Objectives:
1. Remove children in villages from work and retain them in school.
2. Empower the girl child
3. Build a network of NGOs/CBO and support them to eliminate child labour through
social mobilisation and education


Activities Adopted
Children not in any school (government or CREDA) were identified with community participation in project area to undertake them into the school system.
For following tasks were also accomplished:
1. Strengthened links with ongoing projects
2. Got children and adolescent girls into school
3. Organised discussion meetings with different stakeholders and sensitised community on recruitment and supply of child labour, elimination of child labour, child rights and education
4. Ensured people’s participation and involvement with respect to implementation of the activities
5. Established close contacts with women especially mothers and mothers-in-law of adolescent girls and working children and held discussions on various issues and prevailing situations to help them analyse the state of deprivation of adolescent girls/working children
6. Build perspective of women and child labour in the area on issues such as human rights, child rights, working and living conditions, exploitation of children, health and nutritional status, educational entitlements and the behavioural patterns within the family and community
7. Inculcate knowledge about motherhood, childcare, reproductive health, nutrition, personal hygiene and sensitivity of the relationship between mother and daughters
8. Set up 10 child labour vigilance committees to pursue the parents to withdraw from all types of work, build pressure against migration of the children from bordering villages and mobilise village community against child labour and for enrolment of the children in various governmental and non-governmental schools.


To ensure that 500 adolescent girls are withdrawn from all kinds of work and get their basic right to education, two sets of tasks were done
Set 1
1. Identified and recruited para-teachers for 10 community schools
2. Orientation and training of newly recruited teachers
3. Campaigned amongst the community, especially mothers and adolescent girls to persuade them to admit the girls in the schools
4. Enrolment of identified children into community schools
5. Procurement of educational material for the enrolled children
6. Drawing up of curriculum based on the local conditions and specific areas, critical to the overall development of the enrolled children
7. Procurement of nutrition material
8. Provision of supplementary nutrition facilities to enrolled children
9. Encouragement to the education of children and to develop the habit of social respect, personal hygiene, discipline and regularity in schools, among the children
10. Imparted family life education to enrolled children, especially adolescent girls
11. Organised periodic parent teacher meetings to discuss the progress of the enrolled children and suitability of the syllabus and teaching methodologies
12. Establishment of rapport with government officials and ensuring their involvement in the project


Set 2
1. Identified 500 adult women in selected villages and organised them into 20 groups
2. Identified teachers to undertake evening classes
3. Encouraged High School children to teach mothers
4. Provided teaching/learning material and set up libraries for them


Successes – Features/ Highlights
1. Removal of 113 girls from hazardous industries (carpet weaving and beedi-making). These girls form almost 23 per cent of the total girls who were weaned away from different kind of labour.
2. Education of girls: 500 adolescent and younger girls completed two years of non-formal education in 10 KBVs. Nearly 80% of girls were successfully enrolled in mainstream education in nearby junior high schools. Girls' enrolment in formal schools has increased.
3. Regular village level meetings: These have strengthened links with ongoing projects of CREDA. Community contribution was ensured in terms of land, voluntary labour, construction material, fuel wood and vegetables. Health volunteers and schoolteachers were identified. Total monetary value of these contributions was estimated at over Rs 2.50 lakh.
4. Formation of social mobilisation groups: Village child labour vigilance committees were activated to ensure regular attendance of enrolled children. Awareness was built on health, education, reproductive health, mother child relations through regular interaction among various groups.
5. Women’s participation: This was as much as 39 per cent in all the meetings. This is significant for the two blocks selected for this project.
6. Adult education for 250 adult women was arranged through five literacy centres
As a spin-off of the planned activities, the following more achievements were noticed:
7. Health check-up for enrolled girl children.
8. Improvement in teachers’ attendance in government primary schools: After observing punctuality of teachers in community schools run by CREDA, the villagers questioned the absenteeism of the government teachers in primary schools.
9. Check on replacement: Due to community mobilisation and involvement of village volunteers, panchayats and CREDA staff in the project areas, the replacement of children in the cottage and agriculture sector has almost stopped. This process and action has significantly reduced the number of child labour in the area and increased adult employment
10. Panchayats’ vigilance on child labour in different sectors.
11. Check on migration of children going on work to border villages: This is the result of mass mobilisation and active role of vigilance committee members in the project villages.
12. Children spared from health hazards: Children previously working on carpet looms and beedi-making have been withdrawn from work and thus spared from health hazards.
13. Pulse Polio Immunisation of children.


Conclusions
The remarkable underlying factor success of the project was people’s participation in all the stages of the project. It ensured smooth implementation of the project and also made people aware of their rights. The rural folk are now more vocal in demanding their due in various government schemes targeted at the poor, like Swarna Jayanti Gram Swarojgar Yojana, Public Distribution System, Indira Awas. People are now actively participating in the proceedings of gram panchayats.

Though the project was designed and implemented in a rather small area for a small number of girls and adult women, it has furthered a number of government policies and programmes, Including:
Government of India’s policy on Universalisation of Education.
Prohibition of Child Labour (Government policy and United Nations Convention),
Rights of Child,
Reaching Out to Vulnerable Groups and Communities Through Education and Targeting Worst Forms of Child Labour in Hazardous Conditions.

Of late, Central and State Government are laying considerable emphasis on education of girls. girls still cannot access mainstream education at par with the boys. As a relaxation, the State Government has come out with the policy to let girls join mainstream education at any level, no matter what their background. By pumping nearly 400 girls into the mainstream of education, the Organisation has contributed to implementation of this girl child friendly policy.