The SOS Children's Villages in India, through the Family Strengthening Programme (FSP), supported over 17,920 children over the last year.

This was stated by Sumanta Kar, Senior Deputy National Director, SOS Children’s Villages of India.

"Our Family Strengthening Programme (FSP) supports vulnerable families, including of migrants and single-women-headed households, to ensure their economic empowerment," he said.

"It helps keep biological families together by improving access to education, health and nutrition for their children," he added.

"Over the last year, we supported 17,920 children, half of whom were girls, through this programme, who continued to live with their own families," he further said.

"We also managed to reach 3,862 new children for support. Over 13,000 children from vulnerable families were provided support to attend regular school," he added.

Heartrendingly, 4,347 families enrolled in FSP saw an average of 132 per cent increase in their income compared to the previous year," he added.

"Also, more than 1,000 women from vulnerable families were supported by SOS CV India to set up their own businesses," Kar further said.

As part of its Disadvantaged Youth Skilling Programme, SOS Children’s Villages enrolled 1,200 youth from a disadvantaged background at government-affiliated skill development institutes.

About 375 of them successfully managed to complete their course.

A total of 283 of these youth (46 per cent girls) got the first job of their lives in the organised sector, with an average monthly salary of Rs 7,700.

Over the year, SOS CV India also continued to work with 470 children (60 per cent girls) across 32 Children's Villages who have some form of disability.

The SOS Children’s Village Khajuri Kalan in Bhopal is a dedicated Village for children with special needs.

It is currently supporting 105 children with diverse needs, specifically those living with Cerebral Palsy, Mental Retardation, Autism and Multiple Disabilities.

It may be mentioned here that over the year, SOS Children’s Villages entered strategic collaborations with several state governments for rolling out several flagship programmes.

With the Gujarat government, it has collaborated for rolling out a Kinship Programme for 104 children under the Palak Mata-Pita Yojana.

With with the Maharashtra government, it has collaborated for preparing 102 children from Child Care Institutions for employability.

With the Chattisgarh government, the SOS Children's Villages has collaborated for building capacities of care functionaries for parenting, supporting children dealing with trauma and instituting child safeguarding mechanisms.

Along with the Niti Ayog and Duke University, SOS Children’s Villages also conducted a survey of 60 childcare institutions in four states to gauge the gaps in care delivery for children.