Akshardeep

Project Brief: Akshardeep is an educational related project of Swadhar-Pune with its main aim of providing basic education to children of migrant laborers and school drop-outs.
Project Type: Non-Formal Educational Centers (description)
Primary Focus: children from slums (description)

Secondary Focus: children of migrant workers

Area: Urban
Supporting Chapter Contact: Zurich
Status: Support ended.
Project Steward: Shreya Paliwal
Project Partner(s): Guruswamy Kumaraswamy
Other Contacts: Vishweshwara Herle
Project Address: , Swadhar, Anath Pangu Griha,96, Sadashiv Peth (Navi Peth),Pune,
MAHARASHTRA  411030
Tel: +91 20 25 46 26 26/27
Stewarding Chapter: Zurich
Dec 2011ZurichINR 560000
Nov 2008ZurichCHF 4800
Jun 2008ZurichCHF 3750
Jan 2008ZurichCHF 4300
Aug 2007ZurichCHF 4400
Jan 2007ZurichCHF 3850
Jun 2006ZurichCHF 3250
Apr 2006ZurichCHF 1950
Oct 2003ZurichCHF 4250

Total = $34181.79015

Akshardeep is an alternative school programme initiated by SWADHAR in June 1998. This project is specially meant for children in the age group of 6-12. They run 10 NFE classes in Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) area and 10 in Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal corporation (PCMC) area for the children of sex workers, migrant laborers and school drop-outs.


The accepted budget is around CHF 8500.00 per year


Asha Zurih has been funding this project since October 2003. By the end of 2005, Akshardeep was able to put 54 children (out of 250) in to regular schools and out of them 45 are still in the regular school as of now (2007).



They have increased their number of classes from initially 10 to 14 and the number of children increased from 250 to 376. Till now Asha Zurich has disbursed more than INR. 8,25,00.00 to this project.
To help the running of the 10 classes in PCMC area, providing the salary for the teachers and the supervisor, procurement of educational material for the children.
SWADHAR is a registered organisation, established in Pune on 1st January 1995. It helps women in distress and organises many activities for the development of women and children such as, counselling centres, family life education and alternate education programme.

1. Aims and Objectives of SWADHAR:

- To help women, young girls and children develop their
potentials.

- To provide moral and emotional support to women who are
victims of domestic violence and atrocities.



2. Alternative School Programme: Akshardeep

Akshardeep is a programme initiated by Swadhar in 1998. The project is meant for providing basic education to children in the age group of 6-12. These children are either school dropouts or have never been to school for variuos reasons.

Broad Aims of Akshardeep:

To run Balwadis for the children of migrant laborers and families living in slums.

To run Non Formal Education centres for children of
migrant labourers and domestic workers.

One of the main aim of these NFE centres is to prepare these children for mainstream schools and getting them en-rolled there. Also, now they have started focussing on Balwadis and providing support classes to the children enrolled in regular schools to address the issue of drop-outs.