enuka was in her first year of college when she got into a relationship.
Afraid that her parents would disapprove, she hid her relationship from them. To her friends, they were the perfect couple — at least her posts on social media led them to believe so.
But things were far from perfect for Renuka, who was actually in an abusive relationship.
“He was overly possessive and asked me for my passwords. He kept a tap on my phone and made me bunk college to go out on dates. I finally realised what was happening when he hit me in a fit of rage,” said Renuka.
For many women like Renuka, speaking about such abuse becomes a problem as the family is unaware about the relationship.
When it comes to friends, the need to keep up social appearances beats the idea of asking for help.
To use technology to offer help, three collaborators came together to start Snap Counsellors — a platform that was launched on International Women’s Day earlier this month.
It uses the popular mobile application Snapchat to open discreet and relevant channels of conversation.
Snap Counsellors is a collaboration between Love Doctor, a youth counselling service in Delhi; Chayn India, a tech-led women’s empowerment group; and Rajshekar Patil, an advertising professional who came up with the idea.
According to Mr. Patil, Snapchat was the ideal platform because chats are automatically deleted after 10 seconds, ensuring that the conversations are confidential. To provide expert help, he roped in Love Doctor and Chayn.
Avani Parekh of Love Doctor says that the platform was started taking into consideration the fact that a lot of violence in relationships is ‘normalised’ and considered ‘true love’. Issues like possessiveness, she says, are actually major red flags.
According to Ms. Parekh, her counsellors provide a compassionate, friendly outlet for people with questions.
“We serve as the best friend that asks you the tough questions. We won’t tell anyone what to do, but if a relationship sounds like it is abusive, based on the criteria provided by the guide by Chayn India, we don’t hesitate to say that ‘it sounds like you are in an abusive relationship’,” says Avani. Most clients, she adds, just want to talk and share their story.
Nida Sheriff of Chayn says the idea was to use technology to reach women. Ms. Sheriff said the organisation believes technology can empower women in several ways: either by placing it in their hands, or by using it to create resources that they, or organisations that help them, can use.
“More Indians are online than ever before, and this includes women and young people who are victims of domestic violence. Leveraging technology to empower women and victims of abuse is the most obvious solution at the moment,” she added.
Snapchat, say the founders, is the perfect place to get help as it offers privacy, besides offering answers in real time and using a social platform to deal with serious issues.
Snap Counsellors is a collaboration between Love Doctor, Chayn India, and Rajshekar Patil, an advertising professional and brains behind the idea
