United Progressive Alliance (UPA) chairperson Sonia Gandhi will launch the 'Ahimsa Messenger' programme of the Ministry of Women and Child Development here on Saturday.
The event will be presided over by Women and Child Development Minister Krishna Tirath in the presence of Panchayati Raj and Tribal Affairs Minister
V. Kishore Chandra Deo and Member of Parliament J. P. Agarwal.
Nearly 30,000 girls from Delhi NCR who have been benefitted by Rajiv Gandhi Scheme for Empowerment of Adolescent Girls or SABLA will also be present at the event.
This initiative of the Ministry of Women and Child Development addresses violence against women in all forms through a mass movement by creating numerous Ahimsa Messengers in various parts of the country, till the grassroots level.
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Violence against women and girls has far-reaching consequences, harming families and communities. The Ministry of Women and Child Development has conceptualised a programme for empowering women against violence named Ahimsa Messenger. The Ahimsa Messenger as a concept had been introduced by the Ministry of Women and Child development earlier.
However, given the spate of violence against women and children in the current context a full-fledged programme is being started which has the following dimension: a series of awareness building programmes across the nation on Gender issues, a series of training and sensitization programmes for grass root level functionaries across the nation, developing and introducing a gender sensitive module/curriculum which is now being introduced in various training institutes across states.
The 'Ahimsa Messenger' programme aims at preventing violence against women and children and generating awareness about basic legal rights, procedures and provisions amongst women and children at the grassroots. The programme involves both men and women including youths to address and eliminate all forms of violence against women and children at grassroots and facilitate social/community mobilization to fight social evils.
Ahimsa Messengers would also serve as link workers in case of any violence and also facilitate the women to approach the concerned authorities in case of incidences of violence for suitable redressal and follow up on the case. During the launch programme scheduled for tomorrow, Ahimsa Massenger Training Programme and the standard tool kit for training under this Programme will be launched as well.
The programme envisages generating awareness amongst the community and giving intensive training to the various cadres of grass root level workers under various programmes across the country, besides generating awareness amongst the community especially adolescent girls and boys about their civic responsibilities and duties.
The Ahimsa Messengers will facilitate an enabling environment for safety and security of women and children in the community. They will also create women and child friendly environment in villages through community participation, especially of local leaders, adolescent boys and men, opinion makers, village elders etc.
This programme will be implemented through all Anganwadi Centres, all Panchayati Raj Institutions, Sabla Girls (in the age group of 16-18 years) and Poorna Shakti Kendras (PSK) coordinators under the National Mission for Empowerment of Women (NMEW) will be trained as Ahimsa Messengers.
