BANGALORE: In a bid to address the urgent need of the sexual minority community in a holistic manner, Samara Pehchan, a community-based organisation (CBO), organised a media workshop titled ‘Building Partnerships: Media and Sexual Minorities’ here on Tuesday.
Pehchan, a five-year project, aims to provide HIV prevention services for men who have sex with men (MSM), transgender and hijra communities.
Sana, Programme Director, said, “There is no project which looks towards understanding the psychological aspects of sexual minorities community. But, Pehchan, a new project, through the Global Fund Grant, brings a ray of hope to strengthen the existing community-led HIV prevention programmes.”
Pehchan was given the grants last year and activities have already begun.
According to Difaraz, advocacy officer for Pehchan, the situation at the ground level has been changing for better in the last five years, after the HIV prevention programmes. Now Karnataka is among the 17 states in which the Pehchan Project has been launched. The sub-recipient of the grant for 10 districts in Kerala and 21 districts in Karnataka would support the process and implement it through its CBO Samara in Bangalore.