“He already recognizes it from a distance: our Back to Life logo! Whenever I run up the hill to the village in my Back to Life T-shirt, jacket or cap, he is already running towards me with a big smile on his face. This laugh full of happiness touches my heart every time “, says Govinda, one of our employees in Mugu. He works as a social worker for Gamtha, where we run a birthing center.
Instead of a sibling – tragic loss of the mother
Bhupendra is now five years old and healthy and happy. He was still a toddler when he lost his mother. So he can’t really remember her and doesn’t know what it’s like to have a mother. He often calls his grandmother “Mama” and gets sad when others reproach him for being his grandmother and not his mother.
Bhupendra’s father is mentally handicapped and cannot look after his son on his own. He has no job and lives with Bhupendra with his impoverished elderly parents in the Mugu mountains.
Bhupendra’s mother died under tragic circumstances: heavily pregnant, suffering from complications, she waited for the flight to the lowlands to come to the hospital. But before the plane landed in Mugu, she died of heavy bleeding right next to the runway. That happened in January 2016, Bhupendra was barely one and a half years old. At that time there was no birth house in or around Gamtha. At that time we were just starting construction and opened our birthplace in Gamtha in December 2016.
Direct help through a sponsorship
When our employees heard about the family’s plight, we decided to help them. The grandparents did not earn enough from the produce of their fields to support the family and were hungry. In addition, one of them always had to take care of the little one. We promised them regular social assistance such as clothing and supplementary food to help them survive.
Back to Life is not only building birthing centers and schools in Mugu. We want to change the hard and often hopeless life of the children there in a positive and lasting way and give them real prospects for the future. The key to this is education so that one day they can lead a self-determined life.
We support children like Bhupendra through our sponsorship program. The aim is not to tear them away from their family and environment, but to give them a livelihood.
Thanks to his godparents, Bhupendra becomes a schoolchild
Bhupendra started pre-school in 2019. We enrolled him in the Khesmalika elementary school in his village. Back to Life supports this remote school by equipping the attached kindergarten and classrooms, and we also give the teachers advanced training to help the children achieve greater learning success. The school is also part of our health program.
Bhupendra’s grandfather is delighted that his grandson can attend school thanks to the sponsorship and support of the family. “Now I know that Bhupendra has a secure future,” says the old man, relieved.
The boy is now in 6th grade and his teacher, Mr. Nanda Lal Sharma, is full of praise: “Bhupendra is a clever boy. Learning is easy for him and he gets top grades. With the support from Back to Life, he can achieve his secondary school leaving certificate or even the Abitur and learn a good profession.” Bhupendra’s big dream is to become a pilot.