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A C K N O W L E D G E M E N T

A C K N O W L E D G E M E N T

We, at Best Practices Foundation, would like to first acknowledge Debnath have been always been ready to walk the extra mile with
all the women and girls whose voices have given life to this us and have contributed immensely with their analysis and
compendium and whose stories have inspired our thinking. perspectives for the studies on federations and Nari Adalat. We
are grateful to Ashok Sircar for his inputs on every single chapter.
This year long study on the innovative practices of Mahila We would like to acknowledge the contributions of Shalini Joshi
Samakhya has been an absolute privilege and honor for us at and Purwa Bhardwaj on the study on KGBVs which informed our
Best Practices Foundation. It will have shaped our thinking for chapter on the work with adolescents. We would also like to
life in the areas of institution building, governance, literacy, and thank Meera Halakatti, Rony C.J., Subhadip Das and Anchita
gender justice from a grassroots women's perspective. BPF Ghatak for their contributions to the study. Bonnie Shepherd,
would like to thank all the MS staff at every level for their insights, Sujit Sinha and Anita Gurumurthy were instrumental in designing
patience, hospitality and detailed feedback on the drafts to the the framework of the study and methodology. A note of thanks to
authors. We would not have seen this publication through without Natasha Ravindran for her meticulous copy-editing of all the
the constant backing from the National Project Office, particularly drafts. Sudha Menon must be thanked for working neck-to-neck
Suparna Pachauri, Taranga Sriraman and Santosh Sharma. We with the team and lending her artistic flair to the design of the
would also like to thank DFID for their support in the making of compendium and for her work on the Nari Adalat study. A final
this compendium. vote of thanks to the authors; Malasree Dasgupta, Mukta
Banerjee, Preethi Krishnan, Akhilesh Kumar Bakshi, and Sanjeev
We would like to acknowledge MS Karnataka, especially Kavita Pillay who have brought the voices of women into this
D.L. for opening their doors to BPF for the extensive pilots that compendium.
paved the way for a rigorous study and a robust methodology.
We appreciate the commitment of the members of the National Sangeetha Purushothaman
Resource Group, in particular, Sister Sabeena for her close Director
observations on adult literacy, Vandana Mahajan for her insights Best Practices Foundation
on MS' work on governance and the links to the rights based
approach. We need to especially acknowledge Kameshwari
Jandhyala and A. Padma for their rigorous line by line feedback
on the work of federations. Suchithra Vedanth's detailed
comments on the Nari Adalat added depth to the work. Gita
Gairola and Gita Rani Bhattacharya were always available to
provide minute details to our questions on the phone. Seema
Bhaskaran and the MS Kerala team have been extremely
accommodating in providing information on the Mahila Shikshan
Kendra in Kerala given our travel constraints. Nirjumoni Bhayali's
thinking and reflection provided the conceptual basis for the data
exhibition innovation. The team would like to thank Prashanthi,
Flora Lakra, Smita Gupta, Kumkum Tripathi, Lalita Pradeep and
Trupti Sheth for their cooperation with BPF and also their
patience. The interviews with boys, men and personnel from
government agencies and NGOs in the districts and states helped
us understand the linkages, the scope for future synergies and
provided us policy insights for institutionalization. A special
thanks to all the translators for the committed assistance to the
research team on the field and helping us understand the ground-
breaking work of women.

Finally, the work of the research team who worked tirelessly and
in strong collaboration to compile this compendium needs to be
acknowledged. Manab Sen, Nancy Yu and Tarun Kumar
C O N T A C T

DFID India,
British High Commission
B-28 Tara Crescent,
Qutab Institutional Area,
New Delhi 110016
Tel: +91-11-2652 9123
http://www.dfid.gov.uk/countries/asia/india.asp

*Disclaimer: The views presented in this


paper/product are those of the authors and do not
necessarily represent the views of DFID.

National Project Office


Government of India
Ministry of Human Resource Development
Department of Higher Education
Shastri Bhavan
New Delhi - 110 115

Published by:
Best Practices Foundation.
1 Palmgrove Road,
Victoria Layout,
Bangalore - 560 047, Karnataka
Tel: +91-80-25301861
Website: www.bestpracticesfoundation.com

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