Pacifying the deadly beast
An initiative to create a tobacco free world for every child

By Pratiksha Singh
In 2002 when Ms Padmini Somani, Director established Salaam Bombay Foundation, it was out of a traumatic personal experience. Her father was diagnosed with a cancer from tobacco use and said, “If I had known the disastrous consequences, I would have stayed miles away from it.” That was the trigger point for this young lady, who was already involved with the education of Mumbai’s deprived children, to focus her energies on creating awareness about scourge of tobacco.

“Our effort is not just to wean children away from tobacco but to see that they do not acquire the habit in the first place. We feel that tobacco is a disease of the mind – if you lack self-confidence and self-esteem, you pick up this habit as a defence mechanism. We believe in empowering children with confidence, strengthening them through development, instilling a positive and confident spirit and equipping them with the weapons they need to combat this addiction.” she says.

Here are a few excerpts from an exclusive interview with Ms Padmini Somani –

Whom does it benefit and how?
Children in the age group of 10-17 years coming from the weakest section of the socio-economic strata are whom we target. Most of these children are studying in municipal schools and stay in urban slums. They belong to families where incomes are low and uncertain.

We have seen that most of the children who are associated with us have multiple responsibilities at home and live in a highly stressful environment. These marginalised citizens of India are severely deprived and have very little support from their families or society. This vulnerable section of the society hence is most prone to substance abuse, thus becoming the easiest target for tobacco companies.

What is the modus operandi of the organisation?
Our effort is to encourage children to find role models and heroes within themselves. The children are not only trained at sports with high standards but also learn life-skills like focus, leadership, stress management, concentration, emotion management and teamwork that will help them throughout their life.

Life-skill development - dealing with the problem at its core:
All our projects are designed keeping in mind the holistic development of a child. Salaam Bombay Foundation believes that submission to any kind of addiction is a result of problems such as low self-esteem, lack of refusal skills and low awareness. And children can make correct informed decisions if they are given access to correct information and the life-skill tools to deal with everyday situations. Therefore both the programmes – Tobacco Education Programme and Life Skills Training are geared towards creating and spreading awareness as well as strengthening and building a child’s character.

Each project begins only after a detailed research to understand the baseline, so that the impact of each project and programme is understood better. It is managed by a facilitator from Salaam Bombay Foundation and closely monitored by a senior project coordinator. At every stage, we coordinate with the school authorities–teachers/principals updating them about their student’s progress.

Using the Power of the playground - helps capitalise a child’s willingness to learn:
‘Play’ has always had a natural attraction to children and learning through play way is one of the best formats available. Nothing takes away their imagination and drive to win when they are at play because it takes away their daily-life concerns of chores, exam stress, homework and even their inability to do something. Playground is a blank canvas for children to express freely and learn life-skills. This out-of- classroom format of teaching allows them to learn positive thinking and enhances their imaginative skills while engaged in something they enjoy and makes a long-lasting impression on their minds. Unlike forcing the values or norms on them, this helps to inculcate the core message of tobacco free life as a part of their character. Therefore, we use the ‘power of the playground’ to nurture young minds from 147 Municipal and Government-aided schools across Mumbai. Be it activities undertaken to ‘attract’ children or ‘sustain’ their interest in tobacco control, each one is engaging and interactive. So, you will always find us acting, singing, dancing, painting or playing cricket or hockey.

Do you think our Government is doing enough towards eradication of tobacco?
Tobacco consumption is a complex problem for India. A solution will need to be found in multiple innovative ways to handle the atrociousness of the problem. The Government has showcased good intention by providing a tobacco law framework at the national level and also smoke-free policy for public places. This is a first step but lot remains to be done both in detail and implementation. NGOs and civil society both need to come forward to support tobacco control work so that the Government’s efforts have multiplying effect because of society’s acceptance and participation.

What are the various projects undertaken by the organisation?
Super Army:
This is an innovative programme wherein the students sign up to be ‘soldiers’ of the ‘Super Army’ that wages a war against tobacco using unique weapons like art, theatre and music. Starting as an awareness programme it goes on to teach students the fundamentals of advocacy. Today, over 70,000 children have signed up to work towards better advocacy and implementation of laws to protect their generation.

Advocacy Programme:
School students in the 8th and 9th standard are trained to become tobacco control advocates and are encouraged to work with different stakeholders including the police, Municipal Corporation, FDA, BEST, Health and Education Department of the Government and the media to bring about change and protect children from tobacco. Children also get involved in local cultural and religious events to spread the message on platforms like the Kala Ghoda Festival, Ganesh Mandals etc.

Have you ever encountered any of your volunteers getting addicted to tobacco?
This has never happened. In fact, by working on an issue of tobacco so closely, our volunteers are more committed to stay clean and many people who have come into contact with the programme were encouraged to quit tobacco.

What challenges have you faced till date and how did you cope up with them?
Inspite of the epidemic proportion of tobacco-related diseases that have destroyed families, India has become one of the largest consumers of tobacco having the highest number of oral cancer cases in the world. Yet, we struggle to make this a national priority. More support is needed from civil society, NGO partners, media and other stakeholders to spur the Government to handle this menace more effectively. In particular, support from media to focus this issue is one of the greatest challenges we have faced. We think this is where we should make best efforts to deal with the issue as a priority. Here, we would like to thank the entire team of 'Skills Ahead' for supporting the cause.

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