When my brother tied ‘Rakhi’- This Rakshabandan was truly a surprise :-)

I am not much into festivities, unlike childhood they don’t bring much joy to me nowadays because occasions like these means your Whatsapp is flooded with unwanted and irritating messages, pictures and videos or social media sites being epitome of some sparkling joy of celebrations in terms of status updates and may be some random relatives dropping at your home to do small talks or exchange pleasantries. So, I prefer being in casual shirt and shorts and hide somewhere to avoid all the above.

This Rakshabandan however was very different – I didn’t tie rakhi to my brother last year as we had a huge conflict and he was no way capable of ‘protecting me’ rather he was being notorious. But this time he surprised me he supported me by training me rigorously to be healthy so he earned Rakhi from me! While waiting for my another brother, who has been a great support to us in all the hard times, had seen us through highs and lows for past 2 years, I never could imagine the surprise in store for us!

Like the said ritual of the festival all the three sisters (including our cousin) tied rakhi around his wrist. As part of the gift, he handed each of us three white large envelopes, looking at our clueless faces he asked us to open them. As I opened my envelope, a shocked smile formed on my face! It had a rakhi and handmade greeting card.

“It’s not just brothers who protect the sisters. You have been protecting me, supporting me and guiding me all throughout. I respect you and you more than anyone deserves this rakhi.”

I was stunned! Never ever in my whole life has someone surprised me in this beautiful way? Being a feminist, it’s always very difficult to look at social media and world outside celebrating rakhabandan as something that glorifies a man protecting a woman and not say anything about it. Many activists have been saying that brothers should also tie rakhi to their sisters and in all this chaos here was my brother who had this genuine smile and respect for me! I was touched and then I thought world is still not that bad place to live in!

Thank you bhai :-) Wish more people understand the value of festivities as you do !    

Engaging with adolescent boys on 'How to challenge child sexual abuse'

“Do you think only men or boys are sexual offenders?”

The session on ‘child sexual abuse’ is the core of the work that we engage in with the adolescents. The issue is very sensitive, crucial and needs to be handled in the most careful way,  so once the participants are comfortable with the physical changes, their body, develop understanding of consent and sex along with how gender works in their lives, it becomes comparatively easier to discuss this issue.

The session began with the reiteration of the agreements strongly here considering how sensitive this topic is, followed by the intent for the workshop. Then video ‘Komal’ by Child line was screened for the participants, after this circle was opened for the participants to share
‘if they have ever experienced something like this?’ or ‘if they have seen something like this happening’. 

There was lot of things happening, participants whispering to each other, some evading eyes, shifting in their places, showing signs of discomfort, clearly many of them wanted to share but something was stopping them. One of the participant shared that he had seen a girl being molested by two boys while he was going to the market.

One of the boys said, ‘I don’t really trust my classmates to share this.’

This was a fair point and quite understandable since it’s a huge group of 50 students and not everyone is comfortable getting vulnerable. However this is a brownie point for us, because he trusted us to share this with us! The silence or the reactions we faced here also indicate two things: one they might be thinking about the experience of child sexual abuse they encountered or whether they should share here or not.  

 This was followed by the presentation on ‘child sexual abuse’ – which included what is child sexual abuse, who does it, statistics, feelings and thoughts associated with it.  

The objective of the session is not just to aware the adolescents on ‘what is child sexual abuse’ but to build their capacity to challenge it if they face any threat. In the next step, we invited the participants to fill the safety action plan individually, where they were told about safety rules and what to do when someone tries to touch them inappropriately. This action plan explores the feelings, thoughts and associated situation and then it slowly moves to different touch followed by safety rules. 

There was flurry of questions that followed after the discussion –

“If a boy have sex with another boy, then either of them could get pregnant? Is that also abuse”

“You said that having sex below a certain age is a crime even if we have consent, does that mean we can’t have girlfriend?”

This question in particular caught my attention not because it’s important but it’s also indicates conflict when we engage with them on sex education! However the answer to it is equally simple and thoughtful. I am glad that engaging in these workshops is making them question the choices and present reality!

