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Ashish Sharma with employees of Big Bazaar in Dimapur on Aug. 18.[/caption]
Eastern Mirror Desk
Dimapur, Aug. 18: Ashish Sharma, a 29 year man from New Delhi is on a mission. He wants to eradicate beggary from the entire nation, and he has undertaken the ardours task of walking through the length and breadth of the country with starting from Jammu spreading the message for a ‘beggar-free India’ or Unmukt India campaign. This determined young educated man after more than 8603 kms across 15 states since he started his journey on Aug. 22, 2017 is in Dimapur city and heading towards Kohima ready to spread his message throughout the northeast as part of the campaign.
Speaking to Eastern Mirror, Sharma narrated about an incident that touched his heart and compelled him to start his mission.
It all started one evening, Sharma narrated, while returning home he saw a malnourished child with bleeding hands begging around. Sharma was moved by the condition of the child, so he took him home, fed and clothed him and even enrolled the child in a school with the help of an NGO. That incident changed his life.
The incident changed his life. He quit his job as a mechanical engineer employed in an MNC company and embarked on the journey on foot to create awareness against children begging.
“After doing extensive research, I concluded that the condition was going from bad to worse. The government-run welfare schemes were not reaching those who actually deserved them, because of lack of awareness,” Sharma told Eastern Mirror.
“We cannot make people aware unless we meet them personally and a countrywide tour was perhaps the best way to meet the masses,” he said.
But journeying on foot is not an easy task, he conceded but firmly added, ‘my goal is to make India a nation free of child begging kept me going’.
Initially, his parents disproved of his idea, but now they are proud of him and are supportive in his mission.
He said he travelled around 30 to 40 km a day and met thousands of people to make them aware of the welfare schemes that could change an individual’s life.
Also addressing child rights issues, Sharma said that taking reformatory measures and empowering either vocational or regular education is the need of the hour. “The final vision is to make India a child begging free nation” he said.
When asked about the challenges he has faced so far, Ashish revealed that emotionally it was very difficult as he would have emotional breakdowns while walking. “Apart from my own breakdowns, it was very difficult to hear my parents get emotional and be worried”, he shared.
He also made known of how he slowly learned to take care of his wellbeing since physiotherapists were not always available. “My diet is simple, I am pure veg and a simple diet of just rotis and daal work for me”, he added.
Sharma believes that this movement is a psychological movement and in a group or team, a psychological movement is not as much as possible individually.
Ashish Sharma is one of the core founders of Duayen Foundation, a grass root movement for child protection and development has so far covered 180 districts and over 141 cities,
When asked if this walking would help in really eradicating begging, he replied that it will not directly but yet this was still the first phase. “As soon as I complete my journey me and my supporters will organise a huge rally in New Delhi on June 14, 2019 for awareness and then we will start sending children to schools from village levels”, he informed adding that the change he was aiming for is at a psychological level. “Once people get to know that someone is walking 17,000 km for a cause like child beggars and going through immense pain, they’ll also be touched at some level. This will help in getting them mobilised.”
He also informed that for the marathon he has programmed a mobile application called ‘Duayen’ in which he is connecting schools, hospitals, police stations, administrative officials and other government establishments to one another where zero tolerance towards child begging and abused children will be created.
The mobile applications can be of great use in identifying the lost kids and child beggars, helping them reach their homes,” he said.
