Thursday, January 7, 2010: The Society for Indian Children's Welfare Orphanage

After spending a wonderful evening with the individuals that power the Society for Indian Children's Welfare, it was time to see the fruits of their labor.  SICW (commonly called "CQ") was created in 1979 - the international year of the child.  Since then it has served the needs of destitute, abandoned, orphaned and special needs children.  SICW provides a wide range of services - from placing children with loving families to educating them, providing vocational training, ensuring medical treatment, providing counseling services, facilitating pediatric heart and eye surgery and helping to raise funds for Thalassemia, an inherited blood disorder common in India characterized by less hemoglobin and fewer red blood cells in your body than normal.

We arrived at the orphanage mid-morning and were greeted at the door individually by CQ children who placed beautiful flower wreaths around our necks.  We gathered in the CQ office where Swaran Chaudhry, CQ's Executive Director, described CQ's operations and introduced us to the staff members.  Besides the Board of Directors, Swaran introduced us to Nishita Garg, Sheela Adige, Koel Chowdhury, Shilu Pathak, Avani Mewar, Yvonne Kumar, Alpana Kumar, Akbari Begum, Prabha Katyal, Gabriel Gayen, Minakshi Bhattacharya, and Tapati Majumdar. 

Swaran and the Board members told a number of the many success stories with children from the orphanage, including two former residents who were adopted by Swedish families and have been very successful.  The two young adults, Patrik Nilsson and Nandini Sjostrom, happened to be visiting Calcutta at this time so we had the chance to meet them.  Then it was time to meet the current residents.  The children were very happy, bright, and capable, considering the severe handicaps of some of the children. 

Patrik Nilsson and Nandini Sjostrom