– in benefit of Willing Hearts —

Saturday 19 May, 10:00 am – 3:00 pm

Online Sales:  15 -31 May (click here to buy)

In our midst, there are women, men and children who do not have enough to eat every day.

ONE group that is making a big difference is Willing Hearts, a local soup kitchen that prepares and delivers meals to some 2500 people, every day of the year.  Not only that, most of the beneficiaries receive 2-3 packets.  Just think about the ingredients and supplies that Willing Hearts needs to prepare thousands of meals daily.

YOU can help.

Every ONE Can is a grocery warehouse sale with a difference . . . and for the second year running, the proceeds benefit Willing Hearts.  Simply shop all you want at wholesale prices.  But first, make a purchase for donation.  In past years, we filled up one delivery truck on average with donated goods. In 2012, let’s do even better!

We’ll also have music and booths by social enterprises and charities, where you can pick up chic handicrafts. Plus, this year, shoppers get a free cup of KooriMo ice cream!

Please join us in the Tanjong Pagar Distripark on Saturday 19 May from 10am – 3 pm.
Online sales at foodxervices.com start 15 May and continue through the end of the month.

Event Details

• Date: 19 May 2012
• Time: 10AM-3PM
• Venue: FoodXervices (39 Keppel Road, #01-02/04 Tanjong Pagar Distripark)

In the meantime, follow the food trail from Every ONE Can to Willing Hearts’ kitchen to the people relying on this programme.

This photo essay was shot and produced by Joy Wong and edited by Michael Switow and Thulasi Mahadevan.  Every ONE Can is organised in collaboration with FoodXervices.

Related Links: Every ONE Can Resource Page | Online Sales 2012

Every ONE Can feeds a hungry person.
Every ONE Can Stand Up and Make a Difference.
Every ONE Can Make Poverty History!

Braema Mathi

“How are we talking about the issue of human trafficking?
When a woman shares a story of being duped by a promise
of quick money in Singapore, only to be forced into the sex trade,
do we ask ‘how could she have been so blind?”
As individuals we need to suspend judgement of the victims.”

~ Braema Mathi

By ShuQi Liu

Prostitution is legal in Singapore. Sex Trafficking is a crime.  Prosecutions against sex traffickers are rare.  Victims of sex trafficking can be fined or jailed for immigration violations. Singapore’s new National Plan of Action promises a more compassionate approach.

In the face of so many conflicting and changing realities, what does it mean for an individual to suspend judgement?

This is the question I posed to Braema Mathi, a civil society activist and former Nominated Member of Parliament who spoke at ONE (SINGAPORE)’s panel discussion about human trafficking.

We need to start by looking more closely at ourselves and our history, Braema says.

For as long as Asian men have sought to flaunt their success by acquiring concubines and mistresses and frequenting houses of prostitution, human trafficking for sexual purposes has been part of our culture.  In some chauvinistic Asian societies, a man’s coming of age is still expressed in terms of sexuality.   A father encourages his young son to take the virginity of a female child as a symbol of manhood.  The status of women, who are viewed as sexual objects and subject to the whims and fancies of men, is secondary.

Singapore’s rich economy meanwhile has attracted large numbers of foreign women, particularly from rural areas where income opportunities are scarce, to come here with the hope of making quick money.  Men need only travel from one street to another in Geylang to hire women from China, Indonesia, Philippines and Vietnam, among other places. This diversity of nationalities creates an even larger tendency among Singaporeans to judge.

How were these sex workers recruited to come to Singapore?

Did a woman choose ‘the world’s oldest profession’ willingly or was she duped or forced into the business? It can be difficult to know the truth. Traumatised victims often fall into silence, unable to speak of their ordeal, which then makes detection and prosecution even harder.

The definition of trafficking, like the victims themselves, is entwined by the complexities of the trade.

A first step to suspending judgement is to recognise the victimisation of many women in the sex industry.

Sex trafficking as a whole can only be tackled if society engages men to reevaluate our value systems and transform thought into legislation and suitable processes to fight this modern form of slavery.

