Saba Home: First of its kind Orphanage for Earthquake Displaced Children
A first of its kind orphanage for displaced children affected by the October 8, 2005 earthquake is in the making to provide the unfortunate with state-of-the-art accommodation, education, healthcare and a sense of family.
The five-storey building of Saba Home orphanage in Gulraiz Housing Scheme, Phase II – not more than four kilometres away from Benazir Bhutto International Airport – has already been completed and is believed to be operational in the beginning of the next month.
Saba Home is a subsidiary of Saba Aslam Education & Welfare Trust, a voluntary, non-profit, non-political and non-sectarian charity organisation whose chairman, Saghir Ahmed Aslam, has been running it for nearly 35 years on his own without any donations from the public. However, seven years back, on the insistence of various philanthropists here in Pakistan and abroad, Aslam accepted their offer regarding donations on various projects including relief work in the aftermath of 2005 earthquake.
“I am living in the US for almost half a century now and have been working to help the deserving and downtrodden for the past 43 years,” said 74-years-old Aslam while giving his brief introduction to ‘The News’, continuing that he along with his family migrated from India at the time of partition. “Before partition, my family could be called a middle class family but after the bloody divide, we got really poor and passed through hard times,” he said.
In 1958, Aslam said he left for the US and studied there. “With Allah’s blessings, I succeeded in establishing a business of my own in the US after a few years and started thinking of working for the poor here in Pakistan to rid them of the miseries and pains,” he said with tears in his eyes adding that because of belonging to a poor family, he could well understand their hardships.
He said he worked in the areas of education, health and poverty alleviation along with humanitarian relief, micro lending and vocational training to help uplift people in need. Aslam’s greatest credit is the establishment of Wisdom House near Jhelum, one of the largest educational projects for women in rural Punjab that is conducting classes from Kindergarten to Degree College, accommodating some 3,700 students. The Wisdom House is serving more than 80 villages around Jhelum, covering an area of 41 kilometres.
“Three days after the October 2005 earthquake, I came back to Pakistan and got busy in the relief work in far-flung affected areas of the northern region and AJK,” said Aslam, adding that at that time, he thought of establishing an orphanage, unique in nature, in Pakistan to accommodate the affected displaced minors.
“I have two daughters, and inspired by their success in life, I decided to build Saba Home for parentless girls to provide these poor with state-of-the-art living facility, education, healthcare and most important of all, love and affection to make them feel important,” said Aslam, adding that his vision is to see the next Allama Iqbal and Quaid-e-Azam emerging out of a planned orphanage by the will of God.
“We will help the orphans become respectable members of the society, having true leadership qualities, and possibly, the future leaders of Islam and Pakistan.” He said with the completion of the 29-room orphanage, his dream would turn into reality.
“We have developed a school for orphans within the premises of the orphanage where 60 girls from four to seven years of age will be accommodated. Registration of affected orphans is in process at the orphanage.” Aslam added that at the International Education & Welfare Society (IEWS registered in the US) and Saba Trust, they are nearing completion of a unique educational and healthcare centre for orphans where they would receive love, respect and attention that they deserve, and their cultures, religious identities and personal aspirations would be nurtured in a safe and modern environment at the centre.
“We have decided to keep six girls in a room and for every two rooms, there will be a ‘mother’ to look after the girls properly,” said Aslam and added that they do not want to make the girls see themselves as orphans and being brought up through donations. “In the orphanage, we will treat these children as we treat our own.”
To a query, he said anyone from Pakistan or abroad willing to join hands with IEWS/Saba Trust could be a partner in the project on a permanent basis.
Source: Daily Times
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