“About condoms, they are available in the medical stores, but younger kids like us have no access to it” 

At the end of the workshop, two of the participants came to us and asked for extra safety action plan “I have a sister in 5^th standard, she is growing, this is important to her as much as it is important to, so can you give me one more so that I can tell her what I learnt.”

Engaging with the adolescent boys on "Child sexual abuse'

The workshop on ‘child sexual abuse’ has been very carefully and cautiously designed keeping in mind that the twin objective here: engaging on what is child sexual abuse and building their capacity to say “NO” to it along with informing them of POCSO law.  

The session with the first group of adolescent participants of Government school, Dwarka began with the reiteration of the agreements that we have been following for past 5 workshops as of now. This was followed by the game of ‘Wolf and sheep’ which hints towards the vicious cycle of violence and the struggle of the victim to challenge and break that cycle.

We then screened video ‘Komal’ by Childline which talks about good touch and bad touch; we then opened the circle and invited them to share their thoughts on the video or if they have ever being touched inappropriately. This is one of the make or break part of the session because lot of things can happen- it checks if we have been able to create a safe space, do students trust enough to be vulnerable in this circle, what to do if someone shares his experience of abuse and finally keeping the confidentiality agreement intact while abiding POCSO guidelines. 

The students share as to how they have seen people getting intimate in park, someone saw a girl being groped in  train in night, seen a girl being molestation on road though he confronted and saved the girl and others. But what scared me and had to be intervened immediately when a boy indicated that he had seen 2-3 classmates doing inappropriate things to each other, he was about to take their names. This is not a surprise that boys talk about their private organs, their length and deciding who is better man based on it however a 12 years old saying it loud was triggering enough. 

Through a pictorial presentation, we talked about what is child sexual abuse, how bad touch is not restricted to touching the private organs it could be as simple as touching the shoulder, face or head in a way to make you feel uncomfortable, feeling and thoughts associated with the abuse, constantly repeating that it’s the fault of the abuser and not the child, how to fight it out and finally why it is important to talk about child sexual abuse.

The last and most important part of the session is building their capacity to challenge child sexual abuse, this we do by engaging them through safety action workbook. It talks about feelings: good, sad, angry or ‘don’t know’; touch, rules of being safe, what do we do when safety rules are broken and most importantly they have stories indicating abuse and participants are invited to define the touch, feelings and the next course of action. 

Yet another crucial aspect of the workbook is that after each section, they emphasize that it’s not your fault that someone has touched you inappropriately, and the action to take when someone touches or tries to touch you inappropriately. 

This session brought many aspects of the participants out in open which led us to have an intense post session reflection process and dwelled on how to process the findings for the current set of students and for the future workshops.

A conversation on 'Social work, gender and activism'

We have been working with different groups of individuals be it adolescents or more recently teachers and Police on gender, sexuality and gender based violence for more than 2 years now and individually a little more in the development sector or so they call it! So when Sahas was approached to engage with young students of Masters in Social work who are currently interning with an organization that works primarily for justice against Domestic violence case, I was in a dilemma! There are many reasons for it- we were asked to have conversation on “Social work, gender and Feminism” and may be talk about our work at Sahas. 

Now the term ‘Social work’ itself triggers many emotions, thoughts, judgments and the struggles- so a red alert: Do I want to tell them theoretical meaning of it, project a glossy and picturesque image so that they are inspired to step in the development sector or give them a reality check which may scare them or just emphasize on the judgments around the field. We had a better idea, which was facilitating them to show the different sides of the sector, let them question and ponder over it so that they can build and work towards their idea of social work.

We started the session with a mind mapping around “Social work”- not surprisingly the words that came initially were: stopping corruption, helping people, betterment of the society, awareness, equality, unity, justice, change but as someone said ‘Pseudo’ something changed in the group dynamics and then the words like- New way of money making, more focused on individuals that the work, symbol of fame, over abused, hypocrisy, conflicting, impact, and many other negative connotation started flowing. This gave us a head start in the right direction my dilemma was insinuating to. In the next part of the first activity, we inquired as to why the decision of ‘social work’?

“For bringing in social change”

“Wanted to do something for myself and others”

“What happened to me, I don’t want it to happen to the future generations?”

