A grassroots movement
to end sex trafficking
27 January, 2012
Apne Aap Women Worldwide Celebrates National Girl’s Rights Day
Najafgadh, Delhi, 24th January: Apne Aap Women Worldwide Celebrated National Girls Child Day today in their centers in Hasanpur and Dharampura in the Najafgadh district in the outskirts of Delhi. This daylong event was conducted with the young adolescent girls in both the centers to commemorate the importance of girls and their rights across the nation.
The Government declared January 24th as National Girl Child Day in order to recognize the difficulties special to girls, combat discrimination towards females, and empower young girls by teaching them necessary life skills and lessons. Apne Aap hosted a Girls Rights Day so that these vulnerable girls can understand and realize their innate rights and entitlements as a female.
The day’s activities consisted of a Nukkad Natak ( street play) put together by the girls which was centered on the theme of female Feoticide. The girls enacted a female feotus and what it feels to be murdered just because luck has it she was born a girl. The girls also took part in a drawing competition where they...
23 December, 2009
When a problem is big and tends to profit a powerful group, there’s a time-honored temptation to sweep it under the rug by assuming it’s natural and inevitable. This was true of slavery until the abolitionist movement of the 19th century, and of colonialism until the contagion of independence movements in the 20th century. Now these same forces are at work in attitudes toward the global and national realities of sex slavery.The biggest normaliser of profiteering from the rental, sale and invasion of human bodies is the idea that it is too big to fight, that it has always existed, and that it can be swept under the rug by legalizing and just accepting it. Those who profit…
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27 November, 2009
Radio Jamia aired two commercial developed by our Najafgarh youth group asking men not to buy sex. Aap kis tarah ke aadmi jingle, Jism jingle, Aap aise aadmi se jingle.
25 October, 2009
Ruchira Gupta moderates a panel of victims and survivors of trafficking from Nepal, UK, Uganda and Venezuela as the General Assembly is considering international collective action to end human trafficking. The panel will be introduced by the UN Secretary General and the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
The event will be live webcast at: www.un.org/webcast at 1.15 pm New York time on 22nd October.
04 October, 2009
Expansion of the Apne Aap self help model in the next 5years to prevent and protect 3,000 women and girls from sex trafficking in India. The Self Help model organizes these women and girls in small community based economic and social cooperatives (Self Help Groups) under the umbrella of Apne Aap’s Anti-Trafficking Units to access legal protection, livelihood options and educational learning.
Each of the women’s co-operative elects its own office bearers who are office bearers trained to constantly evaluate their programs and and articulate their needs.
These SHGs meet and are trained in the Apne Aap Anti-trafficking Units where project coordinators are available for problem solving and advice.
Members of Self Help Groups are trained to:
- Oversee their own income generation activities
- To enroll children into schools and keep track of drop outs
- Monitor gender-based violence and trafficking cases within the community.
Commitment Objective
- Mainstream at least 1,000 children, especially girls into formal schools
- Register 3,000 women and girls into 200 Self Help Groups
- Play a vital...
23 September, 2009
Good evening. I appreciate the attention that President Clinton has devoted to the issue of human trafficking by conferring on me the Clinton Global Citizens Award. I receive this award on behalf of the victims and survivors of human trafficking who are members of my organization, Apne Aap Women Worldwide in India. I also receive this award on behalf of people who want a world in which it is unacceptable to buy or sell another human being and to imagine an economy in which one is not forced to sell oneself. Among these I would like to mention Peter and Jennifer Buffet.
My organization, Apne Aap Women Worldwide has reached out to over ten thousand trafficked women and children trapped in prostitution. They were kidnapped, sold, coerced, tricked or forced into situations of sexual exploitation. Some were as young as seven. They were kept in small locked rooms and raped repeatedly. Many died by the time they were thirty or thirty five. They never had a past but now they have a future. They are rid of their terror. Apne Aap has found a woman-centred solution that transforms women in the community from victim to leader.
We...
23 September, 2009
New York, 25 September 2009 -- Former President Bill Clinton yesterday awarded Ruchira Gupta, President, Apne Aap Women Worldwide, the Third Annual Clinton Global Citizen Award for her work against human trafficking.
The award recognizes remarkable individuals for their leadership in improving the lives of people around the globe. The awards ceremony took place on September 24, 2009 in New York during the Fifth Annual Meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI). CGI’s Annual Meeting convenes leaders from across sectors of society, giving them a forum to develop and then implement workable solutions to some of the world's most pressing challenges.
“Gupta’s heroic efforts to assist and empower women make her a global leader,” President Clinton said. “Her talents as a journalist and activist have led her to make a lasting change in the social and governmental arenas. Her determination, creativity and strong leadership serve as an inspiration to all of us.”
President Clinton stated: “With the Global Citizen Awards, we highlight individuals who have demonstrated exceptional...
18 September, 2009
“Ruchira is a hearty, loquacious woman with brown skin, black hair and an infectious manner. She grew up in Kolkata, India – the raucous city formerly known as Calcutta – and worked for many years as a journalist for the BBC, the Telegraph and the Sunday Observer of London, as well as for the U.N. Ruchira came from a prosperous middle-class family with a social conscience and a reverence for Mahatma Gandhi. …Ruchira had strong connections with national police officials and knew the law far better than the police themselves. And Ruchira can be every bit as intimidating as any brothel-owner. …Ruchira Gupta and her staff at Apne Aap are part of a growing abolitionist movement that is forming around the world and having a real impact on sex slavery.” Nicholas Kristoff
