NAMATHU NAGARAM, NAMATHU URIMAI (OUR CITY, OUR RIGHTS)
by Sudaroli Ramasamy
SAFETY is a major concern in the life of the women, in all walks of life, at any point in time. But beyond safety, it is important for them to understand that they have every right to build, rebuild and make their locality safe and habitable. With almost all the cities of India becoming terribly unsafe, it is important for women and girls know that they have the right to feel safe without restraining their mobility at any time.
We would start with the importance of understanding of basic rights as a citizen in a broader perspective. Then we would involve community women and girls in the process of Safety Audit either by the use of an app (Safetipin, with which we have partnered earlier) or through a safety audit questionnaire template. This awareness of their rights over their city inculcate them to take ownership of their cities and rights “Our City, Our Rights”.
This is how the “Our City, Our Rights” was born with the objectives:
- Creating general awareness on the Civic rights and take ownership “Our City, Our Rights” among girls and women
- Getting them access to the information about the authorities whom they can approach to claim their basic rights towards the Safer and Habitable city.
- Undergoing the exercise of learning how to gather, organise and present information in order to claim their rights. and practical experiences expands the scope of processing their civil rights to civil governance.
We propose to start with safety but take on other important community issues in many stages over 8-10 months.
Once the idea shape itself into the execution, we planned to take this forward with the women and girls throughout Chennai on a larger scale. We are piloting the process with two local partners, both of whom have decades of grassroots experience working with women and girls.
Training 1, June 7, 2017:
Training 2, June 18, 2017:
Training 3, July 28, 2017:
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