BREADS leads Action/2015 India Campaign in Karnataka

Action/2015 is a global mass mobilization campaign to pressurize the national governments to represent our demands from marginalized communities and our development needs at the UN General Assembly to be held in September this year. It is a global movement to address Insecurity, Inequality and Injustice in the Post-2015 Development Agenda.

Popularly known as the Millennium Development Goals, eight international development goals were established to be achieved by 2015 by the United Nations and the 189 member countries in the year 2000. With the end of 2015, a new set of goals known as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are being drafted. The UN Report of MDG review in India shows that there was some progress made toward achieving the targets, but we have failed to address the challenges of multi-dimensional poverty in the country, as highlighted in the Civil Society Response to the MDG Review conducted by the Indian government of which BREADS was also part of it.

2015 is a critical year for the people and the planet. Three crucial UN summits – the UN General Assembly to be held in September and at the UN conferences to be held on Financing for Development in July and on Climate Change in December this year will result in new global goals – a framework to end all forms of poverty, discrimination, and inequality and a crucial step towards a safer planet. These commitments taken together should lay the foundation for addressing the world’s most pressing challenges.

It is time for civil society experts and organizations to re-unite. Currently nearly 1600 organizations/movements/networks from across 119 countries have joined the Action/2015movement calling on the world leaders and our leaders to take ambitious decisions for our future in 2015.

Action/2015 India Campaign

From India Wada Na TodoAbhiyan (WNTA), a national coalition of organizations to hold the government accountable for its promises to end poverty, social exclusion and discrimination, has been leading the process of developing consensus from civil society and communities around their aspirations from the new development agenda. BREADS Bangalore is a partner organization of WNTA representing the state of Karnataka.

May Mobilization

The campaign is now globally gearing up for its next Big Mobilization moment – May 2015. We believe that May is a prime opportunity to unite our voice, rise up boldly and call for a better future for all. To get ambitious outcomes requires strong leadership from key global decision makers. But we won’t see ambitious leadership without public mobilization on an unprecedented scale. To influence Indian Government to represent grass root voices and to introduce real development challenges from India at these summits, we must:

1. Send a powerful message to political leaders that citizens are watching them and expect transformative change in September at a critical juncture during the negotiations, and;
2. Raise greater awareness of the post-2015 process amongst citizens, creating a wave of ongoing activity over the following 3 months leading to the September summit and promote processes of citizen monitoring and government accountability of the goals in the years that will follow.
3.  Build momentum for continued action towards December around climate justice, sustainable people and planet focused development and the urgency of a concrete agreement during the COP 21.

BREADS is mobilizing 25000 children across the state of Karnataka through its partner Don Bosco Projects to engage in a post card campaign to write to the Prime Minister of Indiato include their demands in the SDGs.