BENGALURU: Citizen group Whitefield Rising is creating a referral directory of the services available for women and children who are survivors of violence in Bengaluru in order to build awareness. If all goes well, they should be able to start providing referral services for legal, medical, counselling or police assistance starting December.
They could be victims of physical/sexual violence or emotional abuse. They’re also starting a comprehensive training programme for interested volunteers to work as support persons. Called ‘Bembala’, trained volunteers will walk survivors through options about the relevant agencies here, and guide and support their follow up.
All volunteers will be trained to listen with empathy and respond in a non- judgmental manner and be able to provide timely and appropriate assistance and information to the women and children who reach out for help. Nitya Rama Krishnan, one of the founding members of Bembala said, “We started Whitefield Rising five years ago and have got calls from women of both lower and upper economic strata enquiring if we can help in cases of domestic violence,” Nitya said. “We learnt that the problem doesn’t get solved by lodging a police complaint. What after? We need legal remedies, but first, need trained volunteers,” she added.
Kiran Bhatia, another Bembala founding member has experience of running Sanjivini Society for Mental Health in Delhi. According to Kiran, they have collaborated with various women’s rights NGOs like Vimochana and another firm that offers legal aid in Jayanagar. “Whitefield Rising is a network of 20,000 residents and one issue that often comes up is domestic violence, mostly reported by the residents’ domestic helps. They suffer abuse from alcoholic husbands and children also report of sexual abuse. The residents didn’t know what to do about these complaints,” Kiran said.
With no information on resource persons who can help, Kiran said they seek to act as the first point of contact for such women. “We will serve as a referral network for women who need police assistance, medical care, legal advice and also need a shelter. They may need long-term counselling too. We seek to act as the first point of contact for survivors of violence,” she added.Whitefield DCP along with constables have had three-hour sessions with Bembala on how they’d respond in case of a survivor approaching them.