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Eight Dharavi school girls manage to win US online funding programme

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Hidden in a tiny by-lane of Dharavi is a bright blue room, where over 20 children are reading everything from Disney comics to science fiction. The small room, with wooden shelves on both walls, is the Friends library.

The best part? It's run by eight class XI students.

The girls, from the Guru Nanak High School and Kamarajar Memorial High School in Dharavi, started the library in February.

The library has now over 350 books, which children can lend at a refundable deposit of Rs 20.

"Children in the area never got a chance to read as there was no library in the area," said Menaga Nadar, one of the founders.

The idea of a library struck them at the Avasara Leadership Fellows programme, an intensive after-school enrichment programme for adolescent girls from urban slums. It was here that they first read books beyond their texts.

However, turning the idea into a reality wasn't an easy task. "We started off with a plan. Initially, we wanted to run it for around six months. We realised we would need Rs 60,000," said Sweety Pavithra, one of the eight founders.

Hope came from the Avarasa programme itself. "We approached a teacher from the US, who was at the programme, to host a Kickstarter page for us."
Kickstarter is an online funding platform for creative projects, which allows people to present an idea to raise funds. Also, the project requires an American citizen to be part of the idea.

"The girls soon started creating content for raising funds and also made a video explaining their concept. In three days, the project received $ 4,795, almost five times the requirement.

The next step was to find the perfect space.

"Joba's (one of the girls from the group) parents offered us the first floor of their house for a rent of Rs 4,000," said Mansi Singh. The girls took over the place with a bucket of paint and brushes to add colour their dream.

The library, which is open only on weekends, has seen over 420 visitors since February 1.

"It's so great to see these girls work on their own. From planning, execution and problem solving, they have managed all by themselves," said Roopa Purushothaman, founder of Avasara Leadership Institute.

With more funds at their disposal, the girls are now planning to train a younger batch to run the library as they move to class X.


 

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