On September 14, 2010, Melanne S. Verveer, United States Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women's Issues, visited the Garima project in New Delhi, India to observe progress the program had made. Garima, (‘dignity’ in Hindi) is a project that IFES is implementing in partnership with Counterpart International under an award from USAID. Garima was launched in New Dehli in November 2009 by the Ambassador herself. It builds on six years of previous IFES women’s rights programming in India and aims to support Indian institutions and civil society to:
- enhance the ability of Indian women to advocate for their rights in the Parliament and state legislatures
- deter gender based violence, female feticide and child marriage, and
- increase the participation of Muslim women in mainstream social, economic and political processes.
Garima works with Indian partner NGOs in Rajasthan, Karnataka and New Delhi to achieve these goals through research, advocacy, public outreach and community mobilization.
Ambassador Verveer made this stop as part of her visit to India. She was accompanied by Melanie Bixby (Deputy Director Regional Affairs- Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs), Sabah Gohri, (VAW Advisor- South and central Asia Specialist), and other US Embassy/USAID officials.
During the visit, the Ambassador and her team had the opportunity to meet with representatives of partner NGOs as well as community members involved in the program including women from the Jain community and doctors working on the anti-female feticide component, young men from Rajasthan who are members of the Youth Forums Against Gender Based Violence, and Muslim women involved with the counselling center component.
Earlier this year, Ambassador Verveer said about Garima: “I travelled to New Delhi and participated in the opening ceremony of this project. I was impressed with how it worked. Male members of the Rajasthan community performed a powerful street play that highlighted the negative impact of child sex selection, domestic violence and child marriage.” She seemed equally pleased with the results she saw today.
Ambassador Verveer commented that these women and men are the catalysts for change. At one point she said that these programmes have the potential to be duplicated in other countries as violence against women is a universal problem and the community approach and linkages with the government could also help women in other countries.
She congratulated the Garima team and said that the wonderful part of this strategy is that the programme doesn’t merely address a single issue faced by women, but it takes a holistic approach and works with all stakeholders related to the issue. She was also very appreciative of the manner in which the partners have collaborated with the government at all levels in the different components of our program. She was very pleased to hear that the Delhi Government would be allocating funds for the training programmes and take Garima assistance in planning these programmes.