Tag: Child Rights | Varta Trust

This illustration is a combination of a photograph and text extracted from the accompanying article. The photograph is a display of a set of four tote bags made with cloth in combinations of bright colours like pink, blue, maroon, green and yellow. The fabric of the bags is sourced locally from Manipur. The bags have a vertical rectangular shape and have long handles made with thick cloth for ease of hanging the bag from one’s shoulder. The bags have a label made with thick paper clipped on one corner just below the handle – the label carries the name Matai Makes and provides details of Matai Society’s livelihood initiative to support the internally displaced people in Manipur. The accompanying text says: “The more prolonged the communal tension in the state, the longer will it take for normalcy to return in Manipur. This is where livelihood initiatives can play a crucial role because they help prioritize issues of survival and economic sustenance. Livelihood initiatives like those of Matai Society hold out the hope for a much larger process of self-reliance, recovery and healing in the state. This means that agencies like Matai Society and their partner organizations also need to sustain themselves.” Photo credit: Matai Society

Livelihood route to healing and recovery in Manipur

By Matai Society

Trans and queer youth are working out innovations to revive livelihood options for the internally displaced in Manipur. Matai Society urges you to join in

This illustration is a combination of a photograph and text extracted from the accompanying article. The photograph shows a set of six colourful drawings made by children living in one of the trauma response centres for conflict-affected children and youth run by Matai Society in the Bishnupur district of Manipur. The centres are run in association with various relief camps. The drawings display a diversity of imaginations of their creators – a house and a tree beside it, a lust tree with heart signs and a child on a swing hanging from the tree, abstract representation of flowers, hearts, fish, and gift boxes, and even a ship sailing on a blue sea under a blue sky with the sun shining bright. The drawings have been created with pencil colours, crayons, and sketch pens on chart papers. The accompanying text says: “The conflict has lasted beyond four months now. During these excruciating days, many local clubs, youth groups, and NGOs have been running relief camps to host the masses that have become homeless. Most of the displaced hail from the hill-valley buffer area. Despite the goodwill and support from various government and non-government agencies and donors, these camps are struggling to make ends meet because of the sheer numbers of people affected. So many have lost their homes, many others their close ones.” Photo courtesy Matai Society

Insight, Manipur Relief Sep '23

Hope amid loss, pain and anxiety in Manipur

By Matai Society

Matai Society reports on the situation in and around the Bishnupur district of Manipur months into the communal conflict in the state and lists the urgent relief requirements

This photographic collage shows close-up glimpses from the archival records maintained by Varta Trust on the sociolegal campaigns against Section 377, Indian Penal Code since the early 1990s. Portions of a couple of pages from the 172nd report of the Law Commission of India on a review of the rape laws published in March 2000 can be seen in the collage. The title page of the report is presented inside an oval shaped inset. The State Emblem of India, an adaptation of the Lion Capital of Ashoka, is visible on the top of one of the pages in the collage. The pages are presented in a stylized manner, with only a portion of the text on the pages visible to the reader. Photo credit: Pawan Dhall

From the Archives Sep '23

Conversations between movements, collaborations across identities, 10 years on

By Dhamini Ratnam

The struggle for equal rights must be a collaborative one – Dhamini Ratnam dwells on this lesson from the past reflected in the queer archives maintained by Varta Trust

This illustration is a combination of a photograph and text extracted from the accompanying article. The photograph, a daytime selfie shot, shows the author Mahua Seth with her son Mihir Seth on a holiday trip. Mother and son, both bespectacled, are all smiles as they look into the camera. Behind them is a sweeping expanse of mountains marked with patches of vegetation, reflecting the bright sunlight. The sky above is a hazy blue marked with cotton white clouds. The accompanying text says: “It became clear to me that we need to build more awareness across every section of society. The Nigerian Igbo communities got it right when they said “It takes a village to raise a child.” We need to work with the parents, of course, but also the uncles, aunts, teachers, coaches, colleagues and neighbours. Photo credit: Mahua Seth

My Story Aug '23

Building a better future with safe spaces, empathy and hugs

By Mahua Seth

As ‘Varta’ webzine turns 10, Mahua Seth imagines a more caring and affirming future, not just for queer people but also their parents and families

This is a panel of two daytime photographs placed one above the other. Both photographs are long shots of the lane near the author’s childhood home in Palm Avenue, Kolkata where the cricket match described in the article was played. Both photographs show about 50 feet of a narrow lane lined by two or three-storied houses on both sides, interspersed with small trees and shrubs. Many houses have iron grills and gates on the ground floor. The lane is quite evenly paved, and is just broad enough for two cars to pass side by side. Several cars are parked half on the road, half on the pavement, which exists on only one side of the road. There is little gap between the houses on the lane, which gives a sense of congestion and everything being boxed in. The photographs have been taken from the turning point at either end of the lane. Photo credits: Pawan Dhall

Vartanama Dec '22

When badminton outplaced cricket

By Pawan Dhall

The author recalls winning a cricket match to secure space for playing badminton near his childhood home in Kolkata

Quote: “What is particularly troubling about the 2021 anti-trafficking Bill is that consent is not a defence when it comes to raids and rescues, thus enabling law enforcement to mirror trends under the ITPA where persons who are voluntarily in the sex trade are picked up and forcibly placed in protection and rehabilitation homes against their will.”

Insight Jun '22

Anti-trafficking Bill must be reconsidered (again)

By Namrata, Shreyashi

Namrata and Shreyashi on the problem areas in the latest version of the anti-trafficking Bill – with inputs from Archit Krishna and Kaushik Gupta

Policy Matters, Vartanama Nov '21

Trans inclusion in schools: A step forward and several backwards

By Debjyoti Ghosh

Debjyoti Ghosh on the politics around withdrawing the draft NCERT manual on transgender children’s inclusion in schools

Poetry Nov '20

Unreliable witness

By Anureet Watta

Quote: The Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2019 fails to recognize that families are often sites of violence for transgender minors. Asha’s guardians, namely her maternal aunt and uncle, were the perpetrators of violence in her case. To vest the exercise of the right to self-identified gender in the hands of parents or guardians ends up truncating the right to chosen gender identity for transgender minors.

Insight, Policy Matters Aug '20

Which way home for transgender minors?

By Namrata

Namrata on policy and legal failures to address the concerns of transgender minors in need of crisis shelter – with inputs from Madhuja Nandi and Pawan Dhall