The Little Flowers Creche, Dharamsala, HP, India

Introduction

• In the wake of the Chinese occupation of Tibet in 1959, His Holiness the Dalai-Lama of Tibet, led by 85,000 Tibetans, fled Tibet and took political assylum in India.
• The sole aim of taking refuge in exile is to fight for our lost independence based on non-violence. With due regard to this goal, His Holiness the Dalai-Lama established the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) or the Tibetan-Government-in-exile in 1960 based in Dharamsala, North India.
• With the aim of looking after and taking care for the children of the working parents of CTA, the "Little Flowers Creche" came into existence.
• Initially it was held in a rented room which couldn't accomodate the incresaging number of staff children.
• The Department of Education has kindly raised the fund for the present creche building which was constructed in 1993, which consists of 3 rooms : one classroom for the elder children, one room for the boisterous play activities, and one sleeping room
• The Little Flowers Creche is run by the Parents' association, consisting of 5 members who are elected among the concerned parents. These members work for the creche in the capacity of the following posts for which no salary/wages is paid

The term of membership is one year

• At present, there are 45 children from the age of 6 months to 4 years. The children who crosses the age of 4 are sent to the pre-primary school.
• Children between 6 months to 2 1/2 years are taken care of by 3 foster mother/ayahs and those above 2 1/2 are looked after by 2 nursery teachers who teaches them the basic prayers, alphabets and other basic concepts.

  Problems and needs

• Since the creche is managed and run by the association of parents who are already engaged in their office work for full time and who has no source of income for the creche, it is quite difficult for them to run the Creche and hence its development is stagnant.
• The present facilities of the Creche is so poor. The children sit and play on the bare floor. There is neither any bed for the babies to sleep nor any desk/benches for the elder children to sit in the classroom.
• They use mattresses which are very old wear off. It has been so many years that the rooms need whitewashing and painting. The children have very limited toys to play with.
• For the foster mothers and teachers, they get salary ranging from Rs 1,270 to Rs 1,670 based on seniority. The present salary needs to be increased as it is quite low in an expensive place like Dharamsala.
• Coming to the question of their healthcare and nutrition, only a cup of milk and a small bread is provided for the children. There isn't any first aid facilities which is important and essential for boisterous innocent children.
• The source of the fund of the Creche is the monthly fee collected from the parents. It is a fact that the fee alone cannot cover the vast expenditure of the Creche.
• So the parents association is compelled to seek support from the individual donors and funding organisations.
• Presently the Creche get regular support of Canadian dollars 1,500 annually from the Trans-Himalayan Aid Society based in Canada and a support of some thousand rupees from the Central Social Welfare Board of India.
• As the total expenditure exceeds total income, the Creche has been undergoing a deficit of approximately Rs 50,000 annually.
• Therefore it has become an urgent and important responsibility of the management to raise fund through any possible means. The management sincerely request support from generous individuals and organisations for any of the following categories :

Kindly make donations/bankdrafts/cheques payable to :

Postal address :

General Secretary

Little Flowers Creche

C/o His Holiness the Dalai-Lama's Religious and Cultural Society

Gangchen Kyishong, Dharamsala 176215

District Kangra, Himachal Pradesh INDIA

Tashi Delegs and Thank You.

Copyright © 1996-2016 Roger Garin-Michaud
ABN: 13772792037
last updated: October 1st, 2017