“To help the people in need”

“To spread awareness, for educating people”

“I saw something wrong happening in the society and to live with that was impossible so I took a stand”

Then we moved on the individual introduction which included name and one positive quality. It was interesting that even with social work running through the day, it seemed very difficult for the students to share a positive trait.  After this, Mona Yadav, Co-founder at Sahas shared her experience of being a volunteer all through her college education, a PhD scholar who is bridging the gap between her education and the work at Sahas, her bitter sweet journey of beginning of Sahas and what led her to work her way out.  It was then Saurabh, who is the Founder at ‘Anaa’ shared his journey of an activist that began when he was merely 16 years old, going to protests, fighting for the women who were victims of Domestic violence, to being jailed and beaten mercilessly for raising his voice against the violence. His fight for the justice against the system and authorities though could scare one but gave us hope that there are many more like us who really want change to happen irrespective of what hurdles or challenges we face.

Then, Himanshu Yadav who has been working with Sahas in capacity of co-facilitator and photographer shared what social change means to him, his struggles with gender stereotypes since childhood that made him think that may be something is wrong with him to challenging the same and now effectively engaging with the boys to see through these stereotypes that society entraps us into. It was an overwhelming experience for each one of us because sharing and listening to each other’s struggles makes us not only relive the moments but also inspire us! 

After a quick break we engage on building understanding on gender, gender based violence, sexuality and patriarchy. Not a surprise, that most of them still think that gender is male and female however when we started talking about gender difference, lot many stories came out-

“Even if I am tired from college, I would still be doing household work while my brother roams around”

“My education was put on hold for 2 years because my parents wanted me to marry, but now I am studying”

“My sister doesn’t go out, restricts herself to home and household work, I would like her to be free and have her opinion heard”

“We have to always ask for permission for anything or everything that we engage in while same in not the case with men. We are constantly scrutinized for our actions, inactions and taunted for everyone’s mistake”

We then shared our tryst and challenges of working in the social sector – deconstructing the mirage of ‘Social work’ as in how it is difficult to fit into the new culture of ‘development sector’, the long hours, the importance of intentions, and many more. Then the session was opened to questions, so that participants can ask if they have any curiosities, questions or doubts-

Participant 1- “Did you face any resistance from parents?”

“We have a very complicated relationship with parents, we do see a glimpse of their support here and there, but it has taken a lot of time to come up with even that amount of agreement. We constantly have discussion on gender in our homes that make our parents uncomfortable and unhappy but if we can’t have conversation in homes than working outside probably won’t work”

“I have been thrown out of my home a number of times but my parents take me back too, so yeah they are slowly getting comfortable with my idea of activism”

Participant 2- “How do people respond to your workshops? Do you get resistance too”

“Working on gender is walking on double edge sword, you are always under personal attack, there is so much resistance that people can call you names man hating and lot of inappropriate words. There was this workshop with :Police where a man actually questioned my intention of a gender activist by saying that I work on gender because some man would have humiliated me or tortured me, you people always talk about problems and in my family women are equally respected and lot others. When I started answering he cut me off in the very first sentence paving my way to the answer that I am a gender activist because people like him don’t even let me say one sentence. So we need to be on our toes for such not so welcoming criticism which all the more emphasize on the importance of work”

Other questions involved- “Where do you get funding from?”   

“Do you think you can work as activist and still manage a living?”

“In current times, how difficult it is to point out the misery and wrong doings?”

Moving towards the closure of our interaction, we invited them to share on “how was the day for them?”

“I didn’t know many of the things, it was enlightening, lot of knowledge was imparted. I am glad I could see your work”

“When I thought we are visiting an organization, I thought it would some lecture and we would write points but this was engaging and we were having conversations around the issues of our life.”

“We have been asked to go through profiles of several organizations through their websites- they seem glorious and enchanting however the ground reality seems so different, I never saw people like you who are so deep down in the work, I learnt a lot. I know the journey won’t be easy ahead but I know I want to take this”

This was one of a kind experience for us, as we rarely engage with young people  so talking to would be activists or social workers or development campaigners was a learning experience and also gave us an opportunity to reflect on our work.