A sub-regional meeting on Gender Responsive Quality Public Services (GRQPS) was held on November 2 and 3, in which representatives from 33 affiliates from five countries (namely Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri lanka) along with PSI staff from headquarters and South Asia sub-region participated. In the meeting, the importance of being Gender Responsive—understanding the unique needs of males and females, valuing their perspectives, respecting their experiences, differences and empowering women in public services—was imparted. Within the issue of violence against women (VAW), Sri Lanka and Bangladesh shared that there is a favourable environment to accelerate the process of ratifying ILO Convention 190.  

An evaluation meeting was also held on November 4 and 5 in which the roadmap for the next three years was discussed to carry forward the priority areas of GRPQS, VAW and issues of privatisation in their respective countries.

Affiliates in Sri lanka and Nepal also organised three national level workshops on VAW and C190 using PSI’s ‘Gender Safe Union’ module to help entrench appropriate Gender responsive grievance redressal mechanisms to make their unions free from gender-based violence (GBV). A total of 150 union members benefitted by the workshops organised by the affiliates.