With the purpose of empowering 1000 adolescent girls in Banda district, Uttar Pradesh and Kishanganj district, Bihar on issues around ‘Employability;’ Samatvam Trust supported Society for Reaching the Unreached (SRU) in 2022 for six months (April-September 2022). The focus of this program was on personality and skill development, communication, building self-esteem /self- confidence and to build community and family support for girls. Encouraged by the success of Phase 1 of this project, Samatvam Trust decided to support this program for 6 more months. Phase 2 of the program seeks to go beyond Phase 1, in that it seeks to equip the girls with life skills like self-defence, first-aid, knowledge of banking procedures, accessing legal aid, lodging complaints/FIR etc. An attempt would be made to mobilize, organize and create a platform for the girls to meet and interact with successful women entrepreneurs/leaders. The girls will be exposed to different avenues of employment and given the requisite information about each source of livelihood. Relevant industries/sectors in the local context will be identified. In some cases training will be imparted in various skill-sets. The girls will be informed about the expertise required, so that they can position themselves according to their interest, aptitude and abilities.

One of the cornerstones of this program is to build community support for girls within and outside the home. It is critical that interventions go beyond the target group to the adolescent girls’ families and communities. The project team engages with the parents of young girls, school teachers, panchayat members, religious leaders and anganwadi workers to explain to them the importance of their participation in skill-building programs. This helps build support for the girls in the community.

Samatvam Trust has financially supported this program for the second consecutive year.

To know more about Society for Reaching the Unreached, log on to https://www.sruindia.org/