Providing Life Skills to 300 Girls living in Slums

Dear Friends,

Thank you once again for supporting our work with adolescent girls from poor families with multiple handicap of being in religious, ethnic and linguistic minorities. Currently we are active in 16 such areas with a programme of empowerment thru inculcation of skills. Recently, girls from all our centres made a trip to a historical display, an aquarium and Kamla Nehru Park, a special space for kids and adolescents with a view to introduce them to available resources in the city.

We would like to share about a special 9 Day event that was organized to cover 9 days of the popular Navratri festival of Mother Goddess in September/October.  It celebrates women’s fertility thru its symbol of an earthen pot with a lamp inside called garba, a term derived from garbh meaning uterus and fetus. It is well known how women’s sexuality and fertility have been used and misused. Beginning our sex and health education programme we had encouraged girls in early adolescence to speak out on their perceptions and experience around issue of menstruation where untouchability is practiced against girls and women. These were published as a booklet. The matter connects with cleanliness, hygiene and even self esteem issues.

Paromita Vhora, a well known writer and short film maker, offered to produce, based on this booklet, a series of ‘post cards’ called  Agents of Ishque (love and romance) for each day of the festival to draw attention to what actually happens to girls when their first step in fertility, namely, menstruation, one card on each of the nine days. Post cards are in two languages. The campaign was much appreciated and we plan to work further on this issue. We are sharing these ‘post cards’ with you. Your comments will be important to us.

Episode 1: Oh No! Not Again!  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdNruCrbhIM

Episode 2: Out of Syllabus https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iRAKQqRfQk

Episode 3: Mission Mushkil  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KRjtzYmLfw

Episode 4: Cheaters https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7t0D71lB3Eo

Episode 5: Blister? My Foot! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mWFJ3fzt7M

Episode 6: Faltu Ke Tohfe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ND7YNMSqaek

Episode 7: Tu Shaani Zaali  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pilUvP0aho

Episode 8: Lonely Nights https://youtu.be/Tr8AOM_P2-0

 Episode 9: Kurte Ke Peeche https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xo2k3rg0uM

 Our website gives information on many such activities. Please do visit www.vacha.org.in from time to time.

With best regards,

Sonal Shukla

Dear Friends,

On 15^th August India celebrated 70^th Independence Day. Every year our girls bring out their newsletter with public  meeting and disseminate it in their communities. This year too Girls brought our their newsletters that covered topics like , girls access to public spaces,   a new government scheme of Police Didi- special designated  woman personnel in police station who will work with girls and women on safety issues in the area under jurisdiction of the police station.  Girls also  delivered speeches, songs in the public meetings. Umang one of our youth group organized a presentation on  anti superstitions with special focus on snakes. The idea was to dispel myths and fears regarding snakes. The children in the audience had several questions for the group and were happy to get answers from the organizers.

The same youth group organized an information camp on government identity cards for their community. In India the unique Identity Card is  a new concept. . It is also crucial to have the Ration Card which gives people access to public distribution shops ( fair price subsidized shops.  A  lot of migrants do not have information  about the process to apply for these documents or required documents to acquire theses documents. The camp was very successful.

We always arrange for exposure educational visits for our girls. Girls’ vulnerability becomes multifold due to lack of exposure to available resources in addition to other oppressing elements. As part of exposing the group to local resources, girls from one centre visited the local railway station to familiarize them on using facilities available. Infact the community is based around 15 minutes distance from Railway station but these girls had not been there in the past.  They were given information about how  to read the chart for travel fare, how to look for signs to locate women’s compartment, special compartments for elderly or people with special needs. They were also taught how to read the indicators and listen to the announcements on the platforms. They were happy to know there was a special coach for the people with special needs .

Girls with leadership quality, from our cenres  have been actively part of a campaign ‘Make My Space- Ab Nahi To Kab’ where they performed street plays on general awareness of girls rights in public place. These events were held during the Ganpati festival an important Hindu festival spread over ten days where lots of cultural and other events are held in public spaces. For many of the girls it was the first time they had got permission to come home late and it was the first time they had spoken in public. This initiative was covered by media.

Links:

• Access to public spaces: teenage girls stake their claim