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On a trip to India in 1996, Dutchman Ton Snellaert was anguished by the squalor and utter destitution he saw among the homeless people. Sick,naked men lying on the sidewalks, ignored by those who passed by,conflicted with Ton’s sense of social justice and love. Helpless, he turned to the Bible and the following words became a road map for the organization he would create in Delhi over the next decade.“…Share your food with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your home. When you see the naked, cover them… and your healing will quickly appear; And those from among you shall raise up the foundation of many generations...”
Ton took these words literally and opened “Delhi House” in December1997 with room for twelve patients. Together with some other volunteer she started to pick up sick and dying people from the streets of Delhi,and cared for them. Quickly the patient numbers increased. Three years later a larger piece of land was purchased and renamed “Sewa Ashram”.Since then more than 3000 people in desperate need have been helped –physically, mentally and spiritually.
In summer 2007, Ton traveled for an indefinite time to Europe and left the Ashram
in the hands of a capable team of successors.
Until now Sewa Ashram was a kind of emergency camp – responsive to the spontaneity of immediate demands, ready to act. It was the moment itself who governed what next should happen without giving time to the staff to breathe. In this way the community of the poor became very crowded and quite complex. Now the Ashram has reached a point where a decision on its future has to be made – time to identify strengths, weaknesses and potentials in order to meet the needs of our growing community.
Sewa Ashram runs on a small budget. All expenses, including medical care, medicine, hospital bills, food, housing, clothing, and the maintenance of the ashram and our ambulances sum up to an amazing daily 3$ per patient! If for example 250 donors provide an average of 50 US $ per month we already can do our work.
At Sewa Ashram we try to follow the teachings of Christ. We believe that the very foundation of our work is to love and treat our next, as we would like to be loved and treated. Thus we care for those in desperate need, for our neighbors, and all the members of our team. If this is the base of our work we will be able to recognize the beauty and uniqueness of the people we are working with, complement each other, and become a strong team bound by love – regardless of everyone’s cultural or religious background. Of course, we haven't quite reached this level of true brotherhood, but we strive for it and welcome everybody (see JOIN US ) to contribute and learn with us.
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“But some seeds fell on good ground and yielded crop a hundredfold”
The life-story of Javed is as amazing as his paintings. Innocent nature child, his parental home a mud hut near Calcutta. Father on a string-bed coughing blood, mother in the field harvesting crop, bending her back for someone else. Poor landless farmers with five children, weathering floods and droughts. Javed, black naked child playing in the mud, climbing trees, roaming around, no school on the horizon, free as a bird.
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I was shocked by the sight of an eleven year old boy lying sprawled out
between a gang of rickshaw-walla’s and junkies. Some guy inserted a
needle in the small boys vein. I grabbed him from between these men and
brought him to the Ashram. In just a few days the broad smile blossomed
up and his high voice would resound through the Ashram premises. Though
at a sudden his face would again cloud over, laughter silenced, dark
rings appear around his eyes.
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 Dinesh parked his rickshaw in the shadow of a tree. He had no strength left, no breath. For more than five months he was coughing up blood. His lungs seemed filled with water. Appetite had left him long ago, no need to for food. Dinesh placed the seat of his rickshaw in such a manner that he could sleep on it and then closed his eyes. He had nearly dozed off when a sudden jolt threw him from his seat. Lying on the ground he saw that a car had hit his rickshaw, both wheels were smashed, the axle broken.
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About Us 
