Indore’s Beggar Rehabilitation Centre empowers residents, ensures Rs 1 lakh Rakhi order for Raksha Bandhan

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Updated: July 22, 2024 12:54 IST

Indore (Madhya Pradesh) (India), July 22 (ANI): In a remarkable attempt to eradicate begging, a beggar rehabilitation centre in Madhya Pradesh’s Indore district is dedicated to training beggars to become ‘Atma Nirbhar’ under the ‘Bhiksha Vriti Mukt Bharat Abhiyan’ in the city.
The centre rescues beggars from the streets or religious places and reintegrates them into society by helping them to fend for themselves and teaching them various skills and courses.

In view of the upcoming ‘Raksha Bandhan’ festival, which will be celebrated on August 19, the beggars are preparing ‘Rakhis’. The centre has received a pre-order of 1 lakh rakhis and the beneficiaries at the rehabilitation centre are busy making them.

The president of the NGO ‘Pravesh’, which runs the beggar rehabilitation centre, Rupali Jain, told ANI, “Under the Prime Minister’s ambitious campaign ‘Bhiksha Vriti Mukt Bharat’ (Beggar Free India), we have been working for the last three years to make Indore a beggar-free city under the leadership of Indore Collector Ashish Singh. We rescue beggars from the streets or religious places and bring them to our rehabilitation centre. Our aim is to reintegrate them into the society by treating them if they are sick, depressed, mentally ill or drug addicted.”
Besides providing basic needs such as housing and food, the rehabilitation center also focuses on employment by teaching them various skills, she said.
“We teach them various courses like sewing, making handicrafts, incense sticks and rakhis. With these employment opportunities, we work towards their upliftment and make them ‘Atma Nirbhar’ (self-reliant). We also work on seasonal festivals like Raksha Bandhan, so we have received an order of one lakh rakhis, for which our beneficiaries are making thousands of rakhis every day,” said Rupali Jain.
After completing this order of rakhis, another order of one lakh rakhis will be received from the same customer. In this way, they will be lifted. Currently, 17 beneficiaries are preparing rakhis and several others are engaged in making handicrafts. Different types of rakhis made of cow dung, resin and pearls are being prepared here, she added.
“At present, there are around 50 people in the rehabilitation centre. In addition, we have trained them under the SMILE (Support for Marginalised Individuals for Livelihood and Enterprise) Yojana and some have also found jobs. A few are working in a paving brick factory and some are working in a sewing workshop. Those who want to start their own businesses are being trained according to their interests. All of them were involved in begging and are now working in the mainstream society,” she said. (ANI)