Keep a Child Alive

Day 23 - Aanchal: A Home to Call Their Own

The spirit of the RNP+ Aanchal Care Home in Jalore is one of love.  Located in rural Jalore, the orphan care home was established by the Rajasthan Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS (RNP+) to provide a safe haven for the most vulnerable children in the community.  Many of these children have lost their parents to AIDS, and their remaining family members are too poor or unwilling to care for them.  At the Aanchal Care Home, 28 children have found shelter, access to education, proper nutrition and medical care.

Intense stigma about HIV/AIDS still permeates the rural community where the Aanchal Care Home is located.  Therefore, when the Keep a Child Alive team visited the home at the end of last year, we met with the urgent need to re-house these children in a larger, more comfortable, secure home.  With the support of the District Collector, two properties were donated to RNP+ in a more secure location to be renovated for the new home.  And in the first week of May, the children moved into their new beautiful home!

The new home is more centrally located now to where the children attend school in Jalore.  The boys’ quarters are painted blue and green, and the girls’ quarters are pink and orange.  On May 6th, the District Collector cut the ribbon to mark the official opening of the new homes, and all the children ran in, their faces lit with joy.  They climbed up onto their brand new bunk beds, hugging and laughing with each other.  Others ran around outside and immediately started playing on the swings.  The new Aanchal Care Home is set up to allow all these children the chance to be kids again, something that they all deserve.

Keep a Child Alive is continuing to work with RNP+ to help address the stigma around HIV/AIDS that exists in the communities in which they work, to ensure that these children have a positive environment to grow up in.

This is why we do what we do at Keep a Child Alive. Text BUYLIFE to 90999 to give $10 to help us continue these inspirational stories of hope, love and strength.

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