An educated girl becomes integral to the social fabric. Her learning and skills break the historical cycle of ignorance. When a child on the street grows up begging, the suffering is unimaginable. Ignorance and delusions make up their living habitat with neither confidence nor hope. 

The young girl and the lives of those around her are ruined—a social curse that is perpetuated generation after generation.

Growing up in Vrindavan, Sherin's life took a dramatic turn when her father was diagnosed with cancer. Coming from a financially weak background, her unemployed mother was forced to take care of him and their four children. 

Being a fatal disease as it was and despite the expensive treatment, Sherin's father passed away after two years in 2009. The intense life became more difficult for the mother and the kids. Although her mother was always concerned about their education and upbringing, it became difficult to pay for education. 

Sherin, a young girl from Vrindavan. 

However, they found some relief when they heard about the Educate a Girl project offered by Food For Life Vrindavan. Sherin immediately came to take admission and was offered education free of charge. 

Food For Life Vrindavan (FFLV) was founded by Rupa Raghunath Das 31 years ago. It aims to educate the poor girls in Vrindavan and empower them to transform their lives and take their families out of the vicious cycle of poverty. 

Rupa Raghunath Das had the vision, skills, and persistence to develop FFLV from a food distribution program into an organization that seeks long-lasting solutions and effectively helps to improve all areas of life in Vrindavan. 

The Educate a Girl project has given free education to more than 1800 girls from kindergarten to graduation. 

Fighting for women

Vrindavan is one of the holiest towns in the world. There are thousands of temples, and many new buildings are being made with commercialisation. But right outside them are hundreds of slums and kids begging. 

Since 1991, FFLV has been working at the grass-root level to stop child marriage by educating underprivileged girls from these areas providing them with free quality education with vocational training, nutritious meals, sports gymnasium, medical facilities and transportation. 

FFLV providing free meals.

The Educate a Girl project is powered by sponsorships offered by donors. Educating one girl costs Rs 3500/ month and Rs 42,000/ year. The break up of this includes quality education, nutritious breakfast, and lunch, transportation, uniforms, books, stationery, school maintenance & FFLV admin cost. The organization is supported by donors across the globe some of them are The First Company and The Body Shop. 

One of the donors, Suzanne and Dr. Ludwig Jacobs, Founder, and owner Dr. Jacobs Medical, Germany said, “ We value and support the focus on education. We are very impressed with the student's attitude, their understanding of a good education, and how hard they work for it with such strong determination. We spoke to some of our sponsored students during our last visit to experience these young ladies growing into educated, strong women."

New generation of empowered women

When Sherin joined the program she enjoyed the classes every day and never missed school. Always a social and outgoing girl, she was very supportive of her classmates and enthusiastic about participating in extracurricular activities and stage performances in the school. She always represented FFLV as our student on international platforms as well.  

Various training programs for students. 

Sherin has completed her school with a specialization in the science field, and a Bachelor's degree and is now working at FFLV as the assistant of Public Relations. 

Today, FFLV runs 3 schools providing free education to over 1800 students in the Vrindavan region. Their main objective is to educate girls and reduce child marriage cases to take them out of this social fabric of poverty.