[India] Using IT for women in distress

[Irfan Khan <nahknafri@yahoo.com>]

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This month we applaud the work of Nari Raksha Samiti
(NRS), an Indian
social welfare organisation devoted to improving the
lives of poor and
destitute women.  Founded fifty years ago to help
women in distress, NRS
focuses on promoting the safety and security of women,
family welfare,
employment, health, and training in job-oriented
professions. The Samiti
has twenty centres headed by volunteers.

Under the leadership of Vandana Sharma, NRS has begun
using twenty-first
century technology to address the wrongs that result
from the age-old
traditions associated with the dowry system.  Vandana
recognized the
impact that computers are having on the changing
Indian economy and
established a small computer education centre in the
NRS building. 
Vandana and the NRS volunteers are now training 250
young women -- sixty
of whom are dowry victims and have a history of
harassment and
exploitation -- in basic computer literacy as well as
office software such
as Excel, Word, and Power Point.  This IT training
program joins training
programs in tailoring, interior decoration, cooking,
food preservation,
and weaving in providing needy women with the job
skills necessary to
break out of the cycle of poverty and abuse which
affects so many women in
India.

The NRS computer centres not only provide job
training, but have also
allowed NRS to establish an online complaint system
for solving dowry and
family dispute issues.  Women can confidentially lodge
complaints through
the system and receive assistance from NRS and police
and government
authorities.  NRS has been successful in training more
than four hundred
dowry victims and poor women in the community.

For more information, please contact Vandana Sharma at

+91-11-3973949/2945372 or at nrsdli@vsnl.com or visit
the NRS website at 
http://www.narirakshasamiti.org.



source: Bridges.news: February 02, Volume 3 Issue 1
Email: info@bridges.org
Web: http://www.bridges.org/


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