Prabha Hira Pratishthan

Nurtures and supports orphaned children living with HIV, providing a loving and stigma-free environment with comprehensive care and education

  • Gold Certified 2023
  • FCRA
  • 80G
  • 12A
  • CSR-1
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Gold Certified Gold Certified

About

  • Headquarters

    Pandharpur, Maharashtra

  • Since

    2001

Established in 2001 under Prabha-Hira Pratishthan, the Palawi project provides a Care Home for orphan children living with HIV, offering them a loving Read more and stigma-free environment. The organisation is dedicated to fulfilling the children's educational, nutritional, medical, and recreational needs, while also raising awareness about HIV/AIDS and sensitizing the general population to its prevalence. Founder and trustee, Mrs Mangal Shah, along with her family, has played a crucial role in supporting and nurturing HIV-positive children for the past 18 years, making Palawi a shining example of compassion and commitment. With a firm belief in addressing the broader needs of HIV-positive children beyond health, Palawi emphasizes nutrition, psycho-social support, education, legal assistance, livelihood opportunities, and social protection. Currently, the organisation provides a happy home to 150+ children, and the next generation of the family, including Mrs Mangaltai's daughter, son-in-law, and grandchildren, continue to contribute their support and expertise in running the institution, bringing positive changes to the lives of these children.


Issue

Mangal Shah is well-known humanitarian, a woman who has the will and power to dedicate over 50 years in the service of most excluded and most vulnerable community- HIV/AIDS positive children and people. She began her work in the field of HIV/AIDS in early 1990’s when the picture around the issue was only filled with deep stigma, stringent discrimination and a great despise. At very tender age of 17, when other family members devoted their time on puja-archana, Mangal shah realized that it always better to offer food and help someone who is in need. She approached doctors at government hospital and started to run a soup-kitchen for sick, leprosy patients, handicapped people, pregnant women, HIV/AIDS positive female sex workers who were admitted to the government hospital and had no family to provide food. It was a very common incidence at the hospital and occurred multiple times, that if a women delivered girl child, no family visited her in hospital. She was left alone in the hospital with bare care and support from anyone, Mangal Shah started to care and help such people. She began providing homecooked food to the needy patients at the hospital and she soon realized the need to work for the most excluded community of women in Solapur district, the female sex workers who have been affected by HIV/AIDS. Mrs Shah and her daughter Dimple were working to create awareness about HIV/ AIDS among the sex workers/prostitutes in Pandharpur. None of the villagers came forward to take care of the abandoned children. They were crying mercilessly and were in awfully bad condition with numerous wounds and small insects crawling on their body. They took the babies and rushed to a hospital immediately but as soon as the government hospital came to know about the children being HIV positive, they refused to admit HIV positive children stating that the government hospital has no guidelines and isolation centre to sustain PLWHA for long. The Doctors had opinion that the children will not survive for long after looking at their physical condition, incredibly weak and had many infections. After that they approached many other organisations, six to be precise. But they all refused to take care of HIV positive children. This incidence propelled Mangal Shah in 2001, with all courage, compassion and love, the project Palawi, under Prabha Hira Pratisthan began its mission to provide shelter and care home for HIV/AIDS orphan children and women. Other projects like Hirkarni targets the destitute women.


