Location: Prayagraj (formerly the Allahabad District) / State of Tamil Nadu
Project 1: Empowering Women and Girls through Education, Well-Being and Income Enhancing Strategies
Project 2: Empowering Prison Inmates and Families
Partner: ACTS / KRUPA
The people of rural Uttar Pradesh are very poor. Girls and women face many inequalities, with limited or no schooling offered to girls. Domestic violence against women and girls is prevalent. Child marriage is illegal, but still happens a lot. ‘Dowries’ are banned by the government, but still continue between families. The people in this region often live in unsanitary conditions, suffer from malnutrition and have high maternal mortality rates.
Project One: Empowering Women and Girls through Education, Well-Being, and Income-Enhancing Strategies
Goal of the Project
The Challenge
Despite India’s rapid growth, rural women and girls in Uttar Pradesh still face:
Early marriage and domestic violence
Low school attendance and high dropout rates
Limited access to health care, especially for girls and mothers
No income of their own and few opportunities for independence
Cultural norms that restrict movement, voice, and opportunity
Gender and caste-based inequality that still continues to silence potential, leaving too many behind
Our Solution:
Bridge schooling for out-of-school girls aged 10–18, with additional nutritional support
Vocational training in tailoring, craft, and design with an “Earn While You Learn” model
Reproductive health education and hygiene workshops
One-on-one family engagement to shift harmful norms
Community events and medical camps in partnership with local leaders
Our Reach:
1,000+ women and girls supported annually through education and health programs
120+ out-of-school girls per year receive bridge education toward rejoining formal schooling
275+ young women trained annually in tailoring, stitching, and home-based business skills
600+ girls and women reached yearly through personal and reproductive health awareness
40+ years of trusted community presence in the Neva & Gohri clusters
Lower cases of child marriage in the project area
Countless stories of women becoming wage earners, leaders, and changemakers
Empowering Prison Inmates and Families
Chennai is a city on the Bay of Bengal in the south-east of India, and is the capital of the state of Tamil Nadu. The city is home to a museum showcasing the city’s roots as a British military garrison and East India Company trading outpost, when it was still called Madras. The Tamils form the majority of the population and more than 40% of the families live below the poverty line. Petty crime, especially theft of personal property, is common, particularly on trains or buses, but for foreigners it is one of the safest cities in India.
Goal of the Project
This Krupa project is funded by a private donor for work in prisons where the aim is to ensure the holistic development of prisoners in Tamil Nadu, to bring about transformation and integration of prison families into society. Families of prisoners face poverty, stigma and isolation from their community, and ex-prisoners find it difficult to get work which increases the chances of re-offending.
The Empowering Prison Inmates and Families project aims to address this through:
Training 300 prisoners/ex-prisoners and their family members in printing, agriculture, 4-wheel driving and paper bag making,
Provide counselling sessions for 200 families for improved family unity,
Ensure 400 children of prisoners can access education,
Improve the health of prisoners.
Progress Update
Employed inmates after release: 53 men and 17 women in various jobs as Painting, Fishing, Driving, Tailoring, Accountants, vendors, mobile phone service etc.
27 male inmates are growing individual plots of okra, eggplant, pumpkin, and leafy greens – all of which are used in the prison kitchen. The program is conducted by trained inmates,
2 medical camps were held in the one of the prisons and medicines were distributed,
56 girls and 10 boys received educational assistance,
The Block Printing program was restarted towards the end of the COVID lockdown, and 13 women were trained,
Weaving, candle making, paper bag making and leadership training could not be done due to the pandemic,
Cluster meetings, house visits and counselling meetings with family members were mostly done over the phone or online.
