Thinking sensitively...

Young minds seem to think sensitively and sensibly over the issues plaguing our times. From 28^th- 30^th Oct 2010, Gramya Vikas Mancha with support from Actionaid India organised a comics workshop for children in Anwesha Book Fair held at Chandmari AEC Ground, Guwahati in which children effectively brought out their views over various social concerns.

The participants belonged to T.C Girls’ High School and Maharishi Vidya Mandir, Guwahati. The students were enthusiastic to get pally with a new medium that they had never thought they could also create. Interestingly, the young students expressed their concern over the burning issues of the society such as terrorism and violence. Children also made stories on subjects like child labour, environmental degradation etc. Trainer: Usha

The wave continues….

After Nalbari, GVM hosted another Grassroots Comics Workshop from 9th-12th January 2010, at Rangia this time, with support from UNICEF and ECHO on the theme Disaster Risk Reduction with special reference to women and children. Hence the children of different age groups came together and expressed their points of view in this regard.
The children mostly created comics on flood as it is the most annoying and frequently experienced ordeal here. The girls also made comics on how the traditions and social structure adds up to the inconvenience of the womenfolk during disasters as she is the one who remains indoors and looks after the children, therefore aggravating their vulnerability...

Early Warning saves nine!!!

After the first workshop in Nalbari with GVM on Disaster Risk Reduction, this one was meant to reinforce the need for understanding the signals given by nature prior to disasters and taking them more seriously. Therefore, on similar lines, the next in the series was conducted from 23rd to 25th December 2009 in GVM Office Campus by Sushmita and Usha.
Interestingly, it was more of learning than sharing on our part as the issue was something new for us in the first place. A range of indicators to disasters like famine, earthquake, flood etc. were unveiled by means of comics. Some from these 31 participants have formed a comics group to keep the work going!!