Reena Devi

Reena Devi- village Boropar, Sikkar, Barari police station, District Katihar, Bihar. Reena Devi primarily reports on issues related to gender, sexual violence, and religious minorities Reena Devi has always had large aspirations. As a young girl, she often experienced gender discrimination. She frequently heard about women in her community who survived sexual violence. Reena was discouraged from attending school and instead stayed home to work on her family’s farm. During her chores, she imagined ways to change the culture of gender discrimination and how to provide better opportunities to women. When she was older, she joined the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti…

Asha Devi, a farm labourer from Bihar was working hard to make ends meet with her seasonal, meagre earnings. She had no idea, that she could have a supplementary income during the non-harvest seasons through the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA), an Indian labour law and social security measure that aims to guarantee the ‘right to work’. The scheme, dubbed the world’s largest public works programme , provides 100 days of wage employment to every adult of India, who volunteers to do unskilled manual work. Just like Asha, her entire village was clueless about NREGA and had struggled to

When Reena Devi, Video Volunteers Correspondent for Bihar, got to know that an entire village had no awareness about NREGA, she approached the issue by first educating them about their rights under the NREGA scheme. She then got the community to register and apply for work under the local gram panchayats. As mandated by the NREGA ACT, the applicants, an entire village got employment.

Reena Devi’s dedication to bringing about a change in the society and helping the community has helped an entire village get employment, that is rightfully theirs. The power of citizen journalism has once again helped a community in India.

This video was made by a Video Volunteers Community Correspondent Asha Devi.

Community Correspondents come from marginalised communities in India and produce videos on unreported stories. These stories are ’news by those who live it.’ they give the hyperlocal context to global human rights and development challenges. See more such videos at www.videovolunteers.org. Take action for a more just global media by sharing their videos and joining in their call for change.