Nirja Bhatnagar, National Director-Program Policy and Advocacy, Sulabh International Social Service Organisation

Nirja Bhatnagar, National Director-Program Policy and Advocacy, Sulabh International Social Service Organisation |

Born and brought up in Uttar Pradesh’s Azamgarh district, Atma Devi Jaiswar was only a teen when her parents got her married. At the tender age of 14, she moved to Mumbai with her husband and started her life in Dharavi. “I came to the city in 1999 and was a clueless teenager who was subjected to domestic violence every day. I bore two children within a short time and I didn’t know how to take care of them, because I, too, was a child!” shared Jaiswar, who is now 44.    

Confined inside her then rickety home as her husband and in-laws didn’t allow her to step outside, this prolonged experience shook her to the core. Determined not to let this crush her spirit, she fought back, and decided she wouldn’t let any other woman in the neighbourhood face a similar ordeal. 

“I heard a few social activists who would come to the neighbourhood and talk about women’s rights and that resonated with me. So since 2005, I have been going around the entire neighbourhood of Dharavi to talk to people about their rights, their situations and how they can help themselves and inevitably help their children break the generational barriers,” she says, adding that when she would step outside with her husband, she was forced to cover her head in a goonghat.   

From 2005 to 2009, Jaiswar created awareness about women’s rights, spent extensive time speaking to Dharavi’s women to understand their plight and motivated them to not only speak up for themselves, but also to work, so that they could become financially independent. She would inform and educate women about the necessity to work, financial independence, legal rights in cases of domestic violence, laws related to child sexual abuse and so on. These four years laid the groundwork for changing the lives of these women and since then, there’s been no looking back. 

“Today, around 5,000 women have joined hands and have been working in various fields, enabling them to not only create their own individual identity, but to provide their children with better education and quality of life,” she says. Over the years, Jaiswar’s work has branched out to Ahmedabad, Nagpur, Nashik and Solapur. 

Nirja Bhatnagar, National Director-Program Policy and Advocacy at Sulabh International Social Service Organisation, who has known Atma Devi since 2010, thinks that she has a finger on the pulse of Dharavi. “She is committed, honest, transparent, focussed and democratic in her work. Dharavi is a dynamic and diverse neighbourhood and with her innate leadership skills, she has managed to bring change.” 


Rahul Dev

Cricket Jounralist at Newsdesk

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