News

On Sunday, The Sreepur Village, celebrated the 48th Independence Day by participating in different programmes organised by the Sreepur Village School.

As a first phase of the programme, the children of the Sreepur Village School celebrated the free spirit of the Bangladeshi Independence day with great fervour and joy. In excited anticipation, they gathered in the school grounds for an assembly while the national flag was hoisted by Pat and Imran (our two directors) and the melody of the national anthem of Bangladesh played in the background.

As it is #NutritionMonth and #youcancareweek would you like to see what snacks The Sreepur Village provides the children during school times?

Living in a remote village in Bangladesh’s Sunamgaj District, Runu Bala struggled to feed her three children. Without land and living near to Tanguar Haor - a large wetland area in North-Eastern Bangladesh that gets flooded for five to six months of the year - it was hard for Runu to grow vegetables or other crops. Vegetables are an essential source of nutrition for a sound and healthy body, but in Bangladesh, two out of every three children born are underweight due to malnutrition.

In Bangladesh, many mothers, like Runu, don't have enough land to cultivate vegetables conventionally. Sack gardening does not require much space and a variety of vegetables can be grown according to need and taste. The bags are also easy to move, which is important for families living on 'char' lands (River Island) and riverbanks, who are often forced to move as their villages become flooded. The large majority of our mothers are from the Char area.

In celebration of International Women’s Day 2018, the mothers’ association of the Sreepur Village arranged a cultural programme and led a discussion which focussed on this year’s theme of #PressforProgress. It was an opportunity for the Sreepur mothers to celebrate womanhood in all its form and during the two-hour long discussion, the mothers primarily discussed the importance of self-reliance, training and development, they also thanked The Sreepur Village for supporting them and their children.

Today is International Women's Day and The Sreepur Village would like to share with you a story of hope and empowerment:

After the death of her husband, Khadija and her three children were evicted from their home by her husband’s elder brother. Abandoned and alone the only option for Khadija and her children was to move to Dhaka. 

It was whilst living in a park that Khadija’s children met an organisation that offered to refer them all to The Sreepur Village (Shishu Polli Plus), the only residential mother and child project in Bangladesh. Without The Sreepur Village Khadija would have had to place her children in institutional care and spend the rest of her life alone on the streets of Dhaka.

Today is World Book Day and The Sreepur Village would like to take this opportunity to share with you the story of Alo, a 45-year-old mother of four children and whose name means light.

Alo, real name Sobeda Begum, lost her husband 12 years ago just before the birth of her youngest son. Her husband was an agriculture labourer and the only earner of the family and one day he never returned home. Due to Alo’s early marriage she never had the opportunity to go to school.

As today is Rare Disease Day we would like to share with you the story of Surzo (meaning sun in English), a boy whose left leg was infected by a rare bone infection called Osteomyelitis.

Surzo, whose real name is in fact Nahid, was only 12 years old when he fell from a high brick stake whilst playing with friends. After 3-4 days he got a very high fever and became unconscious. Immediately, Surzo was taken to The Sreepur Village Health Clinic but due to his high fever and unconsciousness and the concerns of The Sreepur Clinic, he was taken to a nearby NGO clinic named Public Health Centre (well known as Gonosyastho Kendra (GK). The GK clinic also failed to identify the reasons for Surzo's condition. After thorough consultation between The Sreepur Village and the GK Clinic staff, Surzo was immediately sent to a government hospital in Dhaka accompanied by one of The Sreepur Clinic’s trained nurses.

As International Mother Language Day, held annually on February 21, is such a significant event, we would like to share with you, in detail, the activities that The Sreepur Village organised on this most memorable day.

For some, a routine visit to the dentist is the norm but for many Bangladeshi's this is not the case.

As the majority of the women and children of The Sreepur Village have never ever been to a dentist the prevalence of their dental suffering is quite high.

As this week is Sexual Abuse and Sexual Violence Awareness Week we wanted to share with you the story of one of our beneficiaries. By raising awareness, we hope that more people will be able to help put an end to such brutalities.

Presently, at The Sreepur Village, 60% of the mothers have faced some form of sexual abuse or violence in their lifetime. We would like to share with you the story of Sathi who is unmarried and an under-aged mother of The Sreepur Village

To mark the end of Story Telling Week we are delighted to share with you some pictures of our new library, currently being updated.

Led by Matthew, our child development specialist, the school teachers have been busy working on modernising The Sreepur Village school library. Last year, we restructured our school and teaching system so that we could improve each-and-every child’s learning experience, and to keep in line with these plans, the library is now being reorganized, painted and most importantly filled with a selection of new book

In rural Bangladesh public transportation is a nightmare for women, especially for the poor and marginalised. If our mothers could learn vital skills in repairing bicycles such as how to fix a puncture, then this would help them in many ways. With such skills, the mothers could set up their own businesses, they could also save money by repairing their own bikes, and ultimately by learning to cycle this would not only give them freedom but would also be a life saver in the villages especially in the Char (River Island).

The Sreepur Village would like to send their heartiest congratulations to Becky Horsbrugh who yesterday crossed the 16-km Bangla Channel from Teknaf to Saint Martin’s Island in the Bay of Bengal. She is the first British citizen to have completed this challenge

"After nourishment, shelter and companionship, stories are the thing we need most in the world." Philip Pullman

The Sreepur Village, a UK-based charity, provides a safe haven for over 400 children and 150 mothers in rural Bangladesh. Living alone in fear and not knowing where the next meal is coming from is the start of many a story, and one that all of our beneficiaries have been able to share.

Everyday on the grounds of the CMC (Child and Mother Care) our Baby-House's children have their lunch under the big water tank. 

“Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home -- so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world” Eleanor Roosevelt (The Chair of the drafting committee of The Universal Declaration of Human Rights).

Today, the world will be observing Human Rights Day, and if you follow The Sreepur Village, you will see how we wholly support this declaration.