Action

The project Palawi under Prabha Hira Pratisthan founded in 2001. Since then, it continues to meet the urgency of the challenges faced by vulnerable and marginalized CLWHA/PLWHA. The Palawi mission focused on providing solutions and system-change for people living with HIV/AIDS. Providing a holistic approach towards ensuring a better life of HIV positive orphan children, women and HIV positive population in general. *Residential care-home for HIV positive orphan children *Education *Medical Assistance *Skill Development and Vocational Training * Awareness Campaigns *Empowering women and girls Since 2001, there has been a considerable growth in the admission of HIV positive children to our care home. In 2001 we started with 2 children, in 2005 we had 15 children admitted to the care home, the number increased to 69 between 2006-2010, during 2011-2015 the number increased to 88, there were 112 children in the year 2018, 2019-2020, there were 110 children at the project Palawi. At present we run a homely care-home for 150 HIV positive children. In other projects dedicated to destitute over hundreds of women were provided shelter and livelihood. It’s been over 22 years for the organization to work in this field and to give immediate and undeviating services to HIV positive orphan. In last 5 years only, over 10,000 general population have been sensitized through awareness campaign in the rural parts of Maharashtra. Palawi is committed to contain the spread of HIV/AIDS by emphasizing on awareness programs and targeting the vulnerable community. The central focus of our organization is to ensure rights, equality, and citizenship, Palawi has ensured access to treatment and care services for people living with HIV and orphan HIV positive children, mitigated stigma, and built agency among individuals from underserved and marginalized groups, and their families who face multiple socio-economic challenges owing to their HIV positive status. Over a period of 22 years Palawi has developed various programs and innovated multiple ideas to target the most-at-risk populations. Creating awareness among different strata of population. And providing a residential care home services for orphan children and people living with HIV/AIDS. It has served as a signboard for HIV positive orphan children. The vision of Palawi is to create a just and equitable society for HIV positive women, orphan children and HIV positive population in general. curbing the HIV epidemic necessitates broadening the scope of services beyond health, to encompass nutrition, psycho-social support, education, legal, livelihood and social protection. By bringing individuals from socially and economically excluded communities into agents of change. The young adults of Palawi age 16-23 years have begun their work in social fields and are already an agent of change through their direct involvement in our newly launched project Palawi – Parisparsh. The mission is to build bright and better environments that: - • To support and facilitate changes in the environment that enables the community to practice safer behaviors. These changes need to become policies and get implemented at state, district, and local levels. • Strengthen and empower individuals from excluded communities to understand their potential and act as agents of change. • Expand partnerships, networks, and linkages to catalyze a critical mass of such leaders. • Engage and influence governments, businesses, and other stakeholders to take this movement to scale. • Empowering the children and women affected by HIV/AIDS through vocational courses, providing access to education, enabling income generation opportunities and to live life with dignity. The project Palawi under Prabha Hira Pratisthan is an organization in Maharashtra which is considered as one of the hard-hit states in India in terms of prevalence of HIV/AIDS. Palawi is only few such institution in Maharashtra which has focused on providing solutions and system-change for people living with HIV/AIDS.

Demographies Served

Impact

She began her work in the field of HIV/AIDS in early 1990’s when the picture around the issue was only filled with deep stigma, stringent discrimination and a great despise. Mangal stood in that crowd for these unwanted, hated, and sick population. She became a ray of hope for these marginalised community. Her calibre speaks in her action to bring a humane change in the lives of thousands of people. Before coming to Palawi, each child had a very dark and gloomy past. After both parents have died from AIDS related illness, the child had to suffer at different levels by their distant or close relatives. Verbal and physical abuse, discrimination, stigma, lack or no food or clothes were part of their daily lives. Their minds had been scared with stigma and discrimination attached to HIV/AIDS, even before knowing or understanding the meaning of the word "HIV-positive". The children at incredibly young age were treated in inhumane ways. Discrimination intertwined with their everyday routine. The sad truth is that these vulnerable and hapless children had no place to go or survive. Many of them were abandoned at the railway station, bus stop or left all alone in a deserted place to die. Most of these children were found by local people or police and sent to Palawi. HIV positive children are most vulnerable and are marginalized, at the same time these children are as much an integral part of society as we are. Mangal shah and her organization should be selected because of the Impact/Outcome/contribution of the work done. The impact Palawi makes towards the most vulnerable and marginalized group affected by HIV/AIDS is no illusion but reality at the grass root level. People were reluctant to accept HIV positive orphan children into our society but its Mangal Shah’s commitment, perseverance and endeavours that has not only given a new meaning to the lives of these children but have made them a responsible citizen. The impact of HIV/AIDS related death or illness of parents has tremendous negative effect on children's education and health. Before coming to Palawi, 90% of the children were either school dropout or was not able to attend the school because of their health conditions. AIDS orphan usually lack parental care or financial resources for education and well-being. Most of the children in our care home comes from a low income or poor socio-economic status. But now, all the children above 5 years are getting a formal education in our very own educational unit of Prabha Hira Pratishthan, Gayanmandir. At the local level it is a huge change to see HIV positive orphan children not only going to school and receiving a formal education but also scoring excellent marks in their classes. When we see our young boys and girls earning their own livelihood by making informed decisions about their work and their life, it gives us immense pleasure. At Palawi Vocational Training Programme is introduced to enhance the livelihood opportunities of HIV –positive women and elder children. The Vocational Training Programme aims to develop entrepreneurial skill among them. The objective is to create a workforce empowered with improved skills and knowledge to gain access to decent employment and become self-sustained. Each child at Palawi is encouraged since very young age to be skilled in their area of interest. They are advocated and guided to become an agent of change and, just to our expectation, the adult residents of Palawi have been helping in other social projects of Prabha Hira Pratishthan. They are understanding the true meaning of " giving back to society". Most of the girls in project Palawi were admitted here in the residential care home with a very brutal and harsh experiences in their past lives. Some of them being raped or physically abused by their distant relatives. Many of them were tortured and forced to do all household work after their parents have died. They were refused admission into school. These girls are no longer in threat of being raped or ill-treated by any relatives. They are no longer ashamed of themselves. Continuous counselling and support from the organization in every possible way has definitely changed their mind and their life. It is great to see our girls confident, healthy, smart and educated. They are working as teachers, care givers, fashion designers etc. It is indeed a proud moment for us. The intervention in the area related to orphan children living with HIV/AIDS is absolutely important as these children are most vulnerable and marginalized. They can easily slip into dark circle of sexual exploitation, drug abuse, exploitative child labour, phyco-social distress, reduced access to health service, nutrition-shelter and material needs, withdrawal from school, economic problems, life on streets. They face horrible discrimination from their family and society at young age. The impact of HIV/AIDS related death or illness of parents has tremendous negative effect on children's education and health. • AIM 1: Ensure access to high quality medical care to all children resulting in a reduction in the opportunistic infections and hospitalizations. • AIM 2: Provide opportunities to access quality education to all children in the home. • AIM 3: A. Provide opportunities to access to career guidance, skill development trainings and mentoring for children to prepare towards transition to independent adult living. • AIM 4: Provide opportunities for children/youth to participate in decision making around their wellbeing as well as for using life skills in transition towards adulthood. • AIM 5: Building confidence and raising the children to be fearless and be informed about their rights. • AIM 6: The young children acting as an agent of change and giving back to society. Mangal Shah’s strength is her commitment to work at the grassroot level where the intervention is needed the most and to include the most vulnerable and marginalized population of the society and bring a social change. The forte of our organization is our capability to address the stigma and issues of such marginalized communities. We have developed various methods to respond to the need of the socially and economically excluded communities and to keep them in the centre of all our work. www.palawi.org

