Safecity Monthly Update – April 2016
Safecity is growing exponentially and we’re constantly working hard to translate our vision to reality. Because we don’t want you to miss out on our work, we’ve decided to put together a monthly column to tell you about what we’ve been up to. You can sign up for our newsletter here.
Our work in April was centered on the themes of safer cities particularly with respect to sexual harassment in public spaces in lieu of the Global Anti-Street Harassment Week that falls in the second week of April. We are also thrilled that we received three awards this month and are grateful that our work is being appreciated. Read on to know all that we’ve worked on and achieved this month.
Safecity Wins at the Intercultural Innovation Awards
We are happy to announce that Safecity is a winner at The Intercultural Innovation Awards, a partnership between the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations and the BMW Group, which supports grassroots initiatives that promote intercultural dialogue and understanding.
Our Founder & MD, Elsa D’silva was present at the ceremony and received the award. 10 global grassroots organizations received the Intercultural Innovation Award at the 7th Global Forum of the UNAOC.
Check out the short video made by UNAOC on our YouTube Channel here.
Our Founder & MD, Elsa D’silva at The Intercultural Innovation Awards
During a period of one year, the selected initiatives will enjoy invaluable expert mentoring and resources from the BMW Group and UNAOC. In addition to receiving monetary support, the finalists will have the opportunity to participate in training activities as well as to become a part of the exclusive “Intercultural Leaders” network. Launched in 2011, the Intercultural Innovation Award is the result of a unique public-private partnership between UNAOC and the BMW Group. This model of collaboration between the United Nations and the private sector creates deeper impact, as both partners provide their respective expertise to ensure the sustainable growth of each project.
SDG 11 : Sustainable Cities & Communities – Gendered Perspective
For the entire month of April, Safecity made a case for safety, especially women’s safety in our cities and communities – one of the targets of UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. As a part of this worldwide effort, our focus was on Goal 11 – ‘Make cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable’.
Check out our comprehensive blog on all the discussions we conducted this month on SDG 11 here.
We would particularly like to thank Anuja Sawant for spearheading this effort. Read her blog on SDG 11 here.
Safecity: International Anti-Street Harassment Week
Safecity participated in the International Anti-Street Harassment Week from 10 – 16 April, 2016.
We engaged with people in our online and offline communities through activities, workshops & creative campaigns to highlight the issue of Sexual Harassment in Public Spaces.
Read our comprehensive blog post on our activities during Anti-Street Harassment Week to learn more here.
Talking Walls: Mural Painting by young boys and girls in Sanjay Camp, Delhi
Know Your Rights : Sexual Harassment Awareness Poster Series
Reclaiming public spaces through sports: Indira Nagar
#MySafecity Photo Campaign: These amazing girls we’re working with in Indira Nagar, Jogeshwari (E) in partnership with Vacha Charitable Trust say, their safe city will have freedom for girls.
Reaching more people: New Campaign launched in North West Delhi
We launched our first on-ground campaign in North West Delhi with Action India and in solidarity with Delhi Police’s Parivartan Program on April 27th, 2016. This also happens to be our 8th campaign in New Delhi since 2014. As part of this, we conducted a training with Action India’s Jahangirpuri team, a group of dedicated women who work tirelessly in challenging settings, on how to run a campaign for safer spaces. We shared our stories, we heard theirs and we created an action plan together.
We are looking forward to inspiring stories of change from this campaign encouraged by the impact of our past and ongoing campaigns, join us in making our efforts stronger, louder and more visible!
Safecity Emerging Leaders
Safecity is celebrating the journey of people who have emerged as leaders as our campaigns progressed in their communities through our blog series “Safecity Emerging Leaders“. Read the inspiring stories of these individuals who are passionate about making their neighbourhoods safer with Safecity and have taken action in their own special ways.
Read this month’s Emerging Leader, Saba’s story on our blog here.
Saba
13 year old Saba Parveen is the youngest of her family of seven, however that does not stop her from raising her voice loud against any social injustice. Living in the community of Bandra Plot, she has fought for the issues of free and accessible community toilets, girl’s education and now with Safecity, she is working on a campaign against sexual harassment in public spaces.
“Before I didn’t even know what ched-chaad (Sexual harassment) was but now I take action and speak up against it.”
