Dressed in rags, his face streaked with mud, the little boy was trying to sell a bottle of water to Sachi Singh, while she waited for a train at Charbagh station in Lucknow. "It was tap water poured into a plastic bottle bearing a mineral water label,” Singh says. “After he had moved away, I saw a policeman thrashing him.”

She was moved to tears by that sight, and promised herself that one day she would do something for the numerous children she saw who - instead of spending their days studying and playing - are working in inhumane conditions and facing brutal law enforcement.

Singh has kept that promise. After completing her Masters in social work, she set up Ehsaas. The organisation helps children living on the streets, who spend their days doing simple jobs to make ends meet. It's because of Singh and her Ehsaas team that the Charbagh railway station has become the first station in the country to be declared child labour free. Moreover, the railway police officers there double up as child welfare officers.

School, not work

Sonu is one of the many children who have been helped by Ehsaas, "I am from Jharkhand and ran away from home. I used to sell bottles of water on the station when 'Didi' (elder sister) met me. It was she who forced me to leave this work and study. Shachi didi even ensured that the police didn't beat me or my friends up anymore." Sonu now lives in Ehsaas's childrens shelter.

Singh's organisation has rescued more than 100 children who once lived at the Lucknow station and on the city streets. The children are being prepared for a brighter future through education, vocational training and counselling. Wherever possible, the children are reunited with their families.

Building trust

It's been a difficult journey for the activist and the children. When the organisation first tried to take kids off the platforms and the streets, they would run away from Singh and her team, fearing that they would be caught and beaten. "We had to make them understand that we are their friends,” says Neeraj, who works at Ehsaas. “There were times when we had to fight with the police to save the children, which eventually made them trust us and draw closer to us. They started coming to us with their small problems. Slowly, they became our friends."

It was a modest start, but there were troubles in store for the team. "The personnel from the government Railway Police, as well as the Railway Protection Force, were apprehensive about our work,” Neerah says. “They thought we were intruding into their territory. They even threatened us.”

Kids have rights too

That’s when Singh decided that improving the kids’ lives meant she would need to teach the railway police that the children had rights and needs. Their efforts to sensitize the police didn’t yield many results for a while. "We kept trying to convince them to at least sit with us and talk,” Singh says. “The arrival of a sensitive station manager came as a blessing for us."

First, they worked towards ensuring that no shopkeeper at the station hired children. Those who did have them on their rolls were asked to let them go. "Some agreed, while others had to be threatened. The consequences of hiring children were explained to them," says Rajesh Kumar, a police inspector at Lucknow station.

After getting the additional director general of the railway police onboard, Singh was finally able to achieve what she had set out to do nearly a decade earlier. In April, the Lucknow station became completely child labour free. "We now realise that these children need to be handled with care,” Kumar says. “And if not anything else, the least we can do is to ensure that they live in a safe environment."

Future plans

But Singh's work doesn't end here. There are many things she wants to do for her "friends from the streets", including setting up of short stay centres in areas where children congregate after either run away or been forced out of their homes. There are also plans to establish a vocational centre providing computer training and other skills. For the kids who live on the mean streets of Lucknow, the future has become a bit brighter.

By Tarannum/Women’s Feature Service