Related Articles and Links

• Rachel Choaa-Howard:  Fight Human Trafficking by Respecting Human Rights
• Bridget Tan:  Stop Sex Trafficking
• How do we stop Human Trafficking? Discussing “Child Prostitution, Human Trafficking and Poverty”
• Developing Business Partnerships to Combat Human Trafficking
• Trafficking Home Page (coming soon)

The seminar room was full house when the moderator, Kirpal Singh, Director of Singapore Management University’s Wee Kim Wee Centre, opened the talk-show style discussion by noting that the topic of poverty in Singapore is an issue that has not set easy with the government here, but that a mandate of the Wee Kim Wee Centre is to address issues that others might be shy or anxious to discuss.

Four panelists – civil society activist Braema Mathi, community reporter Radha Basu, grassroots social worker Nadia Bamasri and Nominated Member of Parliament Laurence Lien – and audience participants from a range of organisations including Beyond Social Services, Mendaki, NCSS, ONE (SINGAPORE) and the catholic church explored the nature of local poverty, government schemes to address and cultural attitudes that help and hinder the provision of essential social services.

Dilpreet Kaur, of the International Council on Social Welfare (ICSW), provides a detailed account of the discussion. (Note: this is not a complete word-for-word transcript.)

“What is poverty in Singapore?”

"Do we have the right to judge
and say 'sorry we can not help you'?"

Braema Mathi: I’m glad we can use the word “poverty”. I want to broaden it rather than deal with the word ‘poverty’ per say. I am wearing a hat as regional president of the ICSW, a 76 year old organisation, primarily looking at communities in need.  There is a disconnect between social policy and communities in need. Why?  Poverty is a result of income disparities and consequently limited access to basic necessities for day-to-day living.

From our politicians, we hear “cheaper, better, faster”. What does this mean? This rhetoric of “cheaper” can be very problematic if we just keep switching vendors to increase profit margins without a thought for workers’ livelihoods, particularly if there is little governance, few regulatory tools or even a lack of proper laws.

To come back to the question, what do we mean by a person in need? In the 1960s, the person in Singapore in need was different. He didn’t have access to clean water and sanitation. Today, food seems to be in abundance, yet in our midst we see people at hawker centres who pick on the leftovers from your tray and plate.

Homelessness has also been vividly described in the online media – people who are caught out without shelter and by their own silly mistakes. What has gone on from the 1960s to 2012?

What do we do then if someone got on the bandwagon of upgrading then got caught? The waiting out period is thirty months, which then forces them onto the streets or to bunk in with relatives or to fork out for rentals in the private sector. There is a disconnect here. These thirty months are a definite period, so what do we do during this time? The social policies are limited. What then is the role of society here as well? Do we let them be or do we start to look for ways to help? Do we have the right to judge and say ‘sorry, we can not help you”?

“So then Braema, is there then a remedy, a quick solution or is this is a complicated problem?”

Braema: Despite the government’s Many Helping Hands approach, we have a disconnect where meeting the needs of people are concerned. It’s not that there aren’t schemes or that we’re not doing enough. But people are still falling through. What are we going to do about this? Singapore needs to start thinking about the Social Protection Floor Initiative (SPFI), which is driven by the International Labour Organisation and the World Health Organisation and supported by ICSW. The government needs to start reviewing the trends of people falling through the net and what it can do for them in terms of establishing a concrete floor from which they can step up. Developed countries are using the SPFI, especially because of ageing societies. It is time Singapore considers this approach.

“Radha, as a Straits Times journalist, you’ve actively reported on social issues. Could you tell us about some of your personal encounters with people in need?”
Radha Basu: I want to contextualise poverty, which is a very strong word. I’ve covered malnutrition and areas where people have no access to food and shelter. I don’t think anyone dies from starvation in Singapore. But are there unmet needs? Absolutely. And personally, I feel it is growing.

