Children Peace Program

Under this programs, Girl Child Peace Camps (Asia and Nepal with only girl participants), Training for teachers and Seminar for Principals on Peace Education, Children Peace Councils, Mural Paintings, Peace Light Illumination Program, Baal Shanti Abhiyan, a children’s television program to mobilize and provide space for children to expresses their fear, concerns and opinions about any situation and problem that affect their life. All the programs under the Children Peace Program are focused to create a favorable impact on children and their life.

Mural Painting on Children’s Hope for Peace

The Mural Painting is a regular program of Bikalpa. It is an outlet of fear and frustration and is a hope to provide means to find out the long lost voices of children. It is a hope of the children towards the changes and end of their fear and suffering. When the brush touches the white canvas, it reveals fear and frustration and Hope for Peace emerges in a colorful way. Each child is gifted and their paintings are beautiful. The process is more important than the product. Mural painting is a healing process. Six Mural Paintings are organized every year in different locations to allow children to express through art.
The Mural Painting is done with the objective to voice children’s feelings in the form of paintings. We believe art is the most powerful way of expressing feelings and can be stronger than words. It is a way of channeling their feelings and freeing them from the trauma of the violence existing around them.

Mural Painting Procedure:

Discussions are initiated on the present situation and how children feel, what do they fear about and what do they think on peace.
Children draw or paint individually at schools or institutions,
Children are then invited for collective mural painting,
It begins with meditation and relaxation for about ten minutes.
Mural Painting lasts for about 45 minutes to an hour according to the concentration span of the children.
Mural Painting is then displayed in schools or public area.

Children Peace Light Illumination Program

The Children Peace Light Illumination Program is a program where children from different walks of life come to one spot to pray for everlasting peace and security. The program is organized to mark important days and children come together in public places to light candles or butter lamps and hope for peace. This program is run with the objective to provide space for children to contemplate and pray for a cause and a meaning. Four Illumination Programs are carried out in a year on different occasions in public areas.

Nepali/Asia Girl Child Peace Program

The Girl Child Peace Camp is a regular program of Bikalpa Children Peace Program. It is organized every year for girls. Peace Camps are organized on an alternate basis: one year for the girls of different districts of Nepal; alternate year for the girls from different South Asian countries. Each Peace Camp is organized on the separate themes. Sessions on peace and nonviolence, mediation, communication, leaderships, excursions are organized in the five days residential camp. Every year, the girls also get a chance to meet prominent political personalities of Nepal to present their concerns.

Why Peace Camp for Girls only?

Violence against the girl child is worst. One cannot imagine the type of violence the girl child suffers.
The situation of girls in Asia is worst.
Girls are the source and the strength for Non-violence.

The objective of the Camp

To Nurture and Strengthen the Culture of Non-violence and Peace,
To Help each girl to discover by herself that non-violence is inevitable
To Share and exchange the wealth of one’s culture
To Provide mediation skills,
To offer hope by beginning to create, build & strengthen the Culture of Peace and Non-violence.
To Establish friendly and peaceful relationships among the girls in Asia
To have loose and friendly network of Girl Child Peace Makers

Children Peace Council

Aims:

To cultivate, nurture and strengthen the culture of peace and nonviolence in every child,
To cultivate, create and promote peace and nonviolent culture in schools,

Objectives:

To create environment of mutual respect and trust among students, school and parents.
To assist and equip children with tools and skills for positive behavior, creative and positive thinking,
To generate and develop a sense of belonging and responsibility among students.

Programs:

Interaction and consultation with students to express their understanding on peace and nonviolence,
Peace council formation
Training on how to operate, strengthen and sustain council and its activities.
Training on facilitating skills,
Formation of Peace Council Support Group, (School, parents and experts)
Evaluation of the Councils

Peace Education

To support the International Decade for the culture of Peace and Non Violence for the children of the World” Bikalpa began organizing Training for Teachers and Seminar for Principals on Peace Education. Peace Education .The mandate for the decade specially emphasizes the need for the international community to recognize and implement strategies to focus on and ensure assistance for children exposed to harmful and violent situations. It also clarifies that children must be provided with the ability and opportunity to participate. Therefore, to promote the culture of non-violence through peace education, the program Peace Education was initiated because:

Chief among the activities required to promote non-violence among children in all communities is education.
Both formal and non-formal education provide children with the necessary tools for acquiring the knowledge base, skills, values, attitudes and behaviors associated with non-violence. This is what Peace Education tries to address and teach.