Raising awareness and training the population

Who would dare go and see the local authorities to ask for water taps in the village, for a title deed for land cultivated for generations, or for access to the temples like everyone else in the population? Not one of the 1,400 inhabitants of the Dalit quarter of the village of Thettu would have dared do that a few years ago. And yet the 1950 Constitution bans any discrimination against caste members. So, theoretically, the Dalits have the same rights as the rest of the population.

The place is southern Andhra Pradesh. In the village of Company, a name given by British settlers when they used to trade here, some twenty Yanadi tribal families live in huts, at the edge of the forest. (...) Today their presence is threatened. The forest ministry still hasn’t granted them title deeds, as it should have done under provision of the law. For that reason, the inhabitants of Company have no access to government programs that would allow them to have running water, electricity and staple commodities at reduced prices for the poor.

Anjali poses with her three sons in front of her house, between open air sewers and a swampy private property. We are in the Rajendanagar District, in the heart of the huge Koramangala slum, in Bangalore. Anjali’s parents fled the poverty of Tamil Nadu rural areas over 40 years ago. Anjali is now 37 and has never known any other life than the one in the slum of this South Indian megalopolis.

Fedina’s cultural team and Okkuta, the federation of retired people’s associations, demonstrated their anger on Saturday, June 27, 2009 in front of this hospital.

With billboards, leaflets, and 20 minutes of performances: songs, dances and sketches, they denounced abuse, neglect and discrimination against the poor and the elderly within public hospitals.

During a training session organized by the Senegal Unit of the Aoudaghost Network, 7 Wolof words were identified to sum up the various rights of the child, including ESC rights.

The Senegal Unit of the Aoudaghost Network made a booklet in order to raise people’s awareness of their ESC rights.

As part of the national activities of the International Programme of Training on ESC Rights Enforceabililty Approaches, the DEME SO Legal Clinic decided to carry out various awareness raising and communication actions on women’s economic, social and cultural rights in the town of Bancoumana: radio broadcasts, conferences-debates and radio broadcast debates.

This module on women’s economic, social and cultural rights was drafted as part of the support project for promoting the ESC rights of women and grassroots women’s groups, a project that was developed by the DEME SO Legal Clinic in the rural town of Bancoumana, Mali.

Knowing one’s human rights is a necessary condition for people to claim and assert them. "Training on Your Rights: Modules on Monitoring Economic, Social and Cultural Rights", consists of several modules that will equip people with needed skills to monitor and document the realization or abuse of their rights.