"We have no minimum wage and limited collective bargaining. We need one or the other and it’s time people started talking about it."

There is no official poverty line but there are 200,000 local families who are living in the bottom fifth of the income scale.  Their average monthly income in 2010 was $2,040, but the poorest 10 per cent – about 100,000 households – earned only $1,400 per month.

We don’t have current household expenditure figures, but in 2007-2008, the latest year for which figures are available, the average monthly household expenditure among the lowest 20% of resident households was $1,760.   That’s about $500 more than their average monthly income at the time ($1,274).

There is a gap in income and basic expenditure before state cash-transfer policies like Workfare are put into place. There is also a disconnect between people not knowing which schemes are available or considering it onerous to seek help. Recently, though, MP Amy Khor announced that there will be just one form to apply for assistance at the Community Development Councils (CDCs).

Who needs the most assistance? Generally, these individuals have uncommon or multiple needs. The existence of multiple problems is what exacerbates their conditions. Consider these examples:

• * a low-income earning couple with a special needs child
• * homeless men who cannot go to CDCs for help because government schemes require an address
• * foreign brides — with Singaporean children, but estranged or widowed from their husbands — who are not eligible to rent a HDB
• * the mentally ill, who have homes but cannot get along with parents or family members.
• * unwed mothers who have been low on the government’s priority list for fear they might procreate more illegitimate children
• * and foreign workers who have been cheated or injured.

“You must have followed up with the government on these issues? What were the official answers to these hardship cases?”

Radha: There is both a lapse in communication outreach in terms of implementing the schemes by the State as well as the “shame” factor among potential applicants of such schemes. So something needs to be done.

“We are Singaporeans, but yes we have subsets of groups like Mendaki, etc that focus on one group. Nadia, you work with 4PM, Persatuan Persuratan Pemuda Pemudi Melayu. Are we wrong to assume that the Malays are out of proportion when it comes to poverty or hardship?”

Nadia Bamasri: At 4PM, our work revolves around children, youth and their families. We do not only work with Malays; we have a 70-30% policy to help non Malays as well.

Nadia Bamasri at "Ramadan on Wheels," an annual project to assist low-income families.

But there is a Malay problem. Statistics have shown that when it comes to education, Malay parents have lower levels of education and as a result are in the lower income bracket.

We don’t see poverty and slums because we live in these boxes called flats. But you just have to open the door and you can smell and see the poverty.

Braema talked about withholding judgement. We are not supposed to judge, but as a social worker, we are required by funders or the government to ask so many questions about income and other family characteristics before we can help these families. However, do we really know what these families/individuals need? That’s a more pertinent question. Handouts are not always the solution. There needs to be more cross cutting measures, not just within the Malay community, but across all groups.

“Radha alluded to single mothers. I was brought up in Geylang in the 1950’s. Malays then were very communal and would support each other all the way. Is this apparent today?”

Nadia: Today, we live in flats and have lots of social issues. Who’s fault is it? We never blame ourselves. If you ask people, they’ll tell you about the government, their long working hours, etc. This is different from the kampong days. People nowadays are much too worried about labels and judgement.

For example, if you are pregnant and Malay, first thing your parent will do is to send you to a home. Why? To cover it up. The pregnancy is taboo. It is very embarrassing to the families. However, there is no support at the home. The young women are allowed to go to work or school. This only entrenches poverty further, especially for these single mothers.

“Laurence, in your maiden Parliamentary address, you spoke about introducing a Social Health Index in Singapore. What is this? And how do we achieve social health?

Laurence Lien: At the National Volunteer and Philanthropy Centre (NVPC) and the Community Foundation of Singapore, my job is to get the well-to-do to give. Almost all the time, the question I get is: “where are the needs in Singapore?”. I explain, then they say “What is the government doing about it?”. Then I have the burden of explaining why we must not wait for government.

There is little visibility of our social realities on the ground. As a society, we like to hide our problems and the marginalised. We need to stop hiding poverty, especially if we want people to be part of the action to address social problems.

