A simple helping hand

Seeing a healthy future for Vidhya - and India
After her time in Madurai Sevashram Girls Home, last year Vidhya went off to a one-year general nursing course in Coimbatore. She is currently at Aravind Eye Hospital on a 3-year course specialising in eye care.

N Krishnaveni - Staff Nurse
Krishnaveni was an only child when her father died and Mother, unable to support her on her meagre earnings as a farm coolee (daily paid casual labourer), gratefully placed her in Rengasamy Childrens Village. She continued into Inner Wheel Girls Town for her secondary and higher secondary schooling, finally gaining admittance to a private college for her four year BSc. Nursing course. Working initially as a Staff Nurse in the low-paid private sector her career and earnings took a welcome boost with three years as a Nursing Tutor. During this time she married and, in May 2009 took up her present post as Staff Nurse in the Public sector, currently earning Rs 34,000 monthly and able to live at home, a 10 minute bus ride away.

Below the surface another story unfolds. Hers was an arranged marriage, her husband Ranjithkumar a labourer in a cotton mill, having dropped out early from secondary school. Two years ago both his parents suffered strokes, requiring full-time care. So now he stays at home caring for them and Krishnaveni supports her extended family with both her salary and her nursing knowledge and skills. Her own mother is a farm coolee earning Rs 100 daily when work is available. She lives elsewhere but her daughter visits every two or three months. Krishnaveni gives a clue to the special mind-set which helps her to face the challenges at work and at home. Asked the most enjoyable part of her work, she replies instantly "Service!" "Yes," she muses, "I do think of my sponsors – I didn't ever meet them but I'd like to say thank you. Without JHC and my sponsors, I couldn't have become educated and would still be a coollee, like my Mom."

G Pitchaimani - Physiotherapist
When the Child Labour Prevention scheme came to his village in 1995, it meant Pitchaimani could start secondary school. School costs were paid by the scheme, which also gave his parents two Jersey calves to rear. Milk income lifted his family from poverty and, given his excellent 10th standard results, financed his higher secondary education. Again high marks in the science stream gained him a college place to study physiotherapy, supported by The Boys Town Society. With his Bachelor of Physiotherapy and associated internship completed, The Leprosy Mission Trust in India appointed him to their hospital at Purulia, West Bengal as Research Physiotherapist in 2008. For the next four years he studied part-time for his MSc. in Medical Sociology. Currently he's a Research Physiotherapist cum Social Worker at The Leprosy Mission Hospital, Kolkata and studying for his Post Graduate Diploma in NGO Management. "Sponsorship by JHC through The Boys Town Society let me continue in school and has given me a great future. Without that I'd probably have been a daily-paid labourer in a firework factory or textile mill. My family's life has changed too. They have economic security and are well respected socially. I'm very grateful"

	ABOUT THE JOE HOMAN CHARITY
	JHC is a heartwarming and unsung story about vision and hope - one that everyone involved can be proud of. The excellent website www.joehoman.org.uk carries full information. You can download copies of the magazine Nandri with its uplifting accounts of pupils' progress. The Charity President and Founder, Joe Homan went from the UK to start a single project in 1965 for destitute boys, just south of Madurai in Tamil Nadu, South India. From these humble beginnings, the work has grown so that today there are 7 residential homes for boys aged 11-18 in South India and one in Thailand, each housing 70 youngsters, as well as 5 similar projects for girls and younger children. The charity also helps hundreds of children in community projects, giving them valuable support in their education. Based in Peterborough, the Joe Homan Charity aims to help these disadvantaged children and improve their opportunities and lifestyle by encouraging them to obtain education, and vocational training to develop their self-esteem - enabling them to break out of the poverty trap. Where circumstances are so poor that their families are unable to support them, the Boys and Girls Homes provide these children with a home from home. There are also opportunities for children within community projects, whose continued education is threatened by family poverty. The majority of JHC work is funded through individual sponsorship of the Children. General donations support children and communities for whom no individual sponsors have been found. The Charity works closely with local NGOs. Regular visits to supported projects, along with written reports on each pupil by volunteers and good financial stewardship, allows the Charity to monitor their achievements. The Patron of JHC is Chris Mullin He is an author, journalist and former MP, a minister in three departments and chairman of the Home Affairs select committee. Chris is currently a judge for The Man Booker Prize, 2011, and Chairman of the Heritage Lottery Fund for the North East of England. His widely acclaimed diaries have been on the BBC, and he is much in demand as a public speaker. Having been taught by Joe Homan in Ipswich, Chris' involvement in humanitarian causes goes back many years. His good nature and good humour have brought him many friends, including the Dalai Lama. For more information and contact details, go to www.joehoman.org.uk	Seeing a healthy future for Vidhya - and India After her time in Madurai Sevashram Girls Home, last year Vidhya went off to a one-year general nursing course in Coimbatore. She is currently at Aravind Eye Hospital on a 3-year course specialising in eye care. N Krishnaveni - Staff Nurse Krishnaveni was an only child when her father died and Mother, unable to support her on her meagre earnings as a farm coolee (daily paid casual labourer), gratefully placed her in Rengasamy Childrens Village. She continued into Inner Wheel Girls Town for her secondary and higher secondary schooling, finally gaining admittance to a private college for her four year BSc. Nursing course. Working initially as a Staff Nurse in the low-paid private sector her career and earnings took a welcome boost with three years as a Nursing Tutor. During this time she married and, in May 2009 took up her present post as Staff Nurse in the Public sector, currently earning Rs 34,000 monthly and able to live at home, a 10 minute bus ride away. Below the surface another story unfolds. Hers was an arranged marriage, her husband Ranjithkumar a labourer in a cotton mill, having dropped out early from secondary school. Two years ago both his parents suffered strokes, requiring full-time care. So now he stays at home caring for them and Krishnaveni supports her extended family with both her salary and her nursing knowledge and skills. Her own mother is a farm coolee earning Rs 100 daily when work is available. She lives elsewhere but her daughter visits every two or three months. Krishnaveni gives a clue to the special mind-set which helps her to face the challenges at work and at home. Asked the most enjoyable part of her work, she replies instantly "Service!" "Yes," she muses, "I do think of my sponsors – I didn't ever meet them but I'd like to say thank you. Without JHC and my sponsors, I couldn't have become educated and would still be a coollee, like my Mom." G Pitchaimani - Physiotherapist When the Child Labour Prevention scheme came to his village in 1995, it meant Pitchaimani could start secondary school. School costs were paid by the scheme, which also gave his parents two Jersey calves to rear. Milk income lifted his family from poverty and, given his excellent 10th standard results, financed his higher secondary education. Again high marks in the science stream gained him a college place to study physiotherapy, supported by The Boys Town Society. With his Bachelor of Physiotherapy and associated internship completed, The Leprosy Mission Trust in India appointed him to their hospital at Purulia, West Bengal as Research Physiotherapist in 2008. For the next four years he studied part-time for his MSc. in Medical Sociology. Currently he's a Research Physiotherapist cum Social Worker at The Leprosy Mission Hospital, Kolkata and studying for his Post Graduate Diploma in NGO Management. "Sponsorship by JHC through The Boys Town Society let me continue in school and has given me a great future. Without that I'd probably have been a daily-paid labourer in a firework factory or textile mill. My family's life has changed too. They have economic security and are well respected socially. I'm very grateful"

	For more information at any time, contact The Conductor of Just1, Hugh Gibbons a keen JHC supporter who sponsors a fine lad E-mail: hughgibbons@just1.org.uk Tel: 01344 451847 Write: 75 Qualitas Roman Hill Bracknell Berks RG12 7QG United Kingdom www.just1.org.uk