Delhi Slum kids run Balaknama Newspaper | Fusion - WeRIndia

Balaknama, a quarterly newspaper on the lives of street children is run by slum kids in New Delhi. These kids focus on various problems faced by street kids including police brutality, drug abuse, sexual abuse, child marriage and all other issues in their daily lives.

Chetna – an NGO pays the production costs for this newspaper and offers education and training for the kids who write as journalists for this newspaper. They also receive stipends for their travel and other expenses to cover stories. The novice journalists of Balaknama earn money by doing works like washing cars, working at hotels, and collects trash from the street.

Though only half of slum population in New Delhi is literate, Balaknama has a great popularity due to its real stories contributed by street children from their personal experiences. Others focus on good deeds that street kids have done. The readership has been increasing and at present it is in tens of thousands. This newspaper is printed in Hindi.