Brighter Future Development Trust

Brighter Future Development Trust


Who We Are

Brighter Future is a non-denominational Christian organisation committed to the relief of distress and poverty caused by the diseases of leprosy, TB, HIV/Aids, to sufferers of these diseases and their children.

Brighter Future works to prevent worsening disability through education, medical and custodial care.

Brighter Future helps the elderly and severely disabled to live with dignity.

Brighter Future offers the children of leprosy parents, orphans and other needy children a loving and caring home, an education and vocational training to enable them face the future as normal independent citizens.

Brighter Future tackles the underlying causes of the ostracism, deprivation and poverty, with compassion and respect, empowering sufferers and their children to become active participants and not mere passive recipients

Brighter Future encourages the disadvantaged to break out of the cycle of poverty and deprivation that the disease of leprosy has traditionally heaped upon them.

Our Mission

To provide for the physical, mental and social and spiritual needs of individuals, families and communities disadvantaged by Leprosy, TB and HIV/AIDS or age.


Our Vision

A world without prejudice towards any disease or age group

Our Values

As Stewards of the trust that donors have put in us for the benefit of the sick and disadvantaged

• We promise to use resources Wisely and Efficiently and Without Prejudice

• To speak and act Honestly and be consistent with Professional Competence and Accountability

• To be Responsive to life threatening emergencies where our involvement is needed and appropriate

• To be Committed to Sustainable long term development

Where we are
Brighter Future is based in Vizianagaram, a large railway junction city in the state of Andhra Pradesh in eastern India. It is situated on a narrow coastal plain between the mountains of Eastern Ghats and the Bay of Bengal, north of the naval port of Visakhapatnam. There are good rail links to the five metro cities of India. Agricultural and traditional fishing, from log boats, make up 70% of the occupations in this area, with jute manufacture and a ferro-manganese plant on the city outskirts. The unemployment rate is 45%. There are no social welfare or state pension schemes. The Vizianagaram and Srikakulam Districts have been declared ‘Backward’ by the state Government. The climate is harsh, with frequent cyclones, and subject to drought because of the unreliability of the monsoon rains. The 2005 tsunami destroyed fishing villages and boats, and contaminated wells and land with salt water.

Leprosy sufferers are drawn to the town and to the port of Visakhapatnam because they can take advantage of free travel on the trains. Their deformity allows them to avoid paying fares from fear of physical contact by railway officials. Five leprosy colonies were built across the region in the 1980’s. These have become derelict as their more mobile inhabitants moved to the more lucrative metropolitan cities. The disintegrating colonies, without electricity, became home to the most disabled leprosy sufferers and their families, and the elderly. Medical care of the inhabitants, once provided by The Leprosy Mission, was discontinued in 1999. The weakest, the least mobile, elderly and the blind beg in local villages and temples. Others go to Visakhapatnam and larger local towns.

The Railway towns also attract the abandoned and abused, orphan children and ostracized adults, who beg from passengers, sell ‘water’, or sweep carriage floors when trains halt in the station, for a pittance. They sleep along the tracks, on or under bridges, (when the railway police turn a blind eye), exposed to danger and harassment.

The naval port of Visakhapatnam has its share of prostitutes who are given health education and are counselled by Brighter Future social workers and staff. The women are concerned for their children’s future and ask Brighter Future to take their daughters into the Rainbow Home.

Slums abound, as in every large city, attracting the unemployed from the countryside and those at the bottom of the social ladder. These street dwellers can be seen sleeping on the roadside, on walls and under flyovers, shrouded in dirty shawls, seeming more dead than alive.

Traditionally marriages take place before the late teens among the poorest sections of society, in part to protect their daughters from exploitation. They are funded by loans from moneylenders and the begging cycle starts again as the parents and children attempt to pay off these debts.


It is against this background that Brighter Future works for children and the elderly