Enabling the enabler

After successfully conducting the #LetsTalkPeriod through zoom, it gave me confidence to reachout to more teachers working in marginalised areas. Sunita Bhasin , the director of SSMI (where we conducted the first virtual session for their teachers), introduced me to Sushma Aggarwal of Arpana trust. On 22nd February 2021, another virtual session on Periods, covering facts, ancient wisdom, busting myths and sharing information on sustainable feminine hygiene solutions was succesfully concluded.

Sushma Aggarwal, an octogenarian, is a source of inspiration and a force to reckon with herself. She shared her tryst with serving the marginalised through Arpana trust which was founded in 1962.

Mrs. Shroff, Mrs.Seth, and Mrs Sushma Agarwal were 3 friends who wanted to contribute to Arpana trust and started working in a slum with 20 children in Indira camp, Delhi for half a day. After 10 years of work, the slum was to be broken, and they realized that with the relocation, all the hard work may dissipate with the education of the children coming to a halt. Sushma Aggarwal says ‘We went to the slum commissioner and requested for an alternate area where these families could be shifted. The commissioner was familiar with our work and was impressed with the dedication of us old ladies and shifted the 200 families to the molarband area’ . This is where the ‘Basti Vikas Kendra’ with 100 children started. Now there are a total of 1500 hundred children receiving education both in pre-school as well as through tuition support. For older girls who are not very educated or school dropouts, there are beauty culture, tailoring, and craft classes conducted, to enable them to get jobs or work from home as per their individual requirements. The main focus remains, making the girls economically independent.

‘Most of the teachers with Arpana trust have worked for over 10- 15 years including Kalpana Maam, Saroj Maam and Nabneeta Maam. They help imbibe Arpana’s ethos of selfless service, love and affection for the children’ Sushma Aggarwal added.

It was with these teachers , enabling the children of molarband at the Basti Vikas Kendra , that I conducted the #LetsTalkPeriod session virtually. Enabling the enabler 🙂

The session lasted for close to 3 hours – while the workshop itself is for 2 hours, the feedback and interaction of the participants, sharing their stories is always the highlight in each session. Here is some of the feedback along with some artworks imbibing the lesson. The best one stands to win a stonesoup.in menstrual cup worth Re. 945.

‘It was an amazing session, this subject needs to be discussed more and males should also be involved in this kind of session.’

‘Good for us and future generations how to fight with period problems.’

‘बहुत अच्छा था बसे तो हम सब ये बाते जानते हैं बस खुलेआम इस बारे मे बात नही करते जो करना बहुत ज़रूरी है’

‘The session was very informative and helpful. I Learnt and got know about good and fact full knowledge about periods other than myths.’

If you work or run a non profit school in a marginalised segment, I would be happy to conduct this session on periods with your school Free of cost. Drop me a mail on womanendangered@gmail.com or suparnaa@simplysuparnaa.com and lets make the most through the new normal.

Everybody bleeds so LETS TALK PERIOD!

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