Delhi street kids to get set for UNICEF mission

Indo-Asian News Service

New Delhi, November 5

A special UNICEF project aims to turn a gaggle of street children in New Delhi into roving puppeteers who use their marionettes to teach safe sex, promote AIDS awareness, gender equality and sensitivity to everyone from truck drivers to friends, family and peers.

Spread over the next two years, the project would be conducted by the city-based Ishara Puppet Theatre Trust and the Salaam Balak Trust.

"We will first have a large group of street children who will attend extensive workshops," said Dadi Pudumjee, head of the Ishara Puppet Theatre Trust. "From these, we will pick a core group of 25-30 children who will be our campaigners."

These children would then go around the city and hold puppet shows to teach groups like truck drivers that are specially susceptible to HIV/AIDS.

Truck drivers travel great distances on the highway and are in frequent contact with sex workers, which make them potential AIDS victims

"This kind of activism works the best because puppets can say things that human beings cannot and children say things adults cannot," said Pudumjee, who has been a puppeteer for the last two decades. The puppeteers will give four performances in different locations and will be paid as well.

"Though no one will be paid during the training workshop, the core group, once selected, will be paid," said Pudumjee.

"We are looking to make this an alternate profession for these children, a different way to make a living, through which they can also contribute to society and teach a few things to their peers."