Changing the tide: 'Girl Rising' bets on children to bring gender equality

Years ago, a group of journalists undertook an extensive research and found scores of diverse reports that prompted them to think “how can we eradicate global poverty?”. The answer to their quest lay in girls’ education, they found, because “educating girls is one of the foremost strategies with potential to bring change not only in the lives of girls themselves, but also within their own families and communities”. Thus was born Girl Rising. Stories of eight girls from around the world was captured in a film to spotlight their courage and perseverance that empowered them to transcend those barriers and gain an education. Girl Rising came to India in 2015 with the Hindi dubbed version of the film — Woh Padhegi, Woh Udegi. Priyanka Chopra, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Alia Bhatt, Parineeti Chopra, Sushmita Sen, Freida Pinto, Madhuri Dixit, Nandita Das lent their voice to each of the eight stories. 

Speaking about the organisation’s work, Nidhi Dubey, country representative, Girl Rising, says, the organisation leverages powerful storytelling tools to alleviate barriers that diminish agency and self-confidence. It uses compelling content to shift attitudes and behaviours impeding women’s equal access to opportunities. “As a lawyer by training, I have always felt about eradicating any form of injustice and discrimination. Women and girls face many forms of discrimination through the course of their life — most are guided by societal norms. These discriminations do not have a legal recourse but need to be addressed immediately. Until we don’t look at the roots, an equitable world will be harder to build,” she says. 

Pointing at how women are conspicuous by their absence in leadership positions, as heads of state, in fields of science, technology, engineering, math etc, Dubey notes, the primary perception of girls and women, continues to be limited to brides-to-be, mothers-in-waiting, cheap labour. Stereotypes, norms, social mores find themselves being passed on from one generation to the other without being questioned. “Girls and women can only realise their full potential once when they are encouraged to dream big for themselves,” she adds.

It is undoing this years and years of discrimination which is an uphill task she finds while working with the organisation. Understanding their mission will be realised only when there’s change at multitude levels, Girl Rising’s initiatives and campaigns, thus, focus on adolescents, teachers, parents, community members among others. Their Schools Campaign, is a school-based gender sensitisation curriculum which encourages adolescents — both girls and boys — to spot and stop manifestations of gender-based discrimination and imagine a future devoid of any discrimination. “The curriculum leverages six stories from Woh Padhegi, Woh Udegi and drives discussion around issues of child marriage, early pregnancies, street harassment among other issues. Since it is participatory in nature, the curriculum enables students to introspect on dominant social norms and topics of equity and access,” says Dubey.

This curriculum has been implemented in five states — Delhi, Rajasthan, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab and has reached nearly 35,000 students in the last year. According to Dubey, there was a significant change in adolescents’ behaviours and beliefs. A recent evaluation of the campaign revealed that nearly 90 per cent of the students (of the sample size) were able to identify forms of discrimination previously not known to them. Further, the curriculum has also enabled them to articulate their future aspirations and pledge support for girls’ education.

So how does it consider to be of help in today’s time when there are so many cases of violence against women? Dubey says most of the cases that we see or hear today occur because discrimination and violence has been normalised over the years. She stresses on the importance of gender-equitable attitudes such as respect for one another and cultivating feelings of camaraderie between one another early on. “Adolescence is a formative phase where a lot of habits and beliefs are solidified. Our content and curricula is geared towards helping adolescents adopt equitable practices and transition into responsible adulthood,” she adds. 

The organisation is looking to build campaigns and initiatives, based on creative content, bring attention to the inequitable access that girls and boys have. With an endeavour to change mindsets one school, one community at a time, the organisation’s message to all women is, “your gender does not decide your future, your dreams do.”