Over the past week and half, I have had the opportunity to do some field visits with SKA. For the particular project I am working on, the field visits have involved meeting with women who are in rehabilitation programs provided by SKA. These women are all of the lower caste and the majority have been employed in manual scavenging at some point in their life. They were selected by SKA to join a rehabilitation program due to how bad their living conditions were. For each field visit, myself, the other intern at SKA, and one to two SKA team members travel to the homes of the women. The trip out is usually pretty long, often requiring taking the metro all the way to the end of the line and then taking one to two additional rickshaw rides further out. Once at the house, the women tell us their life story and their experience with the rehabilitation program. This is translated to us by the SKA team members.<\/p>\n
This project has been very valuable in allowing me to see SKA\u2019s specific programs to help improve the living conditions and the specific challenges they have to face. For many of the candidates, SKA allows the women choice in finding a livelihood that they want to engage in. This has included sewing clothes, selling vegetables, driving a rickshaw, raising buffalo to sell the milk, and more. From an objective standpoint, this seems to be the most sustainable method of creating a rehabilitation program because it allows for personal agency and a sense of ownership over one\u2019s livelihood. However SKA has had to confront some issues with women who are not as motivated or enterprising as others. These women have a harder time finding a method of living that is sustainable for them. Doing these interviews has also given me a better perspective of the people themselves. For people who are engaged in cleaning work, sometimes finding a better livelihood is blocked by mental barriers. In meeting one women who had previously done manual scavenging, we met her son who is still currently employed in cleaning work. Despite his mother\u2019s example and the influence of SKA, the son doesn\u2019t have the confidence to find a new type of work. The values of the caste system that have been continually imposed on him has caused him to believe that he is only able to do this one type of work. When reading about and learning about the victims, the educational, economical, and health inequalities are very obvious and easy to understand. However, it seems that outside perspectives often tend to overlook the mental and emotional effects experienced by disadvantaged people. Despite having the financial support and guidance from organizations such as SKA, it can be difficult to overcome the emotional trauma caused by a lifetime of discrimination.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Over the past week and half, I have had the opportunity to do some field visits with SKA. For the particular project I am working on, the field visits have involved meeting with women who are in rehabilitation programs provided by SKA. These women are all of the lower caste and the majority have been employed in manual scavenging at some point in their life. They were selected by SKA to join a rehabilitation program due to how bad their…<\/p>\n