Home - Project Mala - Sponsor a child in India to eliminate child labor

We have educated over 10,000 children

in rural India in the last 30 years
we provide medical treatment

including eye tests for children
Everyday each child is given

a nutritious cooked midday meal

Overseas sponsorship

We have sponsors in 11 different countries
Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, India, Ireland, Malaysia, New Zealand, Spain, The Netherlands, USA, UK
Able to pay in Australian dollars, Euros, Indian rupees, US dollars and UK pounds

Payment information

Project Mala
United Kingdom

Project Mala was founded in 1989 as an action programme for the abolition of child labour in the hand knotted carpet industry in India. We provide education for children in the carpet weaving belt. Our programme includes education up to secondary school level, hot midday meal for all children and healthcare facilities. 80% of the funding comes from individual child sponsors.

About Sponsorship

All your sponsorship money goes to India
No long term commitment
Photos and reports are posted to personal logins
Children do not know they are sponsored
Children receive education, free uniform, food, medical care, sports and cultural training

Sponsorship Options

Make a Donation

Early Primary (£8/Month)

For children to prepare for Primary school

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Primary School (£11/Month)

We take in 300 children each year at primary level

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Middle School (£15/Month)

Middle school is the foundation for higher education

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Secondary School (£25/Month)

More focus on sciences in secondary school

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Video Gallery

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Recent Newsletters

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One of the ways to bring out the best in the children

Anne Gilmour, Education Trustee, describes one of the ways she brings out the best in the children...

Best School Award

The Indian Talent Olympiad has recently ranked Project Mala School among the top 1,000 schools in India out of a pool of 150,000...

Enrolment 2024

As is customary each year, we received 3121 applications, with 2635 coming from external applicants seeking admission to our schools...

Board Exam Results 2024

In Class 12, all 41 Project Mala students attained a pass mark in the 1st division. The results were exceptional but one student, Rajnandini, ...

Government tighten education rules

Over the past few years the Indian government has brought in a universal national ID card which, together with a more rigorous system for registration of births...

Sponsor Visits - Comments by Lauren Totzke and Siddhartha Bose

We are pleased at the increasing number of visits sponsors and supporters are making to our schools. Recently we have Lauren from Totzke Ltd, a corporate patron and Siddhartha Bose...

Mala schools rated second in Varanasi District

It is with great pride that we announce our second position among 396 schools in Varanasi District...

Visitor's View on Project Mala Schools

This is a writeup by one of our visitors, Mr Ben Garland, who spent a few days in our schools at the end of last year...

Enrolment 2023

After a scorching summer (45 degrees), our children have returned to school. This year, Uttar Pradesh experienced one of the hottest summers on record and so different to the day we held our admissions...

Project Mala's Community Outreach – Coaching Centres

As we have had to make the decision to focus on the most able children from the poorest homes in the districts that our schools serve...

Children discuss their teachers

For those sponsors who also follow us on facebook, you will have seen this lovely film the children did of their teachers...

Wishing you and your family a Happy Christmas

The young artist who drew the picture is Rajnandini. She joined our Hasra primary school in 2014.....

What a wise decision to postpone Sunita's marriage

Sunita was a pupil of our Guria school where she made it all the way through to grade 12 and passed out with flying colours.....

Applications for a place in a Mala school still well beyond our capacity

In particular, how both children and parents appreciate quality education and how we still have far more applications than places....

Parent Teacher meetings start again

You will be pleased to know that all the schools are now fully operational again after the disruption caused by Covid...

Past student helps current children

Sibu Ali decided that the best way he could show his gratitude to his old school was by conducting a hairdressing camp. He hired three local barbers and the equipment...

Exceptional exam results for Mala children

Our students have suffered badly through the pandemic, from the school closures and the difficulty of continuing to study at home with limited technology and teacher contact...

Three children rejoin Project Mala

As we do not have the resources to keep every pupil from primary school through to class 12 graduation, we have to set competitive exams in classes 5, 8 and 10 to select which students will most benefit from the limited number of places...

