UNAIDS Poster Competition for World AIDS Day

We at UNAIDS are back with this exciting effort at mainstreaming the issues of sexual minorities in our country. We now announce the highly popular poster competition for World AIDS Day (WAD) this year.

This is what you can do if you are a MSM, transgender or lesbian/bisexual women's group of any sexual orientation (except heterosexual) or any gender identity. This year you will notice that we are bringing in the lesbian/bisexual women into the ambit of this poster competition in an effort to visibilising their issues in mainstream society. Learning from our experiences last year, we have thought of a totally different concept for a competition from women's groups. So please read on

How you go about winning this competition

This year's theme is "Access To Treatment for All" or simply "Universal Access"

You get together as a group, sit down and thrash out what are your main issues in dealing with everyday life as you live it. Then, as a group, you make a poster based on those ideas. Try to make the poster as polished and ready-to-go as you can; we might send it to Geneva for international audiences.

You then take it to a college, preferably a school or college teaching fine arts like painting, crafts or design. You talk to the Principal of the Institution and show this announcement to him/her and ask him/her to allot you a particular senior class to talk to about your issues. Get a letter from the Principal that he/she has heard you out and agrees or disagrees with what you had to say regarding your issues..

Use your poster as an educational tool discussing your issues with the class. The class then gets to do a poster based on your discussion and their talents at drawings/ painting. It also must also give you a letter signed by a class-representativ e saying they heard you out and that their poster explains how much they understood and appreciated or otherwise did not appreciate your issues.

Put both posters into a poster-holder/ tube and send it to the address given below to reach us before November 1st, 2008. The first three poster-pairs will win prizes of Rs. 20,000, Rs. 15,000 and Rs. 10,000 respectively. There will be another fourth prize for the "best effort" poster-pair. All selected and short-listed poster-pairs will be displayed at an exhibition UNAIDS arranges every year in Delhi and the prize winners will get trophies that are really worth exhibiting in your offices. If we have the money we will get you to Delhi to accept the award from our UN Country Coordinator (UCC)

Last year, the posters were so well appreciated that somebody stole all the prize winning posters from the Alliance Franscaise outdoor gallery despite tight security. That's how much they were appreciated. Rest assured they will surface after a decade and be sold for millions of rupees….

So get going and try your hand at this important poster competition. And remember the last date – November 5th. 2009.

So Queer Folk, don't just march, make a poster/click a photo you women, and show them what material you are made of…..There are prizes to be won and fame and name to be grabbed too.

Who qualifies to enter this competition?
:
• You must be a group based in India and a majority of your group should be Indian citizens.
• You must be a MSM, transgender (hijra) or lesbian/bisexual women's CBO, self-help group or even an e-list (the world then gets to know about your amazing e-list and the support it gives to sexual minorities).
• You must have a letter from the Principal of the College/Institute which you went to with your poster saying the issue was discussed with him/her (for MSM/TG. Women just send us a photograph that is a minimum 12 inches by 8inches)
• You must have a letter from the class representative to the effect that you did your best in explaining the issue to them. (not needed for women)
• You as a group should send us a letter about yourself and what you are doing (support system for your members, counseling, health services, just gup-chup, whatever)
• A letter from any person in your area – a Nagar Sevak, a Municipal Corporator, an MLA, MP or even a Minister (!!) that you approached for help sometime about the problems you face.(not essential but would be nice for future advocacy).

For all women's Groups this is made simpler. A women's group can decide what they wish to do and send in photographs to illustrate the issue of "Universal Access" and they wish to highlight problems and issues of women accessing simple treatment. Eg: Even walking miles to get access to drinking water. However, every member of that group must give inputs and a joint caption must be given that mirrors the actual thought process that went into that caption.

Posterws and Photographs must reach the UNAIDS office by November 15th. 2009

The posters/photographs will be judged by a three-member panel that includes one MSM/TG/Lesbian or Bisexual rep, one art aficionado and one art collector.

No employee or consultant of any UN agency shall sit on the panel

The decisions of this panel shall be final. The final authority of the competition will be the UCC, India.

Address to courier the posters/photographs

Ashok Row Kavi
Program Officer
Sexual Minorities
UNAIDS
A2/35 Safdarjung Enclave
New Delhi 110,029