta to participate in the adolescent girls’ group. These group sessions covered issues regarding physical, psychological and mental changes experienced in this age group. This awareness helped Neeta put some control over her emotions.

Along with this, the Field Worker explained Leela about how to communicate with a teen-age girl and what all things should be kept in mind. This together helped in improving the mother- daughter relationship. Neeta being a little more aware now may take a responsible decision in future.

Leela’s husband’s health has improved with medication, proper nutrition and care. His prior employer refused to give him work. [He used to sale ‘Bhel’ on Railway Platform for which a contractor used to provide raw material and handcart etc.] Here also, the Field Worker took help of some ladies from Savings groups in the area and met the employer explaining the condition and requested to take him back. This assertive move worked and he was taken back on the job.

The family had a few serious and urgent problems on hand. The field worker's assertive actions have helped the whole family and arrested the situation going from bad to worse.