CHILD Foundation is a CRA-registered charity located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada that built and operates a 20-bed charitable hospital for women and children in a remote village in northern India. The foundation is run by a volunteer Board of Directors. The foundation works closely with MOTHER Foundation, a sister organization, located in India.
The inspiration for the hospital was Mrs. Maya Devi who brought up her family in the village of Sarurpur Kalan, Uttar Pradesh – 55 km north of New Delhi. Sarurpur is a village of about 27,000. There are no other health care facilities within a three-hour drive. Seeing the health challenges many women faced – particularly during pregnancy – Maya Devi often spoke about the day there would be a hospital in the community. She wanted to save women the long, arduous and expensive trip to the city to seek health care. The Maya Devi hospital is the realization of her dream. Before the hospital opened in October 2011, women in the community were forty times more likely to die in childbirth than they are in Canada. One child in eleven died before the age of five.
After Maya Devi’s passing, her children turned her dream into reality, setting up foundations in India (MOTHER Foundation) and Canada (CHILD Foundation) to fund and operate the hospital. With the support of Calgary-area Rotary clubs and Rotary International, plus corporate and private donors, we constructed a 20-bed charity hospital on the grounds of what had once been Maya Devi’s family home and it became operational in 2011. The hospital operates on a shoe-string budget of about $70,000 per year. A once-a-year fundraiser called Maya’s Dream takes place in Calgary to cover the operating costs.
Maya Devi Hospital was made possible because of hard work by many inspired volunteers in Canada and in India. We raised money through Rotary clubs and through Rotary International. We received grants funded by the Government of Alberta Community Initiatives Program (CIP). We held fund-raisers led by board volunteers. Private donors and corporations have also been generous.
Since opening in October 2011, Maya Devi Hospital has transformed the community of Sarurpur and the lives of many of the 50,000 people living in the larger region. The hospital now has a reputation for outstanding service, and attracts patients from communities quite a distance away. Although care for women and children is the hospital’s primary focus, we provide care to anybody who needs it if we have the expertise and medical supplies to be of assistance. We deliver the best care practicable on a shoestring budget.
Our staff consists of nine medical professionals. There are four part-time doctors, three full-time nurses, a lab technician and a pharmacist. The hospital serves approximately 2,000 patients on an out-patient basis monthly.
MOTHER Foundation
Located in Delhi, MOTHER Foundation is a sister-organization of CHILD Foundation. Through contractual agreements with CHILD Foundation, MOTHER Foundation provides regular local oversight, guidance and services for the hospital. They are the “face” of the hospital for the Sarurpur Kalan community. MOTHER also shares some of the operating expenses with CHILD Foundation.