At just nine years old, Alizah has already lived through the kind of heartbreak many adults would struggle to endure. When she was only seven, her parents, once her entire world, separated. The home that was once filled with laughter turned quiet, and life as she knew it changed overnight.
Alizah now lives with her mother in a one-room apartment in Shaheen Bagh, Delhi. Her father, Mohd Khalid, left after the separation, and since then, her mother has been juggling multiple jobs to make ends meet. There are days when even the basics, a proper meal, school fees, or new shoes, seem like luxuries.
“I remember when Amma cried silently at night,” Alizah says softly while talking to the Shaagird Foundation. “She thought I was asleep, but I wasn’t,” she continued.
Her mother says that Alizah has always been mature beyond her years. “She never complains. She understands our situation more than a child should have to.”
In the midst of this struggle came a glimmer of hope, a door that opened just when everything seemed to be closing in. A neighbor told Alizah’s mother about the Shaagird Foundation.
With nothing to lose, they immediately called the Shaagird Foundation. Alizah’s story, her quiet resilience, her eagerness to study, and the weight she carried at such a young age moved away. The Shaagird Foundation enrolled her into Garden Public School, a private school in her vicinity. The school provides her a space to learn and grow.
Her books are neatly covered, her uniform is ironed, and for the first time in years, her school bag is not a burden but a source of pride.
“I want to become a doctor,” she says with a shy smile. “So I can help my Amma and other people who are poor.”
Shaagird Foundation has not only given Alizah access to education but has also gifted her a sense of belonging.
Her mother, too, feels a burden lifting. “There’s still struggle,” she admits. “But now I don’t feel alone in it.”
Alizah’s story is just one among many, but it’s a reminder that sometimes all it takes is one opportunity, one act of kindness, to change the course of a life.
