ELDERLY ASSISTANCE - MAVJAT
Elderly Assistance - Mavjat
The Nomadic and De-Notified communities are daily wage earners engaged either in menial labor activities or selling goods or services. They aren’t a part of organized work force hence, remain excluded from labor laws structured for the workers of organized sector. VSSM works with the marginalized nomadic communities that constitute some of the poorest of the poor population of our country for whom managing a single square meal for the family also is a challenge. Attaining basic Education, housing and health for such families remain a distant dream, to them no work equals to no meal. Mal-nourishment, addiction to stuff that suppresses hunger and enables them to put in strenuous hard work through the day are wide spread. Since they are usually residing away from the revenue villages the public health facilities do not reach them (we all are aware how government health services function) nor are their children covered under the ICDS program. Under such circumstances a medical emergency in the family spells disaster. The family avoids consulting a doctor during illness and in cases where a visit is inevitable, they get into the debt trap of private money lenders who loan them money at exponential rates. These debt traps seldom allow such that the family can never pull themselves out.
VSSM has been consistently striving to enable these communities access government health facilities. Through its efforts to obtain citizenry documents for thousands of these families, it ensures the population can benefit from the program government has implemented for medical emergencies in poor families under the Ma Card scheme. It also tries provides assistance to the families in need of special medical treatments in cases of cancer, diabetes, surgeries etc. Through the Swavlamaban and Education programs, VSSM has ensured that individuals seeking loan under Swavlamban and parents willing to enroll their children in hostel give up their addictions.
Achievements
- VSSM has been supporting meals and treatments of women of Vadia who have been infected with HIV during the course of their professional lives.
- VSSM also provides partial to the families whose sole bread earner is fighting sever medical condition until he/she has recuperated well to get back into the workforce. It also helps them buy medicines etc. to prolonged sickness.
- In the past couple of years VSSM has crowd funded major surgeries of few individuals whose cost ran into lakhs. It closely works with its known doctors to ensure individuals from these communities receive fair and honest advice and treatment at minimal cost. The stories of these can be read here.