Stop gender-based violence (GBV) in India

Thank you so much for your support. You are helping so many women experiencing violence and neglect through your support of our work.

For example, last November, a social worker contacted our Snehadhar team about a 36-year-old pregnant woman in Sonai who needed our help. Reaching the police station, our team took over responsibility for her, immediately finding her to be eight months pregnant.

With COVID restrictions in place at the time, she was first admitted to our Caring Friend's Hospital, spending eight days in quarantine. She was not very coherent and was constantly referring to her family but could not give her husband's full name. She explained that she had left home after a quarrel and, being uneducated, had no money or identification.

After quarantine, she was placed in our long-term women's shelter, where she started mingling, laughing, and playing with the women. One day, all the woman's bags were checked, and the team found receipts for the woman and her husband along with a copy of her mother's Aadhar card. This helped us locate her mother's village in Aurangabad District. We were able to call her cousin, who told us she had run away from home two to three years ago. Unfortunately, we were also told her mother could not take care of her daughter, and no one else was ready to take care of her either.

We decided to focus on the search for her husband, and although she had no other information, she did mention Pimpalgaon village. We took the help of the police to find out more about the town, but they drew a blank. Looking back over the receipts we had found, we were able to find another address and make contact with someone from that village. We were told that the woman's husband was mentally ill and had not been seen for ten days. Meanwhile, her pregnancy was advancing, and after 15 days in Snehalaya, she was admitted to a private hospital for three days.

The woman's behavior changed dramatically; she started singing loudly, laughing out loud, jumping on her bed, blabbering, and trying to run away from the project. She was diagnosed as mentally ill. We searched for organizations working for psychiatric patients who may be able to help her, but none were willing to take her until after she had delivered her baby.

After giving birth to her baby girl child in a private hospital in Ahmednagar, we took her back to our shelter for one month's recovery time. Finally, we were able to admit her to Amrutvahini Sanstha for psychiatric treatment. We continue to visit her to check in on her significant progress, and she is looking forward to being reunited with her daughter, who is currently still in our care.

Your support means we can help this omwan and child and hundreds more like them. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts, we couldn;t do any of this without supporters like you. 

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