Beyond blood ties: A Gen Z-built home offering the bonds of a family
A Gen Z-led initiative called Rise Up Home in Kerala has established the state's first group foster-care home. The facility provides a stable, family-like environment for children who have experienced trauma and abandonment.
Why it matters
It represents a shift from institutionalized care to community-based foster models, potentially improving long-term social outcomes for vulnerable children.
Some of the children, caregivers and their Amma in the front courtyard of RUH at Thenhipalam | Photo Credit: K_ RAGESH
A five-cent plot with a two-storey house at Thenhipalam in Malappuram is home to a family like any other. As the afternoon heat begins to subside, Achu (name changed), 7, is playing cricket with some of his “siblings” and other family members in the front courtyard. “I want to be a cricketer like Virat Kohli. I go to a cricket academy for practice,” says the budding southpaw as he mimics a textbook cover drive.
This is a family without blood ties. Yet the eight children -- whose lives were once marked by abandonment, trauma and uncertainty -- now live with their “Amma” (mother) and three “chechis” (elder sisters/caregivers), sharing the bonds and rhythms of everyday family life under one roof.
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