District Level Adolescent Advocacy Workshop - Chandigarh

A one day District Level Adolescent Advocacy Workshop was held on
Saturday 14 Oct 2006 at the CYP Asia Centre, under the aegis of
Ministry of Youth Welfare and Sports, Government of India.

This is in continuation of the 6 day training workshop conducted at
Rajiv Gandhi National Institute of Youth Development at Sriperumbudur
in collaboration with Ministry of Youth Welfare and Sports,
Government of India, in which our UT's team of Three District
Adolescent Resource Trainers (DART) Lt Col Ravi Bedi, Dr. Sangeeta
Jund and Dr. Avnish Jolly had participated. The workshop was
sponsored by United Nations Population Fund, and consisted of resource
persons who are experts in their fields.

The participants of today's workshop are the Office bearers and
representatives of youth clubs of each of the Union Territory's 18
villages. Due to the peculiar nature of the population pattern of the
Union Territory, however, it is intended to cover the youth
in the Slum and Rehabilitation colonies in collaboration with various
NGOs which are active in the city.

The workshop was inaugurated by Mrs Ramminder Kaur Buttar, Deputy
Director Panchayati Raj Institutions, Government of Punjab. She
exhorted the youth to organise themselves, and work for the
development of the Nation. This can be done by first empowering the
youth through education and skill building. Moreover she brought to
the notice of the youth, the adverse gender ratio in the northern
states especially Punjab and Haryana. This is reminiscent of the
outdated idea of the Girl being the weaker child, which is not true
today.

The technical sessions were conducted by Dr GS Bajwa –Role of Teen
Clubs, Dr Avnish Jolly – HIV/AIDS, Drugs and Human Trafficking and Dr
(Mrs) Sangeeta Jund – Role of Peer Educators. The speakers discussed
in detail with the participants the skills required to be good peer
educators. They were advised how to form teen clubs in their areas
and villages, and how the members could derive the maximum benefit
from them.

Dr GS Bajwa
Dist. Youth Coordinator
bajwags@...
Cell 91- 98153-55542