The Role

Child is a precious resource of country, which needs to be nurtured with great care. Each child should get the equal opportunities to develop and flourish. The Child Rights and Development Studies Department (CRDS) in YASHADA is working towards protection and promotion of children’s rights and to expand their opportunities so that they reach their full potential.

Objectives

• To appraise Government programmes and practices related to Child Rights in Maharashtra and to identify gaps in them.
• To investigate and innovate into areas related to Child Rights with a view to formulating comprehensive policy guidelines.
• To provide comprehensive training and research support to developmental efforts for socially and economically deprived children.
• To identify and develop local capacity for protection of children’s rights.
• To study issues related to special protection for the most disadvantaged children - victims of riots, disasters, extreme poverty, all forms of violence and exploitation, and those with disabilities.
• To act as a platform for building alliance of partners working towards protection of child rights.
• To generate knowledge base in the area of child rights.

Areas of work

CRDS focuses on evaluating and strengthening local capacity for addressing child rights issues. Major areas of work are :-

• Evaluating child related programmes and schemes of Government.
• Studying the existing child policies and suggesting modifications.
• Building the capacity of Government functionaries to protect child rights by way of training.
• Developing Child Friendly Cities/villages/areas.
• Creating data bank of child rights.
• Child rights audit.

Projects completed

• Sensitization and Capacity Building towards elimination of child labour in Maharashtra, Gujrat and Madhya Pradesh (in collboration with International Labour Organization, New Delhi).
• A study on Cost Benefit Analysis of child labour elimination (in collboration with International Labour Organization, New Delhi).
• Development of Bridge material for out of school children studying in Non-formal-Education Centers.
• Impact assessment of Life Skill Training Modules for out of school children learning in Non-formal-Education Centers.
• Development of State Action Plan for Elimination of Child Labour.
• Tracking of migrant child labour in Jajjar, Haryana; Mumbai and the children rescued by ‘Task Force’.
• Strategy Development for rehabilitation of migrant child labour through residential schooling (Yashdisha project) and vocational training in transit shelter.
• State Resource Center for child labour.
• Evaluation of Mid Day Meal in the districts of Amrawati, Thane, Sindhudurg and Parbhani.
• Study of Education of out of school girls in Nadurbar district.

Ongoing Projects

• Evaluation of Mid Day Meal in 30 districts of Maharashtra.
• Evaluation of centers for out of school children.
• Training on Mid Day Meal.
• Training for developing child friendly cities in Municipal Councils.

PG Programme

YASHADA CRDS runs a Post Graduate Diploma on child labour. The course is affiliated to University of Pune. The course is of one-year duration, and can be undertaken by distance mode.