Abbreviations clarified by ATC:

VOCSET - Victims of Commercial Sexual Exploitation & Trafficking

ATC - Anti Trafficking Centre of Prerana

FR - Prerana Centre in Falkland Rd red light area

Please keep in mind during reading through these pages that all of my statements are exclusively based on pure observation. Therefore, they can be assumptions and are subjective. The purpose of this perspective is to transmit how I experienced Prerana as a NGO during this short period of time I spent with it. Maybe it can be useful for you in a way, otherwise take it as a way of saying thank you!

Since I have so many things in my mind I have to share to you, I will structure the whole letter into five topics. It won't be that messy in the end, I hope!

My purpose for coming to India was to get a closer idea of developing work. During this half a year and my stay as an intern with two different NGOs, especially one aspect of work in the development field came up again and again - asking so many questions.

Working for social betterment can be divided into two levels: The first one, which I consider as the upper level, is to treat the symptoms. The other one, the level that lies below, is where these symptoms originate in.

Symptoms are visible and therefore can be treated more easily. However - is there a sense in only treating these symptoms? In my opinion, effective development work has to go deeper- has to face the origins as well. I completely agree that this is something very difficult and delicate. There, you meet values, cultures, morals, and laws

I experienced that many NGOs work on the upper, more obvious level, only. What I like with Prerana is the fact that it operates in both levels. Starting in the very fieldwork, facing the direct needs of the people of the field working in, Prerana ended up in activities in the other level as well; its commitment it shows in the ATC.

This, I consider it as a holistic approach in being active in social work, a way that must be more effective than working in either one or the other level.

Especially during the workshop on HIV/Aids I attended in December, there the question rose again. During most of the sessions, I missed the lower level of the perspective of this issue. However, I think it won't be appropriate where basically fieldworkers are attending - workers that are facing the symptoms. In general it seems to me that we, in industrialized countries are stressing too much on changes in the lower level, developing countries on the other hand think of it too less.

To conclude, I want to say that I really appreciate the way Prerana fits together these two aspects.

What I tried to explain in the above paragraph is one among a few positive facts in general that have to be mentioned.

Nearness to the people an organization is working for has definitely a positive effect on all activities. The fact that Prerana's offices are located in the field in which it is working for allows the organization fast an immediate action. It creates acceptance, tolerance, - and most important trust of the VOCSET in Prerana. I think this is how work can be done in the most effective and efficient way, - and the NGO is, as part of the red-light area, contributing to the neighborhood.

If I am not wrong, some of Prerana's employees are former clients. Like this, the organization has good access to important information. This in the sense of that these employees know their sphere of activity and can build up trust of new clients in Prerana. Including not only a personnel that has graduated and has an educational background, there again a bridge can be built between theory and action. Ideas can be shared and a holistic approach can be made.

In comparison with what I have experienced in Rajasthan, here can be found much more cooperation between NGOs. At least, which was not the case in Rajasthan, if you are working in the same field, you should work somehow together. What is the use of competition than just for its own, I mean for the organization's manager's pocket? In Prerana, I felt the idea of sharing ideas to others and networking together. That builds up credibility towards different stakeholders.

Out of the next paragraph it must be obvious what my educational background is.
Within Business Administration, I have a special interest in organization.
I want to share to you what I experienced and observed in Prerana from the organizational view of perspective.

In general, there's a high commitment to work, at least among the coordinators and supervisors. I am very sure that, besides personal motivation, it is based on how responsibility is distributed and defined.

In meetings I could see, even though I don't understand Maharati, how orders are done and how broad the field of responsibility of each employee is. Everyone has to become active, has tothink on her own. The feeling of being an active and important part in Prerana creates motivation, creativity and commitment. The organization becomes very personal and diverse, very lively as well!

Incentives however seem to differ among people working in Prerana. Among coordinators and supervisors, the incentives for work are intrinsic, which means the motivation is created by the work itself. Additionally, they are committed to it because they see the individual destiny of a child or a woman. About some other workers, just out of observation, I am not sure whether this is the case.

What I really like is the way people communicate with each other. It is not only about chatting 
(which is done a lot ;-)). Many organizational issues and problems are solved in for example reminding each other of things that have to be done. Or telling each other what else should be done or is actually not allowed

Like this, orders are not just given top down. This allows the manager/director to concentrate on other things.

The organization organizes itself.
Since Prerana is working on so many different projects, which belong somehow together, it is very important to have weekly meetings in which all coordinators are present. Only like this, where problems are shared and tried to be solved, information flows.
Information has to flow that an organization as big as Prerana can be held as one organization. At least coordinators have to know what is going on in other projects. Like this, those problems are discussed, different and maybe new views of perspectives and ideas are coming up.

