Help Poor Girls Get Access to Sanitary Pads

Poor women, especially in rural and semi-urban areas, struggle to get a clean piece of cloth to manage their period every month. There is a lack of awareness about menstrual health and hygiene. Living in a culture of shame and silence, they end up using poor substitutes like rags and ash, or worse they use NOTHING.

This aggravates their day-to-day misery around this basic need. 

ISCI Foundation, through its menstrual health & hygiene awareness program, is installing Sanitary Napkin Vending Machines in the girl schools around Gwalior. We have undertaken a lot of menstrual awareness camps in backward areas with the best gynecologists to promote menstrual health and have provided free sanitary pads to women and girls.

We provide high-quality, properly sanitized sanitary pads to the girls from these schools and to women and girls of the backward areas.

When you donate to this program, you help women and girls in underprivileged communities get access to sanitary pads to manage their periods.

Rani is not afraid of her period anymore

**When Rani got her period, no one including her mother spoke to her about it. She didn't know how to manage her bleeding.** Through a friend, she learned that she had to use a cloth to absorb the blood. Not knowing how to get a cloth, she ended up using pillow covers and bed sheets. This angered her mother and she got beaten up for wasting money.

She came to know of sanitary pads through a classmate. When she asked her for a few, she was snubbed saying they were expensive and could not be given away for free.

Rani started falling sick with the fear of getting her period. With no access to sanitary products, she resorted to praying to God to stop her periods forever. Her period, which is a normal bodily function, became an unbearable trauma for Rani.

It was during this time that ISCI Foundation came in with the 'Menstrual Hygiene Program' initiative for her school. She got her 'Free Sanitary Pad' kit which came with sanitary pads and a menstrual hygiene awareness brochure. This kit changed her life and gave her the freedom to live like a normal adolescent child. She doesn't dread her period anymore and knows how to manage it.

Women in India's rural areas are struggling with the basic needs of life. A sanitary napkin is the last thing on the minds of most.

This simple piece of cloth saves many women from incidents of helplessness and indignity. It is a solution that is practical, and easy to use.

Your monthly donation will help more girls and women like Rani get access to Free Sanitary Pad kits. Give now and help women grow out of the culture of shame.