"We have painted the poor in a way that a lot of Singaporeans feel they are not deserving of help. The government has a fixation that people will take advantage of assistance schemes and over-consume."

I visited the Boston Foundation in the United States two years ago. This foundation publishes the “Boston Indicators Project” every two to three years. It wasn’t initiated by the government; they started it. They publish this wonderful report that galvanises people to think about how to address issues in society.

We need to do this in Singapore. We track the economic indicators so closely. But isn’t social health just as important?  The last elections demonstrate that social issues are critical to our citizens . When it comes to economic health, the government has all the levers. But when it comes to social health, it’s scared that it doesn’t have all the levers and they don’t want to be accountable in the same way. We need to look at individuals, families, community cohesion and happiness as well. We should measure subjective well-being.  This idea was poo-poo-ed by the politicians. But at the end of the day, this is what we want. What is life for if we do not seek to be happy?

The Social Health Index is to help identify the needs of the people and what the government is doing about it. For it to work, the community must be accountable as well and it must have equal ownership of the issues

We are so fixated with economic indicators, don’t we care about social health indicators?

~//~

Dr Kirpal thanked all the speakers for their answers and sharing of experiences. One hour into the discussions, it was time for the audience to pose some tough questions . . .

People are falling through the cracks. What is the real role of elected govt in resolving poverty problem?

Laurence: I see the government as putting big stones into a container. It has the power to tax and redistribute resources. They must use the levers; these are the big stones. But there will be gaps and that’s where civil society comes in. The government must have a cutoff by income, but often that criteria is insufficient. This is where civil society can come in to play a role. The government can also set a poverty line and minimum wage. I’m not convinced by the arguments against the minimum wage. We need more informed dialogue about this.

Braema: MCYS receives the smallest budget of all the ministries. This is unacceptable. When I started the Straits Times School Pocket Fund, it was because the criteria were too tight. But today 1700 is not enough for children and their families. The goal posts have shifted.

Radha: It’s too easy to bash the government. In fact, a lot of the anti-government bashing online is misinformed. Take Comcare. It’s a 1 billion dollar fund. When I asked Mdm Halimah last year, she told me that only 1 out of 10 families in the bottom fifth of the income scale uses Comcare. Why? Because, when asked, most needy families said they don’t need government assistance; they say their relatives will help them.

And take the recent discussion about cleaners wages. The first reply is that foreign workers are pushing down the wages. But three-quarters of our cleaners are local. What’s the elephant in the room? It’s cleaning contacts. The town councils enter into blatantly one-sided contracts. Cleaners earn $40 a day, but and be fired at will for no reason.

We can say the government isn’t doing enough, but will Singaporeans accept higher conservancy charges?

Braema: I need to reply to that. During the budget discussions, a minister asked ‘Singaporeans, would you like for your tax to increase?” I’m quite tired of this manner of discourse. Every time we raise a social issue, the politicians response is ‘are we willing to pay more?”. We are complicit in this way of thinking. It’s become like a contract we have with each other and we have to break it. It’s a question of shared responsibility.

Another member of the audience from a large local non-profit organisation shared these observations:

1. When this forum started, I was taken aback with being uncomfortable with the term ‘poverty’. Factually the underclass community in Singapore is present. How come the word ‘poverty’ is seen to be so strong and taboo?

2. Today we have more working class with low wages. Permanent jobs are scarcer and scarcer. Contractual work is becoming much more common instead.

3. Bluntly speaking, the ‘blaming the victim’ attitude is quite prevalent, from the apex of the hierarchy to the bureaucrats at the bottom rung. Self-help bodies, including my organisation, are so busy trying to be politically correct that we lose sight of the well-being of our clients. The public at large is not used to the term poverty, but that doesn’t mean we should shy away from getting to know what poverty is all about.

Another participant comment:

Our government has consistent budget surpluses, except in 2009. After a period of time, the surpluses are locked into reserves. This comes from the society, but what’s being done with the surplus?