Know Our Team
Know Our Team is a new blog series that attempts to bring to you the stories of our team, share our experiences, why we do what we do and special moments that have left an indelible mark in each of our lives.
Read this month’s blog by Abhijith Asok, our Head Data Analyst on his passion for data science and his journey with Safecity here.
Most of all, it was Safecity’s focus on data as the weapon to fight gender-based violence which made me fall head over heels for it – particularly because of that bold move when the world itself is trying so hard to use the artillery called data in an effective way.
Diversifying Conversations on Gender through Twitter
@pinthecreep is an open online space for people to discuss issues of gender and educate & engage with people on them.
Each week we invite a new person to share their ideas, views and solutions on the issue of street harassment, violence against women and public safety in general. We have had people activists, lawyers, students, homemakers, journalists managers in large companies talk about the issue of public safety.
The reason to rotate the curator is to bring out the different opinions on the issue and engage people to be activists for this cause.
So far we have had 104 curators and been able to engage over 500 people in conversations about gender from their perspective and expertise, legal, environment, safety, finance, urban planning, smart solutions, technology, education, art, etc apart from reaching out to @pinthecreep’s over 55,000+ Twitter followers. These discussions are crucial to broaden the conversation and explore the myriad and practical possibilities & solutions.
The result is a thriving network of citizen based opinions & solutions on a platform that aims to change the way people behave in & use public spaces.
Our curators have all had diverse experiences and many shared feedback on the ways their discussions on @pinthecreep have enriched them or exposed them to new issues, ideas and people. Here are some of the comments we received from our Curators on their experience:
Fabulous. It has encouraged me to start a blog on fitness – I keep getting asked about it all the time anyway and when you focus that perspective specifically onto women, it gets even more complex. My time curating your handle confirmed that time is ripe for a space that discusses fitness for women. – Reema (@scrollsnink)
Felt that my social media time was being used for something useful. Got connected with those with good insights. Managed to read more about women safety and allied topics while researching for topics. – Manju Latha Kalanidhi (@mkalanidhi)
It was an amazing experience for me. Though I was not curating for the first time (since I have handled curation for another forum during the last year), still I took upon this as a fresh learning experience where I could learn and connect with like minded people. Curating for Safecity was fun because it allowed me voice my opinions and concerns as I wanted to. Though, there were guidelines given to me beforehand, I was allowed freedom and creativity to take conversations ahead in the way I thought was the best. I chose topics, networked with people, made the conversations more participatory and through this process ended up exposing myself to perspectives that I was not aware of. It was an insightful process. – Nidhi @mailtonidhiIt was fun talking about gender issues from a male perspective. – Raamesh (@tweetinghaijin)
If you wish to curate @pinthecreep, please write to us at info@reddotfoundation.org
Biz Divas India – Social Innovation Award
Our Director, Supreet K Singh won the Social Innovation Award at the Biz Divas India Awards!
The Social Innovation Award recognizes an innovative leader who finds solutions to expand economic opportunities,relieve poverty, or increase the financial inclusion of marginalized communities.This is for the individuals who attract, support and inspire some of the most innovative,high-impact social entrepreneurs in India.
Supreet receiving the Award
See more pictures on our Facebook Page here.
SECONA – Security Professional of the Year Award
Safecity won the “Security Professional of the Year – Women” award at a ceremony hosted by SECONA – Security Consultants Association.
Our Director, Supreet K Singh and our Training Manager, Ashwini Syed receiving the award.
SECONA is the first association of security consultants in India, formed to encourage adoption of best practices in the Indian Security & Safety Technology sector. As a part of their annual activities, they have instituted “Shield” Awards, to recognize and honour excellence within the security & safety industry. Secona Shield Awards, powered by Secutech India, have become the benchmark for recognition of excellence in the security industry.
TweetChats
Through our tweetchats we are trying to facilitate important conversations around various issues related to gender in general and women’s issues in particular.
Our curators this month held four insightful tweetchats, ranging from subjects like PMS to Safety in 100 Smart Cities of India, Street Sexual Harassment with respect to the Indian Subcontinent and Safe Cycling in Indian Cities.
Check out the storified tweetchats on our blog here, here, here and here.
Poster from one of our Tweetchats
That’s all for the month of April. Keep watching this space and we’ll keep you updated on all our work and exciting activities every month!