HYDERABAD: “Menstrual hygiene is a subject of silence however it’s vitally important for adolescent girls to have cognizance about it,” says Arun Daniel Kumar, the founder of Youngistaan Foundation which is based in Hyderabad.
Operating from various locations including Moosapet, Banjara Hills, Lalapet and a few others since 2014 on their recent plans initiated for animal cruelty and empowerment of girls by organising volunteering programmes across various government schools, slums and orphanages.
The comprehension that it’s our social responsibility to give back to the society made this award-winning NGO launch events like ‘Women of Courage’ and ‘Animal Heroes’ some months ago in association with 15,000 registered volunteers from Hyderabad.
‘Women of Courage’ is an initiative that aims to ignite pivotal conversations on subjects like safe touch, teen sanitation, menstrual hygiene, etc. by spending quality time with around 14,000 girls across city and making them aware about it. “We especially believe in follow-up sessions so that girls remember what was taught to them previously.
For example, last weekend our team visited the same government schools of the city for such a repetitive interaction and we noticed how actively the girls were participating. The session concluded with some self defence moves so that they know how to survive in a lethal situation,” adds Arun. The team of so far has been successful in distributing sanitary napkins in almost 70 locations across the city and also showed confidence in breaking stigmas on menstrual hygiene by encouraging boys all over the city to attend awareness programmes a while ago wherein a few of the city’s stand up comedians and slam poets spoke on menstruation.
Last month, another key project was called ‘Animal Heroes’ was launched that aims to attract the attention of children towards animal abuse and their behavioural approach for them by organising indulgent activities. Every weekend the team of animal heroes visits various schools and colleges to administer awareness sessions on it. That’s also to point out that during the growing years, nobody teaches children about how to treat community animals as they are a part of the society too and deserve equal love and protection.
Youngistaan is all set to introduce more action-driven initiatives on subjects like gender sensitivity, food-nutrition, education, life-skills etc.