Elected women on COVID-19 frontlines in India

A new report from The Hunger Project India explores the power of local leadership in a time of crisis, highlighting the importance of training and supporting women leaders elected to their panchayat (local village council) to become respected, effective leaders.

The global COVID-19 pandemic has re-emphasised the need for community-level decision-making and access to accurate information during a public health crisis.

Local leaders

Within the first few weeks of lockdown, The Hunger Project India had activated a powerful cadre of highly trained Elected Women Representatives to address these new challenges. Collectively, the cohort – who have participated in dedicated leadership training programs run by The Hunger Project – have an extensive reach of 6.4 million people across 1,400 panchayats.

As frontline workers who live in rural communities and are the eyes and ears of the realities of local challenges, they played an essential role in the urgent response to the advancing crisis. Their inclusive leadership and persistent advocacy was and remains key to ensuring that government health and welfare measures were accessible to all – well beyond the cities.

Some of the actions the Elected Women Representatives took to create COVID-resilient communities across India included:

o   Facilitating the fair distribution of food rations (80,000 food rations distributed)

o   Securing access to social security schemes – particularly for illiterate people  

o   Supporting widows and orphans through local philanthropy  

o   Dispeling misinformation and myths about vaccines, and instead motivating people to get vaccinated (over 500,000 people reached with accurate health messages) 

o   Advocating for more COVID health clinics, testing labs and vaccination sites 

• Protecting young girls from child marriage; women and children from domestic violence; and children from trafficking and illegal adoption.

Leaders with compassion

Nirmala, Sukhiya, Sita and Anita — members of the Sema Panchayat in Rajasthan who had been trained by The Hunger Project — stepped into their leadership and began operating as fundraisers to guarantee access for their constituents to government resources and funds distributed during COVID-19. They approached individuals and groups, and mobilised fund drives to procure sanitisers, essential food items and masks. These local leaders are motivated by compassion and responsibility:

“Our main aim was to provide immediate relief in areas with extremely vulnerable communities where the government hasn’t reached yet. We have been able to support 20 families in distress so far.”

Creating COVID-resilient communities

It is clear that the impacts of the pandemic will be long lasting, and devastating. A long-term response is required to enable countries like India to protect its most vulnerable people, and to be resilient to any challenges that come its way.

Take action.

The Hunger Project Australia is running a campaign to support our sisters and brothers in India, and to empower the Elected Women Representatives to build COVID-resilient communities. Please give generously now: www.thp.org.au/angel-invest