Voices from the ground

The battle for children's rights is not an easy one. It includes interventions at national level policy meetings, lobbying during the formulation of new laws and building pressure from the ground up. We have to work with Partners to perform the watchdog function on behalf of the children and mainstream children's Issues.

The range, texture and forms of Mobile Creches' advocacy have been manifold and have gathered momentum over the years. Non-governmental agencies, academic institutions, women's organizations, trade unions and all concerned citizens are continually roped in, to sharpen thought and broaden a common platform, for joint advocacy with the Government. In the past year many advocacy processes received Mobile Creches’ inputs:

Highlights

• Reaching the Supreme Court's interim orders on the ICDS in the Right to Food (RTF) Campaign and information on what children under six were entitled to, to as wide a public as possible: distribution of pamphlets, meetings in slums and resettlements, conventions with partners from the RTF and Delhi FORCES
• Working with communities in rural areas and in Delhi's slums to be proactive for children  - initiate childcare services, link with public services, organize themselves
• Bringing the issues to the Planning Commission through Sub Committees based on thorough homework and well-honed arguments for inputs into the 11th 5-Year-Plan
• Pushing the new government to follow through on their election promises in The Common Minimum Programme (CMP): framing and passing a Rural Employment Guarantee Act, universalisation of Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS), setting up of a Rural Health Mission.