Are William and Kate following in Diana’s footsteps? There was certainly a sense of it yesterday when the couple decided to spend their only morning in Delhi on a low key visit to a drop-in centre for charity Salaam Baalak at Delhi train station and with a group of Indian women to discuss violence against women.
The drop-in centre is a lifeline for up to 7,000 kids a year ranging from age 8 to 15. They come to escape prostitution, people trafficking or sexual and physical abuse. With just a couple of media shadowing them, this was to be a time for the royal duo to really get to grips with the complex problems in India and spend quality time with the most vulnerable.
William joined in a board game while hearing about the children’s traumatic experiences. The charity’s director Sanjoy Roy explained: “The boys come here for four hours of lessons and some food every day. When they’re not here, they’re at the railway station.”
William asked: “Is that dangerous?” Mr Roy replied: “Yes so they try to stick together … every day around 40 to 50 new children arrive at the station. They often have to deal with trauma, learning difficulties, ADHD and we have special programmes to help them with that. These children are the most vulnerable. Some may have their eyes gouged out or hands hacked off. The primary reasons they run away from home are misunderstanding with step-parents, physical and mental abuse, incredible poverty or a life event such as forced marriage.”
William displaying his mum’s magic touch.
The charity has six homes, 21 contact centres and three Childline centres near stations, bus stands and railway stations across Delhi.
William asked: “What can we do to help?” Mr Roy replied: “Spread the word. People think of them as street kids, beggars, thieves but they are just children. They deserve an education, future and a life. They have a right to a childhood.”
The couple met Amir, 16, who’d become addicted to glue-sniffing nine months ago while living rough at the train station. Counsellors from Salaam Baalak had helped him get detox treatment and now he’s clean.
Kate was impressed with the camaraderie between the boys and William asked them what they hoped to be in the future. One said a doctor, another policeman and a third wanted to run his own shop.
“It’s very interesting that the kids want professional careers,” said William. “In the UK you ask them and they say footballers or pop stars. Is there the opportunity for them to do it, to have these professional careers – that’s the question?”
The charity’s managing director Sanjoy Roy said: “We hope so. If we can’t get them home the only thing to do is to send them back to school as soon as possible. We want them to study to enable them to have a future.”
The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge also met with a group of Indian women. The meeting was convened at the personal request of the Duke who wanted an opportunity to hear directly from women working to support other women and girls. He also wanted to get a sense of work being done to help young women to achieve their full potential and for men to become more supportive of the women and girls in their lives.
The couple met acid attack survivor Laxmi Agarwal and heard about her inspirational campaign ‘Stop Acid Attacks’. Laxmi was attacked at 15 by a 32-year-old man after she rejected his marriage proposal. She explained her decision to stop covering her face in order to encourage other victims not to hide and also spoke of her successful fight for tougher legal restrictions on the sale of acid.
Finally the royals met Sunita Jaiswal, a survivor of domestic abuse, who thanks to the support of Delhi’s Azad foundation, has turned her life around. Through the foundation Sunita was able to train as a driver, giving her independence and an income which allowed her to send her children to school. She told The Duke and Duchess that the confidence she gained through training allowed her remaining fear “to flow out of her” and she now faces the future with optimism.
It is issues like these that both Kate and William are beginning to get involved with and look like being a cornerstone of their future charity work.
Back to matters of state the couple then went for lunch with Indian Prime Minister Narenda Modi.
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