Of heart and mind

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A sanitary napkin was unheard of for me. And if one of us had heard about or seen it, there was no way we could afford it,” re-calls Geeta, a resident of the slums near Karkardooma in Delhi. “Things have changed now, as we not only use these napkins, but also know why we must do so. We’ve got a new understanding of menstruation today,” she adds.

A beneficiary of the Sanitation Solution project run by SSCBS College, Delhi University, and Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE), Geeta belongs to the growing community of underserved supported by the global student body through local universities and colleges. For Manushi Yadav, a student member of the SIFE team at SSCBS, Geeta’s case was an eye-opener. “To survive in a strongly patriarchal society, most of these women had to quit school due to the myths associated with menstruation. We provide them with the opportunities to break away from those stigmas and help them ensure that their daughters do not suffer the same fate,” says the young volunteer.
In India, SIFE works with leading corporate partners and member universities. It establishes student programmes on campuses across the nation. The colleges work on a project once a socially relevant idea is approved. Some projects running across Delhi colleges are Life on Wheels and project Aahaar by SRCC (facilitating micro-credit to rickshaw pullers and empowering them to own the rickshaws eventually, and empowering women rescued from trafficking by training them in cooking and helping them set up a catering business); IIT-Delhi’s Placement Cell and project Weaving Hope (aiming at bridging the gap between the target community and the employers and an initiative to revive the traditional Burmese art of weaving), and project Aarambh by the Institute of Management Technology, under which underprivileged women learn to convert rags into useful and marketable products.
Colleges like SRCC have as many as four projects running with SIFE, some of them taking up issues one hardly imagines. “Under project Azmat, we manually pick human excreta and dispose of it. With this project we aim to liberate the scavengers by providing them with an alternative source of livelihood,” says Arjun Sahai, part of a 50-member team working on these projects. For him, SIFE is a long-term association that goes beyond the three years at college. “The thought of ac-tually helping people in ne-ed and supporting them lead a better life motivates us. It is a place where the heart and mind work together,” he adds.
“Being part of one such project makes students acquire skills such as better communication, leadership and entrepreneurship. They work as a team. It also enhances their self-confidence,” says Farhan Pettiwala, president, SIFE India.
While the network is expanding by the year, a SIFE membership requires a lot of dedication and commitment from a student. “One needs to maintain a healthy study-social work balance so we time ourselves. And whenever one of us has a study assignment, the other member takes over,” says Arpit Khandelwal, a student of IIT Delhi.