Despite the considerable size of Prerana, it hasn't lost its personal character. The director still seems to know about individual cases and shows its closeness and commitment. Also the fact that the director is reachable all the time gives the employees the feeling of support and assistance.

Now a few particularities should be mentioned that have been remarkable to me.

The cook in FR seems to be an important nodal point there. She apparently seems to know a lot, as if issues and problems are shared to her. Of course, she's present during the whole day, which allows her to witness every thing that is going on.

I spent one day in Naunihal. I was overwhelmed about the atmosphere over there. For me, they all, staff and children, seem to belong together - they appear to me like a big family. The children are behaving very well and the care that is given to them must contribute only to the best of their future.

Among the coordinators I can feel a special commitment to their work. That has, although, not only positive aspects. I observed that they are working very hardly, they take their job very serious, - are they still able to separate work enough from their private lives?

I witnessed them falling sick because they were working too hard and too much. This is a point to whom should be given attention to. How can they be protected from something like this to be happening?

Prerana and I.
First of all, I have to say that almost all of my expectations have been fulfilled.

My wish was to experience fieldwork and to get to know the way a professional NGO is working and organized. My wish was to finally get in touch with the people an organization is working for, to see and experience what the needs really are and therefore what can be and has to be done. I wanted to know how my knowledge in Business Administration could be involved in development work.

In Prerana, I got confirmed what I have been thinking all the time; for being active in an NGO in administrative work, it is absolutely necessary to know the field! Only this enables me to work for an organization.

What showed me my stay with another NGO in Rajasthan is, that without knowledge of the field at all, I can't be motivated and therefore not able to achieve one little thing.

Again, the time with Prerana confirmed my view of perspective of achieving a leading position, if it is in a company or an organization: You should really know about the most basic things - otherwise you won't be able to make appropriate decisions, nor are you able to be credible.

Another confirmation for myself; money is not my work incentive. While accompanying Prerana I experienced that work can be about lives that can be changed, perspectives that can be given to a single person, - the idea of making business appeared even more ridiculous and senseless to me than ever before!

Now I have a basic idea of what fieldwork really means. It is to deal with people; it is to work within an extreme lively and always changing, a dynamic environment. It can be very difficult to make plans. I mean, they can be made, but can they be achieved within the time that was set? Or, does it have to be changed as well because suddenly a crisis did happen? This can be quite frustrating, however makes work very interesting and challenging. No day is like the other, and hardly predictable.

Herewith, one rather delicate point has to be mentioned since it is something that made me thinking and questioning a lot.

In Rajasthan, in my NGO as well as in others, I got to know corruption. I got quite disillusioned in the sense that the motivation for an NGO can be pure business - money.
They hide their real motivation behind so-called social work. It turned out that poverty and the needs of people are actually nothing else than a good opportunity to make money! From that very moment where I realized that something with my NGO was not really clean, all my trust and with it all my motivation have gone.

Although I don't know much about the financial part of Prerana, to be honest, I really can't imagine the same is the case here.

Prerana got my full trust.
As it showed me the way Prerana communicates with its Swiss donators, full transparency is present. Transparency creates credibility and this again is the basis for cooperation between NGOs and its donators. Credibility is the very basis especially for international cooperation - for cooperation in the development sector. Corruption based activities can work in short term. I am, however, convinced, that for sustainability, credibility and therefore pure motives for actions is a prerequisite.

Prerana is credible in its intensions and actions. This is shown not only in its daily work and in the cooperation with other NGOs, but also in its international reputation it has already gained.

One fact I really did not like at all was the linguistic barrier that didn't allow me to fully be integrated and involved in Prerana. I would have loved to understand all the simple conversations, if it was among the kids or between the workers and the VOCSET.

It did not allow me to become active. Every little activity was not possible because of that.

However, I learned something out of it for my future: I won't become active in a country or a particular region in this world where I am not able to understand and speak the language of the people an organization is working for.

Communication is fundamental - how otherwise work can be done?

Last but not least, I want to thank Prerana so much for this great opportunity it offered me! I felt most welcomed.

Thank you so much for letting me see what you are doing, for letting me understand what you are working for.

I think it would be very difficult to measure all my experiences I had with Prerana. There are plenty of them - however not just experiences; several times I reached the edge of my strengths, - and I experienced totally new my own personality - reflecting what I have seen.

I would even say - this time changed my personality, in facing a reality I would never had imagined.

I am very sure that the topic of sexual exploitation and trafficking is not finished by leaving Prerana and India.

I actually want to explore more - and who knows, maybe I am going to write my thesis within this topic: The economical dimensions of sex trafficking?