Unheard Voices: Narratives of Migrant Women of Mumbai is a storytelling platform aimed at highlighting the aspirations of migrant women workers. Their experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic in Mumbai, one of the hotspots of the virus speaks about the systemic challenges that they faced in accessing opportunities.
It highlights the socio-economic and cultural barriers that women, especially migrant women workers face in India’s “commercial capital”. This is a repository of their aspirations in life to mobilize necessary support for the community with grassroots partnerships. The fieldwork for this project began in the community of Indira Nagar Slums, Reay Road, Mumbai.
Unheard Voices is created by Bhavya Gupta,
MFA Design and Technology ’21, Parsons School of Design. This project began from Bhavya’s award-winning Schmidt Futures Reimagine Challenge 2020 proposal. The platform is developed as a joint collaborative effort with Khaana Chahiye Foundation’s Neeraj Shetye and Mithila Naik-Satam.
The intervention is created in support of the Hunger Map Project, an evidence-based policy intervention proposed by Khaana Chahiye Foundation in Mumbai during the national lockdown triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic. One of the goals in the intervention is developing a platform where beneficiaries have an agency to share their narratives with the world.
While conducting the fieldwork, we have complied with all the ethical standards of conducting participatory research. We have ensured that our beneficiary’s privacy is not intruded on any way. The interviews, audio recordings and photographs have been uploaded with their complete knowledge and consent. The project has taken adequate measures to ensure we do not engage in any malpractices such as poverty porn which harms the dignity of our participants.
