One Billion Rising
One Billion Rising
One Billion Rising South Asia is a campaign that celebrates love and calls for an end to violence against women and girls. Each year, we RISE across the region through creative and collective events that call for justice and equality.
Violence against women and girls is the biggest war occurring in the world today. Physical and sexual violence affects one in three women and girls, and many more experience psychological and economic abuse.
With the world’s population pegged at 7 billion people and growing, it has been calculated that more than one billion women and girls undergo torture, rape, and other forms of abuse at the hands of intimate partners, family members, neighbors, governments, and sometimes complete strangers.
One Billion Rising (OBR) is the world’s largest mass mobilization to end violence against women and girls. The OBR campaign was launched on Valentine’s Day (February 14) 2013. It was a call to action, asking people across the globe to bring art and activism together and RISE to end violence through dance, music, theatre, and other creative events. In response, millions of people rose in 207 countries across the globe. Since then, Risings have taken place every year across the world.
Since its launch in 2013, events and mobilizations have taken place in each country in South Asia: namely, Afghanistan, Bhutan, Bangladesh, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. Myanmar and Vietnam have also been an active part of the One Billion Rising network.