VIDEO VOLUNTEERS

Video Volunteers gives communities in rural India a voice by enabling them to make their own news and documentaries. We have around 150 people working full time in 300 slums and villages across the country making films on their community issues that they screen on widescreen projectors, on the internet, and (as of last week) in a half hour weekly program on one of the English language news stations here. It's basically about communities using media to encourage local action and coming up with solutions, and also devising new business models through which communities can benefit from new technology innovation to impact news and media control. It creates impact by reducing local corruption and creating a new class of community leaders, mostly women or Dalits or other marginalized groups.