With 'Gobeyond', Monica Bisht Is Helping Underprivileged Children Make Career In Sports

The superheroes, the unusual ones amongst the ordinary bunch, use their capabilities to change the world around them.

And, they do so once they identify the persisting societal issues.

Monica Bisht from Mumbai, Maharashtra is one such superhero. She is a mother, homemaker, a former media professional and a sports enthusiast. It was her keen interest in sports that led her to become a social activist working towards providing sports-related opportunities for the underprivileged kids.

With an aim to reach out to every child who aspired to have a career in sports, in 2014, she co-founded an organisation with her friend, Satinder Singh Makkar. Gobeyond, her organisation, worked with the poverty-stricken children of villages in Parli Taluka.

"These children were either unaware of how they could explore sports or their talents were overlooked only because they couldn't afford it," said Bisht.

She helped these children experience the 'joy of learning sports'. Several activities including marathons, football, kabaddi, kushti, and martial arts were organised to encourage children to pursue their interests.

So far, around 500 youngsters have participated in tournaments that were organized by Gobeyond, fueling her cause to continue in the direction of bringing a change.

Educating the girl child is another cause, Bisht has been dedicatedly working towards apart from sports. In an attempt to remove roadblocks and help girls get access to education, she had been donating bicycles, lamps, computers, television and sports equipment.

Even during the COVID-19 outbreak, she was already ahead with contingency plans for potential panic and disaster. A week before the lockdown was announced, she had planned a community kitchen for a church and decided to use the same setup to feed the food-deprived staff in her society.

A one-woman army, Bisht financed the whole drive and had started preparing chapatis herself to feed as many as possible. Soon, others joined her cause. She also helped the slum-dwellers in her neighbourhood with ration kits.

She helped over 2000 families with one-month rations while running two community kitchens that fed 200-300 people every day. Fortunately, she didn't let any difficulty deter her from reaching out to those who are hit severely by the COVID-19 pandemic. She now aims to help 5000 families and 20000 people more with her food & ration drive.

This story has been received from Giving Circle. It is a platform that connects social change makers, donors, and volunteers. They are working to scale up these initiatives.

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