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GIRLS ADVOCACY ALLIANCE

The Girls Advocacy Alliance (GAA) program is into 4 years of its journey of contributing to ‘Equal Rights and Opportunities to Adolescent girls and young women’ by addressing two forms of gender based violence in the form of child marriages and trafficking for sexual exploitation. As a strategy response to them in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, Mahita is promoting secondary education and job oriented vocational training for girls and young women.

The project is implemented in 3 districts of Andhra Pradesh and 6 districts of Telangana states with the support of Plan India. It is  a global initiative of Plan International – Plan Netherlands, Terre Des Hommes – Netherlands and Defense for Children – ECPAT Netherlands.

The advocacy program targets government, private sector, communities and civil society organisations. Through its advocacy activities, the project has reached more than 90,000 community members such as a religious and caste leaders, youth advocates and women formed Self Help Groups (SGHs).

 

 IMPACT

Mahita under GAA project collaborated and provided technical support to Department of Women and Child Welfare, Andhra Pradesh for the launch of Kishori Vikasam – Phase 2 as state government for holistic development of adolescent girls. Mahita supported with development of 5 posters and 2 vidoes which have been reached to 1.5 million adolescent girls from 11000 schools across 11 districts.

  • Olympic Gold medalist and Ace Shuttler P V Sindhu endorsed the videos on Kishori Vikasam developed under the project by Mahita.
  • Mahita has been identified as Technical Partner for Andhra Pradesh State Commission for Protection of Child Rights.
  • In the year 2018, GAA initiated the process of reviewing and reframing the state rules of PCMA 2006 (GO MS 13) in the state of Telangana. About 750 CSOs from 6 districts inputted on the state rules and have been collated with the help of NALSAR University and Center for Law and Policy Research (CLPR), Bangalore, and the same has been submitted to the Department of Women and Child Welfare, Telangana, who are in turn now reviewing the same.
  • Similar process was adopted in the state of Andhra Pradesh, wherein the state rules and principal act of PCMA 2006 were inputted and the recommendations for reframing have been collated with the help of CLPR. The same being reviewed by Department of Women and Child Welfare, Andhra Pradesh and Law department, Andhra Pradesh.
  • Released research study on ‘Facing constraints and seizing opportuinities : Child marriages in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh states’. The research was commissioned to Center for Economic and Social Studies, Telangana.
  • Telangana State Legal Service Society and District Legal Service Society have been collaborating with Mahita under the project to address the issue of Child marriage and child trafficking.