‘Saamya’ means - equity (n) quality of being fair and impartial. Manifestation of gender-related ideas and practices pan across all layers of society and so are its repercussions. Children learns and acquire behaviours by seeing and observing. Everything they see and experience becomes a source of development of their attitudes and beliefs, and manifests in their behavior. Boys grow-up into young men with expectations shaped around what is appropriate for them to do in the home and outside space. They are schooled by the family and by others to express themselves in a manner that is considered appropriate for men. Thus, the boys are gender trained into men who can show anger but not show affection, who can compete but not corporate.
Saamya is aiming towards building a gender-sensitive society by involving young boys at a very early age, 7 to 11 years, so that they can observe, reflect, learn, and take action to change behavior in their own lives and influence others. These young boys become more gender-sensitive, showing respect, affection, empathy, consent and compassion towards women and girls, and become role models for other boys in their communities.
Saamya has designed an innovative activity-based module that operates on the principles of Empathy, Respect, Equality, Dignity, Diversity and Integrity. Gender is the cross-cutting value through the ethics of Saamya.
The project started in 2020 and in our 4 year long journey, we has reached out to various locations across India, catering to more than 900 young boys.
