Participating in One Billion Rising

Saurabh Rai is currently doing his third year  of BA in Economics at Zakir Hussein College, Delhi University. He chose to volunteer with Safecity because he used to listen about what was happening in societies  all the time. People keep complaining about things that should be corrected or improved whether it was the case of women’s safety, child abuse, basic responsibility, corruption, rights or duties in any sector. Suarabh wishes to stop complaining and start acting and wants to work towards these changes as much as he can. He says, “Kuch positive toh karu apne level pe”.

Participating in One Billion Rising

One billion rising movement was organized by Jagori group in C.P., New Delhi with the help of other NGOs to spread awareness among people regarding women’s situation in the society, the abuses they face throughout their life in a dominated society where women are identified as objects. The main aim of the event was to promote women in local societies, eradicating discrimination practices among men and women, providing them equal chances and ceasing patriarchy.

The event started with the views of the famous social activist Kamla Bhasin. In her speech she expressed her views not just about women but dalits and other unprivileged sections in our society. She focused on providing equal opportunities to every being of society irrespective of their caste and gender. She maintained that the fight was not against women but patriarchy and also against those women who help promoting violence in society and misusing the laws against others. She suggested that one should fight for love and similarity in society irrespective of caste, creed and gender.

One more speaker Satish, who was from Ek Saath Campaign , expressed his views about women sex abuses and other mental and physical pressure faced by them in societies. He suggested that women should get united against patriarchy system.

Another NGO, Jagrookta talked about their program forum to engagement, which says that all women are quite, that’s why there is violence against women. They talked about their goal of trying to make about 1,00,000  people gender advocate to promote people to raise voice against violence at their own level.

The fashion society of Kalindi college performed a ramp walk showing different forms of a women and how she cope up against all the odds. The clear message the performance conveyed was ‘refuse to be a victim’. They showed a poster of women in which half part of women was worshipped as godess and in another half she was raped which was a very disturbing reality. Their message was that violence is not just the physical torture but it could be of any form like mental stress, emotional pressure etc.

NGO S.M.S. [ Srijnatmak Manushi Sanstha] showed the various works women do in day –today life, The problems she faces in day today life, her work is not considered as much valuable as men’s and the less care she receives in family system through their performance. The song they performed at’ Bekhauf Azad was very touching.

Kusum from All India Network Of Sex Workers highlighted the problems of sex workers- their living conditions, their livelihood, their communication problems, their marginalized status, their existence and their rights. She asked why people does not support those marginalized women in bringing them into mainstream society. People should not behave partially towards them. She also pointed out the steps her organization has taken to promote sex workers live normal life and get jobs to provide their  livelihood and live normal life.

There was another NGO group C-Far which was working in the field of transgender. They emphasized that our society only recognize two genders –men and women but they leave behind the third gender. They talked about providing them rights and helping them to be the part of main-stream society.

Naari Shakti Manch , a NGO talked about the conditions of women workers in factories. She informed that how they don’t get their dues, their harassment, they are called for night duties, they don’t get proper working conditions, how they get fired when they resist, and asked people to help women factory workers in safeguarding their rights.

These were the main issues which were discussed at One Billion Rising Movement Event.