Interview with Founder of Sambhali Trust

I have just finished my interview with Govind Singth Rathore, the founder of the untouchable women's empowerment charity called the Sambhali Trust. He gave an entirely new perspective on my project and had lots of new information to share.

He started by describing in detail what the Sambhali Trust does. Their goal is to empower women in the Rajasthan community as much as possible. Their process is this: when women usually come to the charity, there is a good chance they have suffered from domestic violence. Domestic violence and alcohol are two of the main factors that lead towards the abuse of women. The Sambhali Trust helps these women by giving them emotional support and providing a sense of community in the charity. Once this is done, the charity tries to convince the women to attend their education programs. If they convince the women to attend, they begin to teach them basic reading and writing skills, and help them to gain confidence and integrity. Some reasons that women are convinced to get a proper education are that once that is done, they can work and get a job, and although they are from the lowest caste, the untouchables, once they start earning money of their own, they gain a new respect for themselves and from the community around them. Money in India is very important, and some people's greed for it can make them cast aside their prejudice. It's a relief that there are ways for women to get respect in their community, but it is also quite shocking how much influence greed has over such basic human rights issues.

In terms of word spreading out about the charity, workers go door to door in the slums of town and cities and tell families there about the charity, and that they should send the women in the family there. A problem that the charity often runs into is after two or three months of schooling and attending the charity, women and girls stop going. The charity went to find out, and apparently, after two or three months the women begin to get a sense self-confindence, and begin to say "no" to things they didn't want to do. The men in the family saw this as a threat, and stop them from going to the education classes.

The Indian government advises that women should be paid about 1,100 rupees (about $22 Canadian) for their work that they sell each month. The store that Sambhali Trust owns that sells items b made by women in villages pays them from 3,500 to 6,000 rupees ($70 to $120 Canadian) each month. Some negative news is that the Indian government says that if you earn more than 26 rupees (52 cents Canadian) in a village, or 32 rupees (64 cents Canadian) in a town daily, you are not considered poor and therefore get no government support. This leaves lots of families trying to make a living while being paid very little.

I was able to learn some more information about the incident I talked about earlier in New Delhi. A 23 year old medical student boarded a city bus early in the morning, and was brutally gang raped and beaten by a group of men. As a result, there have been many protests in New Delhi demanding stricter laws against rapists in India. Rapists, along with murderers, serve a seven-year sentence in prison. But the protesters are demanding that the accused men serve a harsher sentence, some even suggesting capitol punishment. The sad thing is that every 42 minutes, an Indian woman is raped, and every 62 minutes, it is a child being raped. When I asked Govind why people are protesting now, when it is so common for it to happen, he said that most people don't want to start a protest over something that happens so much already, and don't want to get in trouble with the law. Already police forces have had to fire water cannons at crowds and beat protesters that have gotten out of hand. The thing, however, that makes this case so different is that it was on a public service bus, it was in the capitol of the country, and not only was the girl raped, she was also brutally wounded and beaten.

If you would like to learn more about the Sambhali Trust, or to read Govind's story of what inspired him to start this charity, I encourage you to visit their website

http://www.sambhali-trust.org/