CHENNAI, India -- : “Dear Prime Minister, I wish you a safe and successful trip to New York. I hope you will remember me and other children like me in India, when you discuss about the MDGs and make decisions” - Nirmala, 12, Hyderabad.
This is the letter that more than 25,000 children from different parts of India sent out on a postcard to the Prime Minister over the last couple of weeks. Each one of the 25,000 plus postcards represents the voices of over 400 million children in India, even as we inch closer to the 2015 deadline for the Millennium Development Goals.
As the deadline for achieving the MDGs draws to a close, India is at a critical juncture. World Vision India that initiated the postcard campaign recognizes and celebrates the efforts made till-date to achieve MDGs in India. In the past few years many of the schemes for children’s well being have been made entitlements. There has been progressive reduction in the child mortality rates and dramatic increase in the number of children going to school. The most recent Food Security Bill is a big opportunity towards fulfillment of MDGs, the largest social entitlement by any Government in the world.
However, progress has always passed the poorest communities and the most vulnerable children. Too many children fall through this gap and the current MDGs ignore inequalities that have increased within and between countries.
Despite remarkable progress made during the last few years after the launch of National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), we still lag behind in meeting the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) targets for improving child and maternal health by 2015.
On behalf of the millions of children, World Vision India, through this campaign urges the Prime Minister to emphasise in his speech at the UNGA – (1) the need for the MDGs accelerated efforts to recognise the millions of children who are not currently part of MDGs achievements and gains. These children still lack life-saving vaccines, protection, live in fragile contexts, face inequality and discrimination and millions continue to die from largely preventable causes. (2) The high importance for the Post-2015 development framework to have children at its core. Children need to be an integral part of the “bold vision” to eradicate poverty in our lifetime, because failure to do so will have devastating consequences for today’s generation of children, the youth they will become later and the adults of tomorrow.
“As we make the final push towards the deadline for the MDGs, there is an urgency to do more and to do everything and take action to reach the most vulnerable children for whom the rights are still not real,” said Dr. Jayakumar Christian, CEO of World Vision India.
India, represented by the Prime Minister, will participate in the 68th Session of the United Nations General Assembly and the Special Event to follow up on MDGs to be held on 25 September in New York.
