Virtual Tours India

Is a picture worth a thousand words? Decide for yourself. Visit our photo gallery--and meet the amazing women of India. A picture may be the only way to convey the sense of fun and friendship the women experience during their weekly Credit with Education meetings.

India Photo Gallery

Click on any of the images below for a larger view and description. While they’re enlarged, you can browse by clicking the "Next" or "Back" arrows or returning to this page to select another image. All the photos you see here were taken by Karl Grobl in 2006 and are copyrighted to Freedom from Hunger.

 

Joyous and energetic, these girls run home from school to be with their mothers who are running home-based businesses.Mosquito nets, like the one in this home, protect families from malaria. Our Learning Conversations on malaria teach women about the importance of insecticide-treated nets, especially for pregnant women and children under five.Families in this region are very poor and mud and straw houses are common dwellings.In villages like this one, every able-bodied person works to earn money. Unfortunately, that often includes children whose families are too poor to send them to school.Boys tend to receive more education than girls. Part of Freedom from Hunger’s lifeskills training for women includes lessons about the value of sending girls to school.As in most developing nations, women in rural India are the primary caretakers of children under the age of five and, therefore, self-help services to women are the key to improving children’s health and nutrition.Street poverty is perhaps best known in India but the great majority of India’s citizens who live in absolute poverty live in rural areas.Like mothers everywhere, this mother is proud of her baby and works hard every day to ensure the best possible future for her child.No American export is more highly valued than sustainable self-help programs that equip families to achieve the self-reliance they want so much.Many of the mothers in self-help groups want to protect their daughters from early marriage. This woman was married at 14.While their mothers gather at weekly self-help meetings, their children play nearby.Ellen Vor der Bruegge, Freedom from Hunger’s Vice President for Program Innovation, meets women at one of their self-help meetings. Ellen Vor der Bruegge, VP for Program Innovation, joins with the women as they sing songs of solidarity and encouragement to one another.During a self-help gathering, women participate in Learning Conversations on the topic of malaria.When women gather together on a regular basis, they generate the collective courage to try new things to benefit their families and communities.Sue Glassford, Freedom from Hunger’s Senior Training Specialist, interviews program participants about their experiences with their group.Learning is a joyous activity for women--many of whom have little or no formal education. They are eager to learn lifeskills that will help them achieve their dreams of family self-sufficiency, food security and good health.In Learning Conversations, women share their own experiences around the topic being discussed. Through a facilitated process, they discover new approaches to dealing with age old problems and encourage each other to try new things.When it comes time to take a loan, women sign a register for their loan amount. For those who cannot read or write, they provide their thumbprint. No collateral is required because the women guarantee each other’s repayment.In a learning session on malaria, women demonstrate the proper way to hang and use a net.In their home-based businesses, women develop skills they already have and increase their profits through education on business management and working capital which lowers the cost of their supplies.Most people do several things to earn money. Substance farming is often among them.Getting clean water for her family is a major task in each woman’s day. In addition to transporting the water in jugs from the community well, the water must be treated with chemicals or boiled to make it safe for drinking.This woman, Namita, makes fish traps as one of her several enterprises.Grains are a staple in the Indian diet. The grain must be shucked and sifted before it is ground into flour.