TAI had a very different agenda in focusing on the communities which included WIP (Women in Prostitution) and Transgenders.

The agency had its task cut out and the responsibility of having had to handle a very new, difficult and different type of HIV communication was a challenge by itself.

TAI had initiated Natpukoodam, a social platform for the communities involved which facilitated experience sharing, information and support for various health, legal and economic issues. Now, an effective tool had to be created to bring the members of the targeted community to this social platform.

Different people. Different living styles.Different languages.

The first insight was that the regular approaches wouldn’t work here.

Strategies were worked out in reaching across messages in their own dailects, relevant to their work & living style.

We gave them the right tips on safety and health.

Conveyed the available support systems to safeguard their physical and mental health.

Adopting various types of innovative communication tools was the highlight of this entire exercise.

They showed interest and good response at the end of it all.

From a paltry 40, we were able to rope in about 60,000 transgenders into the TAI awareness stream through “Swarnamukhi”.

This experience helped tackle even more complex issues in communicating to many more such fringe communities.

Much of these models were adapted to the respective regions across the nation and in a few countries in Africa and Asia.