The conversation in singapore drifts towards schemes and an incrementalist approach. We should move towards a different type of score card. By changing the method of assessment, we can measure the unmet needs more easily, for example, how many people with income less than $5000 have had to pay $100,000 out of pocket due to catastrophic illness?

A woman from another social agency disagreed with a suggestion by Braema that Singapore needs more social workers . . .

We need to shift the discussion to ‘what can i do’ to help people in need. Otherwise the blame game will continue. We need to shift policy. How do we handle the poor? Can we resolve poverty? Who should be resolving it? As professionals, what can we do to activate the citizenry?

A member of the clergy added this reflection:

It’s not lack of money that prevents the government from helping. 25% of the budget goes to defence. My feeling is what’s lacking is the voice of the poor. The poor here are docile. We need stronger unions.

The Panelists’ Final Reflections

Laurence: We are confronting this not just as a nation, but as a globe. Income inequality is hitting the whole world. The whole capitalist model has to be reviewed. We shouldn’t be ashamed. There are poor here and we need to talk about it more openly. But they are not helpless and always receiving. We have painted the poor in a way that a lot of Singaporeans feel they are not deserving of help. It’s the mindset. The government has a fixation that people will take advantage of assistance schemes and over-consume.

Nadia: I think I speak for social workers and all the wonderful people who do this work, we need a lot of workers who are passionate . . . we see are a lot of people with zero income and nothing in the bank. How do you compare that with 1500 a month? These are the people we look at. I agree with Laurence, I see our beneficiaries with strengths. They are resourceful, but their basic needs are not met. How much can we really do?

Radha:

1. We touched on minimum wage and contract jobs. Go to wikipedia and type in minimum wage and collective bargaining – almost all developed countries have one or the other, if not both. We have no minimum wage and limited collective bargaining. We need one or the other and it’s time people started talking about it. Contract jobs and immigration may be worldwide phenomena, but other countries have support systems that we don’t.

2. We need more discussion as well from welfare groups. When I asked them for interviews to discuss unmet social needs, they refused to talk because they saw our story as being ‘too negative’.

3. Should we be spending $850 million on baby bonuses every year, but less on welfare?

Braema: At the end of the day, we are talking about people in need. We need to treat the person coming through the door with dignity. Yes, they have a blame approach. Now they talk about teaching the person to fish, but what if you fence the pond or what if the pond has no fish? Having a conducive environment is equally important. I want to go to fish, but i can not find the pond because there are too many obstacles in my way.

Kirpal: Sometimes, it’s easier to say yes and sign protocols, but when you visit them on the ground they are not as good as Singapore. There’s a lesson by old guys like me. We always begin by saying to government, ‘it’s your job to help me’. The government might be less anxious if we see them as a partner rather than always putting them on the defensive. They’re human too. There are practical ways of moving forward, without judgement and the blame game.

Joe Wan, Michele Yap, Braema Mathi, Laurence Lien, Radha Basu, Nadia Bamasri, Hani Mohamed, Thulasi Mahadevan, Michael Switow

Related Articles and Links

• Business Leaders Award to Fight Human Trafficking

ONE (SINGAPORE) is looking to hire an Administrative Officer! Are you passionate about our campaign, enthusiastic and have a positive attitude, able to work independently and with a team, well-organised, and have experience volunteering or working with non-profit organisations? If so, you could be the right person for the job! Interested? Let us know! Please send us an email, along with your CV, to hr@onesingapore.org.

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Administrative Officer Job Description (.pdf)

ONE (SINGAPORE) is looking to hire a Marketing and Communications Executive! Are you passionate about our campaign, enthusiastic and have a positive attitude, able to work independently and with a team, have experience volunteering or working with non-profit organisations as well as strong writing and organisational skills? If so, you could be the right person for the job! Interested? Let us know! Please send us an email, along with your CV, to hr@onesingapore.org.

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Following a watershed election last year that signalled public resentment towards a paternalistic state, the AWARE roundtable discussion conducted on 24 March 2012 sustained the political momentum with an honest discussion about this year’s Singapore Budget.

