Green Gang to take forward 'Mission Shakti' in Uttar Pradesh

Lucknow: The 'Green Gang' group, comprising over 1,000 women members, is set to expand their operations under the 'Mission Shakti' campaign to more than 50 additional villages in Uttar Pradesh over the next six months.

The women are already working in groups of 15 to 20 in about 150 villages of Varanasi, Mirzapur, Sonbhadra, Chandauli, Jaunpur and Ayodhya with the mission of making their villages free from alcoholism, gambling, domestic violence, eve-teasing, child marriage and female foeticide.

The 'Mission Shakti' campaign was launched by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to empower women and ensure their safety and security.

The campaign began on Saturday with the beginning of 'Shardiye Navratri' and will culminate in April on 'Chaitya Navratri'.

The Green Gang initiative began five years ago from a small village of Ramsipur in Varanasi when 10-15 women formed a group to mend the ways of the men in their families who were spending all their earning on gambling and alcohol.

The modus operandi of the group was simple - after identifying the 'addas', which were generally outside the village in a secluded place, the stick-wielding women would raid the place and destroyed their playing cards, liquor bottles, etc.

Seeing their initial success, the idea slowly expanded to other neighbouring villages and the Green Gang presence is now seen in as many as six districts.

The members are dressed in green sarees and their target areas focus mainly on issues related to women and girls.

"We celebrate the birth of a girl child and also put green 'Khushhali Chinha' (mark of happiness) on the house where a girl is born. We also have 'informers' in each and every village who regularly keep passing information about the evils like domestic violence, eve teasing, child marriage etc. With our efforts, we are successfully contained these evils to a great extent," said Manju, who leads a group in Jungal Mahal village, Mirzapur.

Each gang member has the mobile number of the nearest police station and if needed, they immediately contact the police for help.

One member of each gang has also been appointed as a 'Police Mitra' by the local police who keep in touch with them on a regular basis.

The Green Gang is now supported by a group of NGOs.

Divyanshu Upadhyaya of the Hope Welfare Trust, said: "Our coordinators are organizing meeting with the representatives of every gang and it has been decided to extend our operations in 50 more villages in the districts we are already working.

"In the next six months, we will be working extensively on checking eve teasing, imparting self-defence training to girls and dealing with issues like domestic violence, female foeticide."

The Green Gang, incidentally, is also doing its bit towards the environment.

"A couple of months ago, we noticed that the soil around the pond in our village was eroding fast. After a discussion, we planted trees around the pond and soon the practice was adopted in other villages also," said Anita Devi, a group leader in Jalalpur village, Jaunpur.