Gender Alliance joining hands with the Jharkhand police organised a... training program of station house officer for women police station across all districts of Jharkhand. The training was held on IPC 354 and 354 A-D, sexual harassment at workplace and child marriage prohibition acts with the objective to strengthen institutional mechanism and the scope of the executive and judiciary in responding to address and combat crime against women rationally, effectively and sensitively and to jointly design effective programs to prevent such crimes and make the institutional mechanisms responsive to the needs of women and girls, which is the need of the hour. The training was inaugurated by former Home secretary and current Chief Election Commissioner Sri. N.N Pandey, Anurag Gupta, ADG, CID,Jharkhand Police and Manoj Chothe, SP, CID Jharkhand Police who lauded the work of Gender Alliance and Bandhan Tod and the need to build such meaning partnerships to address crime against women.

Political Will plays a prominent role in any legislative, policy reform... right from the preparatory stage to the implementation phase, recognizing the pertinent role political will can play in initiating the much needed reform process in the context of promoting gender equality in Bihar, Gender Alliance initiated a continuous and sustained dialogue and advocacy with the political leaders, the government and Ministers on the issue. With the objective to build consensus among the political representatives of all the parties necessitating an enabling progressive legislative change, effective policy making and reform and well as implementation, towards advancing gender justice in the state of Bihar, Gender Alliance organized a Roundtable Convention of political Parties in May 2017. The event not only resulted in Consensus Building of the political representatives from across different parties of the state but also initiated a democratic discourse in the public sphere and a constructive dialogue on the issue. It further ensued a constructive inter party dialogue on issues of gender equality sidelining and surpassing the party politics for the first time in Bihar. The platform provided an impetus for open dialogues of the political actors and the Ministers with other key stakeholders, including the CSOs, the media, youth and the development partners.
The consultation culminated with the re-affirmation of the government’s commitment to end child marriage through legislative by increasing the minimum marriageable age of girls from 18 to 21.The Ministers and MLAs recognized the importance and the need for addressing the issues of Child marriage, violence and early marriages through higher education of adolescent girls, and in this light unanimously supported Gender Alliance advocacy on policy reform to ensure free and compulsory education of adolescent girls in Bihar and the formulation of youth policy.

Gender Alliance organised a series of district level advocacy... campaign and consensus building Progarms in 2017, advocating for ending child and early marriage, dowry and legislative and policy reforms institutionalising gender and structural inequalities. The campaign sought to generate awareness on the adolescent rights and need for women empowerment to achieve a meaningful change for girls, adolescents and youth in Bihar. The campaigns lead to generating public awareness and sensitization on the rights of young and adolescent girls and women, leading to an informed public opinion generation and meaningful participation.

Harnessing the youth and their commitment towards spurring constructive change ... promoting gender equality and gender justice, through their meaningful and active participation in Bihar, has always been a key area of engagement and priority of Gender Alliance. With a firm belief that giving space to the youth and enabling them to articulate and voices and opinions effectively through debates and discussions, is a tool to empower them and emanation of constructive dialogue and discourse, the Alliance through its sustained engagement with the youth ,has been successful in garnering their massive support. The youth joining hands with the alliance have eloquently voiced their opinion, challenged the existing discriminatory policies and legislation and demanded reform with one voice. With the objective to build consensus amongst the political representatives necessitating an enabling progressive legislative changes, effective policymaking and reform and well as implementation, towards advancing gender justice in the state of Bihar, Gender Alliance carried out an action campaign with the youth and the representatives of political parties on the issues affecting the rights of youth and adolescent girls. These Campaigns and engagements not only resulted in Consensus Building of the political representatives from across different parties of the state but also initiated a democratic discourse in the public sphere and a constructive dialogue on the hushed issues of Gender disparities, which is still in infancy among policy makers as well as in the public domain. Such meaningful and constant engagement with the youth through an array of public and parliamentary debates and campaigns, across schools, colleges and universities at the state and district level has also been instrumental in the formation of a critical mass of youth advocates for gender Alliance who have been proactively enunciating the needed structural and legislative reforms and challenging the existing status quo on various forums.

Besides the pertinent role of political actors and the ministers in any legislative and policy reform the media has... a significant role and power to play in the entire reform process as it affects the public opinion which in-turn affects and influences the development of policies, legislation and reforms. Realizing the pertinent role media plays in catalyzing change and advocating legislative reforms towards gender equality, by challenging the existing structural inequalities, building pressure for the required constructive reform Gender Alliance held an array media consultations with its media partners.

Women and girls are today living in perpetual fear of being stalked, teased, assaulted or raped.... This is true especially of sexual violence against women and girls even in public spaces. The fear of being stalked, teased, stared at or harassed movement, violates their autonomy and impinges their access to services and opportunities which if not prevented and stopped can lead to crimes like rape. This acts as a constraint for their daily mobility and impacts the quality of their life including enjoyment of public spaces without fear and threat of violence. These fear and threat often leads to the exclusion of women and young girls from many parts of public spaces or restricts their access and mobility to only merely a handful of ‘safe spaces’ during certain ‘safe time’ periods of time alone. In response to address the situation in Jharkhand, Gender Alliance in partnership with Jharkhand Police launched an initiative ‘Towards creating a women centric policing in Jharkhand’
As a first step towards this a training of station house officer from women police station across all districts of Jharkhand was organized in By Gender Alliance in partnership with the Jharkhand Police on on IPC 354 and 354 A-D, sexual harassment at workplace and child marriage prohibition act. Former home secretary of Jharkhand and current chief election commissioner, N.N. Pandey, ADG CID Anurag Gupta and Manoj Ratan, S.P. CID inaugurated the program. Women and girls are today living in perpetual fear of being stalked, teased, assaulted or raped.