“We have not witnessed inclusive growth in the Singapore budget for a very long time,” says Yeoh Lam Keong, an economic and social policy commentator affiliated with the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.

Despite additional funding for a number of social programmes, panelists at the forum generally agreed that the government’s budget does not do enough to assist the most vulnerable elements of our society — children, elderly, the disabled and low-income families — particularly when it comes to education and health care.

Health Care

The 2012 Budget signals an increase in healthcare spending from S$ 4 billion to S$ 8 billion over the next 5 years, an increase from 0.7 to 2.2 percent of GDP. But Yeoh notes that Singapore still lags behind other Asian Tigers – Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea — which commit approximately four percent of public spending to healthcare.

In fact, overall spending on social programmes is lower now than it was in the 1980s. While GDP has increased four times since the 1990s, public spending on social programmes has dropped from 20 to 16 percent of GDP.

These issues are particularly particularly pertinent as Singapore’s society ages. Medical expenses, especially for common long-term chronic ailments like hypertension, diabetes and high cholesterol, can overwhelm individuals and families.

Increased spending on hospital beds alone will not produce better health outcomes adds Vivienne Wee, a founding member of AWARE. Singapore’s health care system needs to be reorganised, she argues, to better meet the needs of patients and the general population, rather than the demands of healthcare organisations.

Education

Rising inequality meanwhile is giving children from wealthy families a leg up at school, as early as Primary 1. P1 students are expected to be able to read and write upon enrollment, but students from low-income families generally score worse than their classmates. The problem: these children lack access to pre-school education.

NTU sociology professor Teoh You Yenn argues that the government should level the playing field by providing more funding for low-income families to send their children to preschool.

A government’s budget reflects a society’s understanding and value systems, argues Teoh, adding that people’s actions have the power to shape imaginations of the present and future. “What is pragmatically possible is not fixed independently of our imaginations, but is itself shaped by our visions,” Teoh says, quoting from “The Real Utopias Project“.

Disabilities

“Maximising Potential, Embracing Differences” – that’s the theme of Singapore’s four-year “Enabling Masterplan” for integrating people with disabilities into mainstream society. But until activist Judy Wee stepped forward, the recommendation committee didn’t have any disabled representatives.

Wee argues that if Singapore is to be a truly inclusive society, we need to do a better job of providing people with disabilities with full access to public facilities, starting with our nation’s schools. Currently, only a select few educational institutions are equipped to teach disabled students.

“This would be an important step towards helping Singaporeans with disabilities realise their potential, while respecting the differences of all persons with disabilities,” Wee says, who also notes that data on the number of people with disabilities needs to be better documented and made publicly available.

Contributing to the discussion, hearing-impaired attendees from the Singapore Association for the Deaf, with the help of sign language interpreters from ExtraOrdinary Horizons, called on the government to provide more ‘resource teachers’ for deaf students in mainstream schools.

“We – like any other healthy human beings – have dreams and aspirations to fulfill,” says one SADeaf member.  “It is very hard to tell our children that you cannot be a doctor, lawyer or engineer, because you are deaf.  Unlike Singapore, the United States has deaf societies filled with hearing impaired professionals. This is a strong limiting factor.  And it’s very stifling for the members of the Singapore Association for the Deaf.”

Welfare and Social Services

Better implementation and less duplication is needed in the provision of social services, according to another member of the public participating in the discussion. The “Many Helping Hands” programme can result in cases where several social workers approach the same person with the intention to help. But they end up overwhelming the person instead.

Reflections

In my humble opinion, an inclusive society begins when the government has open dialogues with its citizens. When drafting the budget, our government should actively engage Singaporeans from all levels of society. It’s too late to make changes once the budget is announce in Parliament. A more consultative process, rather than the top-down approach, will be more effective in meeting the needs of all Singaporeans.

