Sponsor a child living in poverty in India.

The Sponsor a Child Programme at OSCAR Foundation was started in 2017 with an aim to uplift children from marginalised communities and help them access their rights.
With over 80 donors supporting 130 children this project has been one of the strongest pillars of our programme through the years.  

Read on to know more about the journey of Pooja - from a sponsored child since teenage she has grown to be a successful independent Coach who is leading our gender programme in the community

“I can help you. I will get a job and help the family,” a 13 year old Pooja said to her father, a cook at the Indian Navy while her mother sobbed silently in front of the charred remains of what used to be their home. The Gautams, a family of five lost their home and all their belongings to a fire in 2013. Her father refused to take her up on her offer. “You will help the family by studying and succeeding in life,” he said.

After convincing her parents that she wouldn’t let football affect her academics, Pooja joined OSCAR’s football and life skills sessions with her sister. Pooja said, “There was always something to learn on the pitch. We may fall down after a tackle but we get up and continue to play. We may concede a few goals down but we always try our best to come back. Football is a lot like life.”

Pooja also enrolled herself into the education programme as she had a keen interest in computers. She got to learn a number of new things at the OSCAR digital centre and was especially touched at how kind and genuine her teachers were. “Throughout my journey, my coaches and teachers have been compassionate. They genuinely cared about us and wanted to help us,” she said.

Pooja soon enrolled into the Young Leader programme and started working with her own girls’ batch. “I am so happy that I can impart what I have learnt to the next generation. Being an OSCAR Young Leader gives us an amazing opportunity to give back to the community,” she said. However, her journey as a Young Leader has had its fair share of challenges. “I realised that despite our work and success, people are not very open-minded. They do expect girls to stay at home and do household chores. We have a long way to go as a society. When I was young, people used to mock me for wanting to play and these thoughts still remain in the minds of many. It is difficult for a girl to prosper in a slum community but we do our best to fight that oppression,” she said with a look of indignation.

Change may take time but Pooja is steering her community forward. She was selected to represent OSCAR at the FIFA Foundation festival at the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia. “It was a proud moment for my family. These visits are symbolic, perspectives change, people start to notice. After my visit, people were more open to sending their kids, especially girls for football and life skills sessions,” she said. Pooja is pursuing an arts degree and also holds a diploma in sport management. Pooja is currently working with OSCAR Foundation’s gender programme which aims to promote gender equity across all our programmes.


A note to Pooja from her Sponsor
"It is good to hear all the things you have been doing. You have done so well completing your studies and now working for Oscar. I want you to know how proud I am to have been your sponsor for the last few years and to see what you have achieved. I hope things will go well for you in the future" - Liz