Enable access to school for girls in Dalit communities in India — a fundraising cause by Sharon Elizabeth
Let us present you our very first pilot small-scale fundraiser Sharon Elizabeth, who with her husband and friend are creating a fundraising cause for enabling education for girls in low cast communities in Indian slums.
Sharon Elizabeth Freundlich is our very first pilot tester for small-scale fundraising, launching in August. Her cause is created for non-profit organization based in India, Dalit Women Forum, to mainstream the education of girl children in order to increase their living levels. Sharon has worked in the target association for a few years as a program coordinator.
Objectives of the fundraising cause are:
- To give awareness to parents’ responsibility & importance towards children’s education
- To Give training on gender-based discrimination
- To make them aware of social values and the importance of a girl child’s education
Expected Outcomes:
- 25 children would be enrolled.
- 6 awareness camps would be organized covering 300 parents
- 25 children would be retained in the schools.
With Sharon Elizabeth we were talking about the Dalit Women Forum and about the motivation to create a small-scale fundraising cause to support girls in Dalit communities to enable access to school.
Listen the podcast:
Girls suffer most — reasons for the cause
There are more than 2500 slums in the city of Hyderabad, Telangana state. Addagutta is one among them. Addagutta is the second biggest slum in the Asia continent consisting of more than one lakh population. The occupation of the women is domestic work, vegetable vending on mobile carts, daily wage labor, local cigarette rolling, flower vending, and rag picking. Whereas men work as masonry, daily wage labor, auto-rickshaws, and garbage lifters from door to door.
The majority of the target families suffer from fluctuation in their earnings, due to underemployment. The absence of investment capital and dependency on unskilled labor, largely contribute to this sub-optimal utilization of human power. On the other hand, most of the target women are unemployed due to a lack of entrepreneurial skills. As a result, the families deprived of basic needs are forced to continue indebtedness. Ultimately, it is affecting girl children not to send schools overall.
Status of women is lower than men and therefore a male child is preferred over a female child. A male child is considered a blessing and his birth is celebrated and a girl is considered more of a burden. A girl’s discrimination begins even before birth. The census data clearly shows that the ratio of female births is declining, and women are reluctant to seek medical aid for ailing daughters, the status of the female child has never been the same as the male regardless of the economic background.
From birth to death in the whole life cycle of the girl they are discriminated, the girl child is even breast-fed for a shorter time and drawn out of the school to take care of siblings. Girls are forced to marry at an early age which results in premature pregnancies and expected risks. So, the girl child needs to be empowered to enter the mainstream of education, economic, and social activity. She needs to be given opportunities to grow in a positive environment and extend support for her overall development.
About the Dalit Women Forum
Dalit Women Forum is a non-profit charitable society based on the philosophy of empowering the oppressed and in the process to create an egalitarian society that is just and free. It is a brainchild of academicians and social workers. Dalit Women Forum is a platform to understand, integrate, and encourage gender issues to create linkages and also acknowledge the imperative need for comprehensive sustainable development in the relevant areas of complex human problems. The major goal of the Forum is to realize all human rights — economic, social, cultural, civil and political — that are to be promoted, preserved and defended
Organization’s vision, mission & goals
Vision
To create a caste and gender-free society wherein Dalits have Freedom, equal rights, and assert themselves as stakeholders powerfully in socio, economic, cultural, and political spheres.
Mission
Strengthening of Dalit movement with organizations, leaderships, resources, and linkages at various levels to realize the vision with a special focus on Dalits, tribal, and Dalit minorities.
Goals
- Building Dalit rights-based associations at the ward, Mandal, circle, and zonal levels.
- Building Dalit’s potential for public action for democracy strengthening for holding the state accountable.
- Equip & strengthen with leadership skills.
- Facilitating and ensure visible Dalit participation and leadership in community-based organizations.
