
In a courtyard outside Ghasoli, a small village in rural Mewat, India, about 200 fists shoot into the air.
In unison, a mass of adolescent girls shout: “All of us are united! All of us are leaders! Educate Mewat! Develop Mewat!”
For a region where, just a few years ago, the female literacy rate sat around 10% and the average age of marriage for women was 12-14, such a show of solidarity is nothing short of revolutionary. And the catalyst for this change is AJWS grantee Alwar Mewat Institute of Education and Development (AMIED) — a local, grassroots organization that has steadily fought for girls’ rights to education in dozens of villages across Mewat for nearly 25 years.
Mewat is a deeply conservative, rural region where villages of Muslims and Dalits (lowest caste Indians) have been working the land for generations. These communities fear that education will push girls to run away, forget their religious upbringings and cast-off tradition. Shifting these patriarchal values is at the core of AMIED’s work. The organization was founded under the belief that education is the key to diminishing forced and child marriages and giving girls control over their lives, creating an equitable society for all.

That’s why they’ve established dozens of education and tutoring centers to help adolescent girls who’ve dropped out to catch up and re-enroll in school, reaching 15,000 girls across Mewat so far. But to achieve their goals, their work must expand beyond adolescent girls.
While this ‘Girls Convention,’ held in one of AMIED’s education centers, has drawn hundreds of girls in AMIED’s network — it’s also attracted parents, local religious and political leaders, and dozens of curious boys, who listen in from the edges of the crowd.
Below, step inside AMIED’s Girls Convention!
All afternoon, local teenage girls and young women speak about how staying in school instead of marrying early has changed their lives. One group of girls, dressed up in turbans and sitting around a traditional tobacco pipe, role-plays how to have conversations with parents who want their daughters to stop studying and get married.
Another calls out what they dream of becoming when their studies are complete: “Journalist! Doctor! Engineer! Lawyer!”
That these girls are celebrating their own liberation is inspiring, but not surprising. The surprises come from the leaders — men whose own patriarchal values and views on girls’ education have been transformed by AMIED’s tireless work.
“I see AMIED as a honeybee in our community,” says an elderly member of the Mewat village council. “They are spreading education from village to village. And we are seeing the honey today — our girls are more educated; their futures are sweeter.”

For AMIED founder Noor Mohammad, hearing these sentiments is as much a sign of success as the climbing numbers of girls AMIED has helped to re-enroll in school.
“For just one girl to get an education, so much background work must happen. Engaging families, coping with community backlash, addressing religious restrictions, providing her with tutoring support,” he says. “This is not a straightforward process. It takes more than a village.”