Programs

  • Palawi Care Home

    Offers a holistic approach to the health and welfare of HIV-positive children. It offers children a secure, loving, and stigma-free environment and works to give them the finest start in life possible by giving them love, care, and support. 150+ orphans who are HIV + and range in age from 1.6 months to 21 years are housed at Residential Care Home. The local hospitals, NGO's, and childcare facilities have referred them to the care facility, and some of the kids were found abandoned at the bus or train station.

Leadership Team

  • Mangal Arun Shah

    President

  • Dimple Rajkumar Ghadge

    Secretary

  • Ashish SHah

    Trust Member

  • Rutuja Shah

    Trust Member

  • Tejas Ghadge

    Partnership and Fundraising Manager

  • Kaushiki Sinha

    Partnership and Fundraising Manager

Demographics & Structure

  • No. of Employees

    21-50

M&E

  • Internal, External Assessors

    No

Policies

  • Ethics and Transparency Policies

    No

  • Formal CEO Oversight & Compensation Policy

    No

Political & Religious Declarations

  • On Affiliation if any

    No

  • On Deployment Bias if any

    No

Registration Details

  • PAN Card

    AABTP0199

  • Registration ID

    E772/Solapur

  • VO ID / Darpan ID

    MH/2018/0196357

  • 12A

    AABTP0199CE20215

  • 80G

    Pn/CIT-IV/T&J/80G/2011-12/671

  • FCRA

    083980078

  • CSR Registration Number

    CSR00016577

Location

  • Headquarters

    4588/1, Gandharv Apartment Gatade Plot Palawi Project Office,Behind HP Balaji Gas Godown, Pandharpur, 413304

    Directions
  • Offices in Cities

Other Details

  • Type & Sub Type

    Non-profit
    Trust

Financial Details

 Income / Expenses
  • 2019-20

    Income
    Rs.7,145,035
    Expenses
    Rs.7,145,034
    Admin Expenses
    Rs.1,240,223
    Program Expenses
    Rs.5,904,811
    Tip: Click on any value above to exclude it.
  • 2020-21

    Income
    Rs.7,668,163
    Expenses
    Rs.7,668,163
    Admin Expenses
    Rs.1,564,374
    Program Expenses
    Rs.6,103,789
    Tip: Click on any value above to exclude it.
  • 2021-22

    Income
    Rs.7,903,762
    Expenses
    Rs.7,903,762
    Admin Expenses
    Rs.1,441,948
    Program Expenses
    Rs.6,461,814
    Tip: Click on any value above to exclude it.