Actor and humanitarian Ashley Judd, board member of Population Services International (PSI) and the Global Ambassador for YouthAIDS, will be writing posts for the ONE Blog during her March 2007 travels through India. During the trip, Ashley will address women’s issues, and have the opportunity to discover how families can be empowered to protect themselves against HIV/AIDS and unintended pregnancies.

Monday, March 19, 2007

A lovely young man showed me a powerpoint presentation about our micro finance and credit programs. It was utterly thrilling. CSWs (Commericial Sex Workers) are in unbreakable cycles of vicious debt: to the people who own them, the madams who run the brothels, and the money lenders who do the classic scam of high interest rates when a woman has an emergency and cannot say no. The deal is so stacked against them, and they suffer, their children suffer, the families back home whom they are supporting suffer.

Our program seeks to remedy that, emphatically interrupting the cycle for them, yet, it is run by them. The women are counseled about the importance of savings and encouraged to set goals: their children’s education, for example. Sangini, which means “friend,” creates a photo I.D. for each CSW. Identification is a huge barrier to banking, as they require papers, such as a birth certificate. These women simply do not have such since they were trafficked, tricked, or simply so rural and poor, or all of the above. Each day, someone from Sangini will come to each brothel to pick up deposits, even if it is only 1 rupee. The member may withdraw her money at any time, in any amount, without penalty; while deposited, it earns a healthy, fair interest. It’s simply the neatest operation. They have outfoxed the cheaters and owners at every move with targeted fiscal intervention that puts what the CSW earns under her own control for the first time!!!

Economic empowerment is an essential piece in the complex puzzle of disentangling women from exploitation; I love all our programs in each of the ten countries I have personally visited, but this one I believe is truly special. It’s the first of its type worldwide and has awesome potential to explode to the benefit of once hopelessly trapped women everywhere. Rock on, Sangini!!!

***

Next I visited with four members of Sanghamitra (our peer educators) – Shehnaz, Akatai, Indira, and Simla; each of whom explained how different their lives are by virtue of sharing their experience, strength, and hope with other CSWs They detailed what it’s been like to find their voices, gain a measure of self esteem, self worth, self respect, and some self love. They were a very typical sampling of CSWs: one was sold into a brothel from her village by an uncle for 3,000 rupees (about $900US); one came knowingly out of starvation and the need to care for her two young children – one of whom had polio; one was trafficked from Nepal; and the other was brought to Mumbai by a friend to do “housework.” They each had had husbands at some point; one died, one disappeared, and the other two were alcoholics. Between them, these four older, beautiful, wounded but slowly healing women had 100 years of brothels between them; now, they have some peace of mind and some choices. It was quietly thrilling to hear them share some light as the finish to their stories of harrowing darkness.

In addition to running the center, which I expect will be a very uplifting visit this week, their job is to reach out as peer educators to other CSWs in the brothels to encourage them to join this community based organization, to describe its benefits and programs, and to talk, always to talk, about how to protect their reproductive health, avert unintended pregnancy, and stay safe. One of the women actually gets to live in the center; I wish they all did.

-Ashley