After an unforgettable 16 days journey through India, the Focus India delegation is back on Swiss soil. Read more about the delegation’s experiences and newly acquired insights in Mumbai.
On the way from Pune to Mumbai the Focus India delegation went to visit one of the three Schindler training centers in India on 30 March 2016. In this way we got the unique opportunity to gain an insight into an advanced and sustainable training program that perfectly matched the project’s overarching theme of gain, train and sustain. Schindler’s education always aims to accomplish even small things to perfection. Therefore, they encourage their employees to develop their skills and they promote corporate responsibility at all levels. The company’s goal is to build a skilled workforce of technical engineers that can provide best-in-class service and do installations of global standards.
The education has several stages and is implemented in a very practical and purposeful way. We were very impressed about the diversity of that system, because Schindler offers its employees not only a very solid in-house training but also opportunities for global career programs where they get a chance to work overseas.
During the visit we had the great chance to see how Schindler trains and sustains its employees within the several education units escalator simulations, troubleshooter cases, commissioning, practice training, safety systems and many more. In summary, they have a world class training center.
After visiting the training center, we were allowed to also visit the company’s headquarters in India. This was about an hour’s drive from the Mumbai city center. Shortly after, we were honored by a speech of Mr. Uday Kulkarni, Managing Director Schindler India. He told us a lot about the evolution of the market, staff training and the development of training centers. After that we had a valuable interaction with Ranjeet Sharma, Deputy General Manager – Sales & Marketing. We learnt a lot about the great history of the Schindler Group in the last 10 years. We also got a lot of impressions which innovations are being introduced and planned in the group for the next years.
All in all, the Focus India delegation enjoyed the interesting and very interactive day at Schindler India. We could feel the very pleasant working culture and the passion of Schindler for educating its employees. For this great day, the warm welcome and the very valuable insights we would like to thank Schindler once more.
On the last official day on site, the Focus India delegation went to visit the NGO Magic Bus.
India has one of the biggest shares of very poor people in the world. About four hundred million people live on less than one dollar every day in India. One of the key challenges to move away from poverty, which those people face every day, is their lack of access to schooling facilities and education. Magic Bus intends to break this vicious circle of poverty and empower the children in the areas of education, health and gender.
Magic Bus mentors some of the poorest children in the world who are living in slums and generally very poor conditions. It tries to guide and educate the children in a way that they have the possibility to make the right choices early on in their lives. Magic Bus aims to promote gender equality in the society and enable access to education for the children, while developing, the kids emotional as well as socials skills for their own life. For that purpose Magic Bus employs adults, which themselves have come from similar or the same situation as the children, to teach the children and serve them as a role model. Through sporting activities and games, the mentors try to make the program attractive, fun, lively and educating for the children.
The young people completing the program of Magic Bus gain access to a youth development platform called Connect. The platform offers skills training as well as counselling services for the kids on their next steps to employability and eventually a better life. Magic Bus aims to work with existing structures in local communities such as other NGOs, local schools and the government to embed their program within the communities and make it become self-sustaining. Magic Bus is one of the largest sports for development organisations in the world and already changed the lives of more than 200’000 children.
Dharavi is known as one of the biggest slums in Asia and was founded in 1882. The official number of Dharavi’s population is 1 million people whereas the inofficial number is expected to be even higher. Dharavi’s area reaches to 1.75 sq km which approximately corresponds to 500 soccer pitches. The slum is divided into two parts: the commercial and the residential area. People who live in the residential part often work outside Dharavi, whereas people who live in the commercial part mostly work there too.
Their main businesses are the processing and production of leather and textiles, pottery and plastic recycling. 80% of the garbage from the city of Mumbai is brought to Dharavi for recycling processing which equals to 4’000 tons of garbage every day. The yearly turnover in Dharavi is estimated at USD 665 million. Dharavi exports its goods globally, but also to Indian shopping malls and markets. Many people who work in Dharavi come from all over the country and often stay for a few months only to earn money for their families.
Raj, one of our guides from Reality Gives, also lives in Dharavi together with his parents and two siblings. Together they share a 4 sqm sized room and he is guessing that if they would sell it they could earn approximately 1.5 million rupees.
Dharavi is an extremly well functioning system with its own hospital, fire stations, police stations, schools, shops, churches, temples and mosques. It is a very multi-cultural and multi-religious place. In the whole area of Dharavi there are only 700 toilets available which means that more than 1’400 people share the one toilet. Dharavi faces huge issues with pollution and public health due to the industries, the poor standards of hygiene in the lavatories and the missing sewage system.
Raj explained that the police is very strict and because of that there is hardly any crime. Even though we saw a lot of poverty in Dharavi, we experienced many happy encounters and there was no begging at all.
The NGO Reality Gives, founded in 2008, supports the Dharavi community with its youth empowerment program. Its target group are young people at the age of 16 to 30 years and its main goal is to provide quality education about computers, English language and soft skills which especially are important for interviews. According to our guide these topics are usually not weighted enough by the public school system and that is why Reality Gives tries to fill this gap. Raj further explained that if one fluently speaks English it is easy to gain access to the some parts of the job market, e.g. to work for a restaurant or a shop. Reality Gives’ education program is funded by donations from individuals and through the tourist tours they organise.
This is the last blog-post about our activities during the on-site seminar in India. Thanks for your interest – what a journey!
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