Volunteers

Now that Nithari has succeeded in shocking the nation, stirring the creative juices of media-loving politicians and bringing light to the fact that CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE DOES EXIST, half this youth group's problems are over.

Firstly, a number of ignorant questions will (hopefully) not be extended in our direction such as "accha, this country is mostly Hindu so how can you say that CSA exists?"/ "accha Pranaadhika (for that is my name), this disease (!) exists only in higher stages of society so why plan rural awareness?/" you got abused because you wear western clothes and indian males get 'out of control' with 'western-minded' ladied because it is out of their culture"...

Page 3, the National Award winning film , Monsoon Wedding, Everybody Says Im fine , Pinki Virani's Bitter Chocolate book and now the Nithari tragedy of 2006-7 all serve as public education tools on Child Sexual Abuse.

After Nithari it is interesting to note how perpetually confused the law-making people are looking, especially when it comes to responding to the media. Undoubtedly one of the best articles on Police ignorance of CSA helped pinpoint one of the many reasons as to why a lot of this case is going to be ruined. If the people don't know what signs to look for, how will they come to a reasonable conclusion as to what happened and why it happened ?

Elaan will be holding an interactive session with the first year students of the Jadavpur University this afternoon. For those who have personal queries or wish to send in their CV's, the procedure and requirements are as follows -

1. You need to belong to the institute, in simple English - you need to be a Student or Faculty member.
2. You need to devote 15 hours a week for a single week (that's 3 hours a day) for sensitization lectures and training.
3. You need to report to Elaan on a fortnightly basis.
4. You need to be fluent in the English language.
5. If inducted, you will be required to work exclusively with Elaan in the capacity of a volunteer
for a minimum of 1 year if you desire a letter of recommendation.

CV's to be emailed to elaanspeak@yahoo.co.in