Sobhan Mukherjee, a boy from Calcutta started an initiative of giving pads to women for free of cost before the release of movie Padman starring Akshay Kumar and became the PADMAN OF BENGAL,he received the title from Akshay Kumar.
Padman starring Akshay Kumar is still creating social awareness about sanitary napkins, a 21-year-old student from Kolkata is playing the role of Real Life Padman.
Sobhan student of Asutosh College studying MSC in Geography started his journey of distributing sanitary napkins at pay and use toilets in South Kolkata since October 2017.
Sobhan’s first initiative was to create Transgender Washroom in Bengal and the concept of Sobhan has reached to various cities of India.
It is not possible to create a individual washroom for transgenders so I gave them a separate washroom in the normal pay and use toilets.Maximum washrooms of Delhi now has a vending machine.
Sobhan is also the founder-editor of a magazine called ‘Kabi Kalom’, came up with the idea one day when a colleague of him was coming to attend a meeting and during that time she was in need of a sanitary napkin but she failed to have one. Beside this Transmen also face various problem during this phase ,from there the idea came to my mind in the year 2017 .I always wanted to involve all genders in my initiatives,said Sobhan.
I realized that women and transmen find them in a great when they are travleling and had their periods.To prevent such certain situation I started TRIDHARA and BANDHAN ,said Sobhan
I started all the initiative by my own pocket money.I spent rs 1000 for buying the sanitary napkins and it took only 2 days the napkins went out of stock added Sobhan.
Tridhara is the project of giving a separate toilet to transgenders whereas Bandhan is the project of keeping Vending machines to each of the toilets.
Soham said” At present there are total 70 vending machines in Bengal and in future I am trying to increase the numbers”.
My mother and father kept on supporting me and I never believe in giving sanitary napkins as after 1 or 2 days it will become impossible for me to give them so I prefer spreading the knowledge of Menstual cycle by demonstrations in various colleges and schools .Sometime I have to villages also,added Mukherjee.
Initially, the pads available were free of cost, later to stop the misuse, Sobhan decided to charge a nominal fee of rupess 2 and he gave the responsibility to the guards of Pay and Use toilets.
He received the title PADMAN OF BENGAL from none other than Akshay Kumar last year on this date AND Akshay came to know about Sobhan from social media.
Sobhan posted a photo with his mother where both of them were busy packing Sanitary Napkins that had been shared by more than 80,000 people over facebook.
Righ now I organising a social awareness programme today on the eve of World Menstural Hygeine Day where he would be travelling with the first Ola driver of Bengal Rupa Choudhury and will be spreading social awareness on Sanitary napkins .
‘ The person whom we called Transmen ,they used to be female by gender and men by their believes.Every transmen either have to change hormone or have to go through the normal phase but still after changing hormones they suffer from untimely periods ‘ said Sobhan
.Womens and Transmen are still not comfortable in discussing their problems they face. Awareness cant be spread by only posting on social media and not by giving free advice,all have to join hands and have to work together,Mukherjee added.
Sobhan is working on a new project based on the victims of Aila, Cyclone Aila, which had raged through south Bengal on 25 May 2009, blew at 120 kmph, killing 45 people in the state and affecting nearly 2-lakh people. The seven districts for whom the fresh alert has been sounded are Kolkata, Howrah, Hooghly, North 24-Parganas, South 24-Parganas, East Midnapore, and West Midnapore.
As many parts of Bengal was under water for a long time , women used to wash themselves in the unhygienic water of local ponds and lake and from there they suffered from Ulcer and other dieseases.I am trying to cure themselves and want to work for their betterment in future also.
Government of West Bengal didn’t help me in my journey, all MP’s, Councillors know me but no one ever gave their hands .I even tried to talk with the CM of Bengal but she was not prepare to help me at all,said Sobhan.
There are many people who are involved in this initiative around the globe but they started doing this after the shooting of PADMAN but Sobhan started his journey before the shooting of PADMAN.Sobhan received National Award from NATIONAL FOUNDATION FOR INDIA and ANANYA SAMMAN.