An attempt to save children. Please help.

When I opened my blog on Blogger, I was not only glad with all the UI and the features that Blogger had to offer but also happy about SocailVibe which is such an easy way to spread the word and help the needy. As you can see in my blog’s sidebar (to the right) that I have added the SocialVibe badge. Through Blogger and SocialVibe.com, I have joined the “Keep A Child Alive” Cause that fights for children with AIDS in India and Africa. Please do click on the badge in the blog sidebar and give those children few minutes of your time. This cause has earned around $2000 till date and we need more. Just a free click, and you can save a child’s life! Don’t look at this as an advertisement, or those irritating surveys for torrents, etc. Its not!!! This is just an intelligent idea to save and contribute towards a good cause, by using the internet to its full extent.

I have joined the “Keep A Child Alive” Cause which provides free treatment to the AIDS affected children in India and Africa. India is one of the worst AIDS affected countries in the world and also, being an Indian made me choose this cause. After all, little children have no reason to suffer like this. So please… all I’m asking of you is ONLY 3 minutes of your time.

Click the badge in the sidebar to you right and follow the instructions. Its not going to take you more than 3 minutes to complete the whole process. The company that is enrolled with us for sponsoring will ask you a few questions for their surveys and to advertise their products (within 3 minutes). You will have an option to choose whether you want to move further for the next activity. The more activities you try out, the more treatment hours will be added to the counter and therefore, more help to the helpless children. So please make your contributions.

Again, my earnest advice to you is not to look at this as an advertisement because it’s not!! Just 3 minutes of your time, and your contributing to an ocean of help that is going forward to save these innocent lives. For more info, visit SocialVibe.com. Thank you so much. Let’s make this world a better place to live in, in whatever small or big way possible.

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Inspirers: Shourya Saluja

This is the first of my Inspirers series of posts. This is to highlight and showcase special people who from an ordinary life make extraordinary things, through their ideas, determination and talent. The first post here is about a 17 year old boy, Shourya Saluja. I read about him this morning in the Times of India and I thought that I must share this with you.

Shourya Saluja, a Class 12 student of Bangalore’s Indus International School is devising a curriculum For Classes IX to XII which will create awareness about cyber safety. While most kids his age are freaking out on social networking sites, he’s rather wary of dangers lurking within these. Now, he’s developing a curriculum on cyber security with the help of Infosys which will be taught first in his school and later perhaps adopted by CBSE.

"Children disclose too much information in their profiles, they upload photos and accept random people as friends just to increase the number in their friends’ list. They don’t know what dangers this can lead to," said Shourya. Kids will also be taught how to protect themselves from dangers like phishing messages, things to look after in a Local Area Network (LAN), internal security. Shourya plans to rate the success of his programme after six months and then seek the Central Board of Secondary Education’s approval to include it in the curriculum. He says he got the idea when his 10-year-old sister asked him to create a Facebook profile with all her information. "I realized that many children are ignorant about consequences of this," he said.

While I searched the net for more info about this inspiring kid, I came across one more of his positive endeavours that will help society. Shaurya organised a Squash workshop, which was conducted by Satinder Bajwa, Harvard University Head Squash Coach, with proceeds going to a Squash academy that coaches rural children. “The best way to promote sports is through communities. If we can support the needy through such initiatives, even better,” says Shaurya. The proceeds will go to Khelshala, an organization in Attawa village in Chandigarh, which was founded by Bajwa himself with the aim of making squash accessible to underprivileged children in the villages nearby. A good squash player himself, Saluja plans to train further and play professional squash. He was ranked ninth in Malaysia, where he lived a few years back, in the Under-15 category at the Kuala Lumpur Junior Open Squash Championship 2007.  After moving to Bangalore a couple of years back, he has been participating in interschool and state championships.  His other interests include basketball, judo and football.

I’m sure Shaurya has more plans and ideas up his sleeve, that willgeneral brighten up this society more. Imagine if we could all take measures to imitate his work in the way we can. Are you an expert in singing? Couldn’t you train your watchmen’s children to sing if they’re earning just to pay for the singing classes? Imagine the speed at which our country will develop if all of us share our powers. Shaurya is a name truly deserved. Keep it going…

You can find Shaurya on Facebook or Twitter… but yes, I guess he will add you only if he knows you well. You can also visit the Khelshala Fan Page on Facebook.

Courtesy: The Times of India, Mangalore, Monday August 2nd, 2010 and Citizen Matters, Bangalore

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