Enrolment 2021

It has been very difficult to enrol the students this year because of the lockdown. We were given some relaxation in early 2021 but it is not enough to complete all the admission process...

Back to school or not?

Although locally there seem to have been few documented cases of Coronavirus, the school is taking health and safety very seriously....

Christmas challenge provides our first smartboards

We are very grateful to all our supporters who made the fundraising on the Christmas Challenge a success....

Deepali gains a place at JNU to study languages

Deepali joined Project Mala in primary school in 2011 and it was immediately apparent that she was particularly talented...

The Big Give offer to double any donation in the Christmas Challenge

This year the Christmas Challenge is supported by a number of well known celebrities...

New Mala App for sponsors to see their children

This App will enable sponsors to see profiles, photos, family details and reports, all without having to visit our website...

Balmukund excels after joining Mala School

It is always a pleasure to write about children who make good use of the education we provide, to the benefit of themselves and their families. ...

The challenges of on-line education in rural India

If that sounds as if our staff are managing their remote teaching effortlessly, and with the help of up-to-date technology, let me tell you just what a struggle it has been for teachers to help their students with their studies throughout the pandemic...

Kavita: Fighting ignorance and superstition to stay in education

Kavita is a bright child from a very poor family and in so many ways epitomises the type of children we are trying to help. She is ambitious for education but unfortunately her parents do not recognise the importance of educating girls. ...

Children speaking English

Most children, when they join us, have only ever heard their parents and grandparents speaking the local village dialect and consider even Hindi a foreign language...

Story of a past student

In the beginning, Project Mala only offered three years of primary education, so pupils left us after completing class five. Recently a past pupil from those early days, a boy called Sibu, wrote to our Facebook site...

Survey shows trend towards smaller families

Each year when we invite children to apply for a place in our schools, we also take the opportunity to collect more information on the children and their families in the 80 villages in our catchment area...

India in Lockdown - 2

The lockdown in most countries is proving difficult,but it hits the poorest people far worse. For people in India who exist below the poverty line, life has suddenly become much more challenging...

India in Lockdown

Schools across the country were told to close immediately, so with little time to organise things, we sent the children home and began to prepare the staff for a long period of isolation...

Message from Anne in India

These are strange times here at Project Mala Schools,India. As the Corona Virus plays havoc with the social and economic structure of India, foreign visas suspended,travel discouraged and all schools closed for the near future, it seemed impossible that anything more could happen to disrupt the beginning of the new academic year....

How we are helping girls

Although society is changing in India and in the cities girls are getting the same opportunities as boys, here in rural Uttar Pradesh life in the villages continues much as it has for hundreds of years...

Curry dinner and presentation

On Saturday 13th June we are holding a special curry dinner in the historic Tithe Barn, York.Anil, CEO of Project Mala, India, and Diptiman, IT and website development expert, will also demonstrate the new Mala App...

Higher education for Mala students

As 2019 is the second year we have had children passing out of class 12 capable of going on to IIT (India Institutes of Technology) courses...

Project Mala on social media

Modern technology is rapidly expanding our communication network. One of the ways we are now using is social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram....

Mala presentation in London

One of our long term Indian supporters, Obeetee, is holding an exhibition of their new collection of hand woven rugs in London and has asked if we can give a talk to their customers on the work of Project Mala....

School council

As part of our commitment to being a child centred organisation, each Project Mala school has a school council...

Village life India's monsoons

In July we wrote that we were worrying about a lack of water, as the school wells ran dry and we were forced to resort to bringing tanks of water in by lorry. ...

Pre-schools success

Mala schools are experimental in nature and innovative in style. One of the greatest innovations has been to establish pre-schools for girls. This has been a great success with the girls from pre-school doing exceptionally well in the primary entrance exams...

Long term friend of Project Mala dies in India

We would like to mark the passing of Mr Edward Oakley, a long term friend and financial supporter of Project Mala...

Village life - 50°C heat in India

Recently our newspapers have been full of the heatwave in Europe where temperatures are said to be reaching mid 40°C. In India it is normally very hot in June but this year has set new records with temperatures regularly hitting 50°C. This has brought renewed problems for the running of our schools...