Related Links

• “A Lively Debate at AWARE’s Budget Roundtable” (3 April 2012, AWARE website)
• Singapore Budget 2012 (government website)

By Jaswinder Thethy

“Things won’t change overnight. We have to wake people up,” exclaims Sampat Pal, the founder of the “Gulabi Gang,” a group comprising hundreds of lower caste women in Uttar Pradesh, India that stands up to violence against women.

Domestic abuse is still persistent in India even though there are laws against it. Rape and sexual abuse cases are rarely registered for fear of social stigma. Women often hide behind their veils rather than defend themselves. But the Gulabi Gang empowers women who are suffering from abuse and educates them about their rights.

Sampat and the Gulabi Gang are the focus of a documentary by British director Kim Longinotto called “Pink Saris,” which was recently screened at Singapore Management University by ONE (SINGAPORE) with the support of the British High Commission.

Being a woman, and coming from a British Indian background I was immediately drawn to this project. Plus it gave me an opportunity to wear a pink sari! I could hardly refuse to represent the High Commission on this one.

Longinotto’s documentary follows Sampat as she mediates on behalf of woman that turn to her for help. Sampat is assertive, fearless and extremely outspoken; she has a huge voice and her threats are often delivered in punchy one liners, though unfortunately the wit is at times lost in translation. Sampat herself is a former child bride and victim of abuse. However she took the unusual step of fighting back and risking disgrace by leaving her husband and village.

Perhaps the biggest obstacle to her campaign is that Sampat can only do so much herself. She survives on donations and cannot always afford to lodge women who turn to her when they have nowhere else to go. In one case in the movie, Sampat returns a girl to her abusive in-laws. But first, she confronts the family in public. I can’t help but wonder if the young woman will continue suffering and I hoped the situation wasn’t made worse by Sampat’s intervention. In the end, it’s up to the girls to stand tall.

The documentary also reveals that Sampat still has complex personal issues to confront, especially when her motives are questioned. At one point, her longtime boyfriend asks if she is not being driven by ego, an accusation that appears to be at least partly true after Sampat proudly refers to herself as the “Messiah for Women”.

Regardless, there is no question that the Gulabi Gang is making a difference in the lives of women, men and children in Uttar Pradesh.

“If girls spoke up, the world would change,” Sampat says. “Be Brave”

Jaswinder Thethy introducing "Pink Saris" at SMU.

About the Screening of Pink Saris in Singapore

The British High Commission supported ONE (SINGAPORE)’s screening of Pink Saris in collaboration with the Wee Kim Wee Centre to help mark International Women’s Day, the 8^th of March, and to highlight the unjust treatment of many rural women.

Kirpal Singh, Associate Professor of English Literature, opened the event, after which, Jaswinder Thethy gave a short speech on the UK’s work in India, which includes investments in education for girls, providing access to finance, skills and low carbon energy, safe births, reducing violence against women, children’s health and nutrition.

Jaswinder Thethy is an Assistant Attaché at The British High Commission.

Related Links

Watch the Pink Saris movie trailer in ONE (SINGAPORE)’s video archive.

Find out how to support the Gulabi Gang.

Related Article

• Event information: Redefining the Economics of Living: Meeting Singapore’s Social Needs

What does “poverty” mean in contemporary Singapore? We are one of the most affluent countries in Asia, yet in our midst are neighbors who do not have the resources to pay for health care, school fees, a home or even proper meals every day. Government programmes assist low-income families and a number of new social programmes were announced in the 2012 Budget. Charities and religious groups also provide support. But is it enough? Who are the most vulnerable groups? Do we need new policies, better implementation of existing schemes, a different framework, cultural changes or is the balance already just right?

NMP Laurence Lien, writer Radha Basu, grassroots worker Nadia Hamid Bamasri and civil society activist Braema Mathi explore our nation’s social safety net on 3 April at SMU’s Wee Kim Wee Centre.  The discussion will be moderated by Kirpal Singh.

This event will be held in SMU’s Lee Kong Chian School of Business. We will be updating this post with more details soon.

Please save the date and RSVP now.