Opportunity Through Vocation – India – Spring 2016 Newsletter

Women in a tailoring class take advantage of good weather and hold their class outside. Photo courtesy of Disha Foundation, India. 2016.

Vinita, SowHope’s partner and local leader in India, has begun a 2-year project with the expectation of enrolling 200 women. The focus is on encouraging and empowering women through education, with the women learning a vocation and discovering ways to look after themselves and their families. Vinita’s drive to offer such training comes from knowing the reality of what life could be for the women without this education and resulting opportunities for employment. Recently, a leading newspaper cited that in the city of Delhi alone, six rapes are reported to the police every day! Vinita wants to help women protect themselves from violence and to prevent them from falling victim to the sex trade.

Recently she reported, “Many Afghan refugee women have joined the training. One girl was being pushed by her sister, who is a dancer in a bar, to join her. She decided instead to join beauty parlor and tailoring classes.” The young women earn certificates of completion after passing their exams, and some of them have quickly gotten jobs.

Responses from the young women about their training, in their own words, are:

  • “My life is going to change totally as I have taken these classes with you.”
  • “I have never before heard such teaching. I am shocked to learn so much about my own body.”
  • “I have been a community slum worker for so many years, but I have never heard teaching with such great teaching aids like we are shown here.”

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