Positive Women Network

The Commonwealth Youth Programme (CYP) Asia Centre has been organising a number of activities including workshops/seminars to raise the awareness levels of young people, youth workers and senior government officials across the Commonwealth Asia Region.

During the last two decades of HIV pandemic, it has been changing trends and patterns of infection. Along with increasing rate of infections among various people, infection rates among women have accelerated. Traditional gender roles assigned by ou r societies are largely responsible as well for the continued spread of HIV/AIDS, and women have to doubly experience the brunt of the stigma associated with HIV infection.

The CVP Asia Centre, as a part of its intensive HIV/AIDS awareness and working with positive people, organised a 4-day Training Workshop on Project Planning and Support to Positive Women from 16-19 May 2005 at CVP Asia Centre, Chandigarh in collaboration with Positive Women Network (PWN+) Chennai. This workshop brought together positive young women from most vulnerable seven states of India who have realised their mission to spread awareness and reduce the transmission as well as stigma and discrimination.

The workshop was organised with the objectives of creating a platform for positive women from highly affected states of India to share experiences and learn from each other, providing them training in commun~cation skills, public relations, project management etc. and creating a positive women's forum and linking up to the Commonwealth Youth Ambassadors to Positive Living Programme.

The programme featured presentations and addresses of eminent experts from both government and non-governmentsectors, who have been involved in HIV/AIDS, related activities for a long time. They delivered presentations on selected but important topics on HIV/AIDS and its impact. The workshop also included interactive sessions, simulation exercises, situational analysis, and discussions with target groups, technical training sessions and field visits. For the field visit, organised by National Service Scheme (NSS) Regional Centre, they visited Shivalik Public School, Chandigarh. The participants interacted with the students. This presented a golden opportunity for the students to dispel the myths and misconceptions about HIV /AIDS. The focus of the workshop was on How to make the young women understand various HIV/AIDS related issues and their implications and what they should do to prevent HIV/AIDS from spreading further in society. After this programme, the positive women will return to their respective states and implement their action plans under the guidance and supervision of PWN+.