CHENNAI: Every day, The International Foundation for Crime Prevention and Victim Care (PCVC) gets about a dozen calls for help from women facing domestic violence on their hotline, Dhwani. But when the pandemic broke out, it dropped to a couple of calls a week. And that’s when PCVC decided to ramp up its ‘I am Dhwani’ campaign, which aims to get individuals and organisations to not only pledge to practise non-violent, equal relationships but also spread awareness and support people facing domestic violence. And in the last six months, more than 5,000 people have signed up to be part of it.
“As per the 2011 census, around 70 lakh women in TN face physical violence every year. So our motto ‘7 for 7lakh – where in three to five years we get seven lakh people to sign up for the ‘I am Dhwani’ campaign. And each person in turn will try to influence at least 10 other people around them not to commit or endure violence,” says Rashmi Singh, executive director, PCVC, who is in charge of Dhwani.
The people who have signed up are from all walks of life -- corporates, NGOs, frontline workers, members of SHGs, and young people.
According to Rashmi, once lockdown began, calls for help dropped. “The women in abusive relationships were with the abuser and so it was difficult for them to reach out. Also, since the government had said that only essential services would be functional, they felt there was no one they could reach out to,” says Rashmi. “So we decided to do our best to create awareness through our campaign. The idea is that while we need support services, it is important for people to know what constitutes domestic violence and where they can go for support.” While the campaign was conceptualised in 2019, PCVC geared it up during the pandemic, conducting virtual sessions, training programmes and social media campaigns. “We made short films, which we put out on social media, developed code words, and mobilised teams of volunteers as women felt safer calling at night,” says Rashmi, adding that in the initial four months women wanted just crisis counselling as they did not want to walk out and expose themselves to the pandemic.
The campaign targets people from all walks of life. “So we reach out to corporates, education institutions and civil society organisations, who already have a mass outreach,” says Rashmi, adding that they want to reach out to people in all TN districts. The training modules that have been developed to orient potential ‘I am Dhwani’ changemakers entail developing understanding on some of the key concepts of gender and gender and gender-based violence, and also getting to know some of the subtle forms of violence, which are normalised. It will also help people identify it in their lives and in the lives of people who are in their immediate sphere of influence and teach them how to start taking action.
PCVC also plans to conduct ‘The Changemakers Networking Event’ soon. “It will bring together all the changemakers from all the awareness programmes so that they can discuss ideas and how to take the movement forward,” says Rashmi.