Plight of Uncared Waifs

In the streets of Portau-Prince, the capital of Haiti, armed members of the disbanded military move around in cars and engage in target practice by shooting down children on the streets of the city. When the Ethiopian police round up children and leave them deep inside forests at the mercy of hyenas and other wild animals, the weak are never able to return to human habitation. These children are paying the price of being ‘street children’. From Street to Hope opens with a broad canvas view of the plight of children living on the streets of the world’s cities. Dabir and Athale take the reader through the findings of a study of organizations working towards the rehabilitation of street children in three cities spanning three continents—Los Angeles, Mumbai and Nairobi. Though the study itself is dealt with in the penultimate chapter of the book, the authors make a careful movement from the macro view to the minute details of the organizations which were studied as part of the survey. The initial chapters prepare the reader and help put in perspective the analysis of the research results.