When we launched an emergency campaign to respond to India’s unprecedented COVID-19 surge earlier this year, we were deeply moved by how generously and quickly the AJWS community responded. Our campaign this spring allowed us to write emergency grants to dozens of our partner organizations across the country, enabling them to support their communities by …
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There’s a haunting hush hanging all over New Delhi right now, broken only by the sirens of ambulances rushing by. A new variant that’s 15-times more contagious is tearing through our densely populated city, and indeed across the country. Hospitals are filled to capacity with sick people — leaving so many others to fend for …
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On March 25th, India suddenly announced a strict, severe national lockdown—the largest in the world, affecting nearly 1.4 billion people. People were left scrambling to protect themselves and their families—often with little information about the frightening new disease. Countless questions bubbled to the surface: How would people prevent the virus’s spread without proper health and …
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“Men and women are equal!” “Let us read, let us study!” These are some of the slogans shouted by over 200 girls as part of a rally—organized by AJWS grantee Nishtha—in West Bengal, India, to push for women’s safety and equality in late February of this year. The girls, mostly high-school and college aged, proudly …
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When Vaishali Sen was 9 years old, she loved to watch “Indian Idol.” Like its American counterpart, the show featured amateur singers hoping to launch their careers. Secretly, Vaishali wanted to do the same. She’d always loved to sing. But in her rural village in Rajasthan, India, good girls weren’t supposed to dream big. They …
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