Hey All,

I was off to Delhi for a week to obtain permission from the Ministry of Women and Child development for the Regional Consultation in October. Now that I'm back, its time for some more news from MASUM. Here's what I am aware of !!

• A new accountant - Yogita Pole joined MASUM in place of Pratibha tai. Pratibha tai has started her own law practice after completing her LLB while at MASUM. Even Archana completed her LLB recently -juggling her many roles very adeptly! :)
• We also had a small farewell party for Rikke who left on the 16th of August after completing her two month internship. She is a student of Anthropology and had recently completed another internship at United Nations. At MASUM she was studying how the Human Rights framework gets translated from the policy making level to the grass-roots. A very bright and promising person - we wish her luck in her future endeavours.
• We participated in the Maharashtra State level Training of Trainers (ToT) on Community Based Monitoring which was held from 7th to 11th August, 2007 at YMCA in Pune. The objective of this training was to conduct training on Community based Monitoring activities for the master trainers from Community Monitoring project districts of Nandurbar, Thane, Amaravati, Osmanabad and Pune. Two masters’ trainers from Public Health Department, trainers from NGOs, CBOs, People’s Organizations from respective five project districts were participated in the ToT. Experts involved in training field were also invited as Resource Person to conduct this ToT.
• Milind is away for a Regional Training of Trainers (Asia Pacific Region) on Promoting Equality & Rights for Women in the context of The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women organised by International Women’s Rights Action Watch Asia Pacific from 25 to 31 August 2008 being held at Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
• About 20 people from Convergys are visiting Waghapur village today to conduct a Creativity Workshop with children and also to have a look at the Mobile Computer Van initiative that they are supporting.
  
• Archana is busy preparing for a two day Review and Strategy Building Workshop on Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act (PWDV Act). The workshop is being held in collaboration with ILS Law College, Pune at the J.P.Naik Center from the 25th to the 26th of August and will be attended by about 25-30 participants from various Organisations all across Maharashtra who work on the implementation of the PWDV Act. The aim is to review the work done and prepare a strategy to pressurise the Government to implement the Act better.

Swati