All That Is Bitter and Sweet_ A Memoir - Ashley Judd [154]
Prostituted women are caught in cunning cycles of vicious debt—to the people who own them, the madams who run the brothels, and then the moneylenders who scam the women with high interest rates when they have emergencies and no other source of credit. The deal is so stacked against them, and they suffer, their children suffer, and the families they are supporting back home suffer. To break that cycle, PSI/India helped set up a lending and borrowing system, following the revolutionary approach of India’s Self-Employed Women’s Association (founded by Ela Bhatt), that puts what the prostituted woman earns under her own control for the first time. Sangini means “friend,” and the revolutionary new system is run by the women, for brothel-trapped women.
I sat in rapt attention as a lovely young man gave a PowerPoint presentation about how this particular microfinance and credit and savings program works. To begin, Sangini creates a photo ID for each woman so she can open an account. Lack of proper identification is a huge barrier to banking (and a significant means of discrimination) for women who have been either trafficked, tricked into prostitution, shunned by their families, or born into such poverty that they don’t even possess birth certificates. The only requirement for a Sangini bank ID is membership in Sanghamitra. Every day, someone from the bank visits each brothel to pick up deposits, even if it is only 10 rupees (less than 25 cents). While there, the representative counsels the women about the importance of savings and encourages them to set goals: their children’s education, for example. The member may withdraw her money at any time, in any amount, without penalty; while deposited, it earns a healthy, fair interest. And she can apply for small loans for emergencies or perhaps to start her own business. It’s simply the neatest operation. They have outfoxed the cheaters and owners at every move. In its first year of operation, the bank took in more than 2 million rupees in deposits from seventeen hundred account holders in Kamathipura. Sangini, and initiatives like it, has awesome potential to serve as a model to benefit once hopelessly poor women everywhere. Economic empowerment is an essential piece in the complex puzzle of disentangling women from exploitation. Rock on, Sangini!
I was so excited to tell Seane Corn all about Sanghamitra when she arrived in Mumbai with Kate Roberts on Sunday night. While I dragged the National Geographic film crew across India (or were they dragging me?), Seane was scheduled to go on an overlapping tour with Kate. It was such a joy to see her lioness mane of golden curls and hear her unmistakable New Jersey accent echoing off the alabaster ceilings of the Taj Mahal Palace. I think of Seane as so sophisticated it touched me to see how giddily thrilled she was to be here, how energized she was by our local missions. We began our time together setting our intention with a seated meditation, at the end of which we looked at each other, heavy-lidded, relaxed, and with a sense that we had been kissed by the divine.
Seane has a remarkable history of resilience and service. She was just seventeen when she moved to New York City by herself and went to work as an illegal underage bartender in a gay sex club. Seane also became involved in drugs. It was the early 1980s, when HIV was quietly surging