SAVE THE CHILDREN

Through the Rakshin Project, social engineer Smita Bharti is spearheading a youth-led movement to create a social tipping point to stop child sexual abuse

Having been a feminist and activist for the greater part of her life, Smita Bharti has come to the conclusion that the great Indian middle class is the one most trapped in the morality of what “good girls” and “good families” are supposed to be. “Women are taught that the family comes before us – not just your partner and children but the entire extended family comes first,” says the executive director of Sakshi, a pioneering rights-based NGO working against sexual harassment and child sexual abuse (CSA) in India.

With experience in diverse roles from educator, writer and translator, to playwright, director and actor, Smita is the recipient of the global civilian honour KarmaVeer Puraskaar 2016 for Social Change given by the international confederation of NGOs in partnership with United Nations. Working primarily with women and the youth, she always asked herself why women never seem to realise their own potential. After years of learning, she realised that, “Women aren’t taught to have a sense of self, nor given to understand that we have autonomy and a responsibility to ourselves.”

It is something she began to question two decades ago – through her self-education explorations such as applying for a fellowship to WISCOMP (Women in Security, Conflict Management and Peace) in the late 1990s and later through her writing, producing theatrical performances, talks and educational programmes.