Having begun on the International Day for Elimination of Violence Against Women (November 25), the community of Arre Voice has begun to take strides towards a world which is supportive & encouraging of women’s voices. The app, which is currently invite-based, is live on Android and IOS in India.
The app currently has voicepods in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Hindi and English and provides for raw, honest and creative expressions (using the in-app studio). While relationships, storytelling, K-pop, K-Drama, music, mental wellness & spirituality are currently popular on the app, this partnership aims to encourage women to speak out about cases of domestic violence – which could range from emotional to physical to even financial abuse – which has been on the rise, especially during and after the pandemic.
Akshara Centre has championed many initiatives at the state and national level to increase safety for women through multiple safety drives, institutional partnerships and public awareness campaigns, including the noteworthy Akshara Survey of Sexual Harassment in Mumbai. and initiative against domestic violence at www.standupagainstviolence.org.
As per the report on Gender-related killings of women and girls by the UNODC, more than 5 women or girls are killed every hour by someone in their own family. UN Women statistics show one in every three women have violence in their lifetime. However, the instances of unreported incidents are multiple times higher.
Arre Voice is appearance-agnostic and allows for a comforting space for sensitive conversations that can be published in public (open to all on the app) or private (open to user selected groups) modes. While the voicepods currently work within a recorded environment, a live product is in the advanced stages of development and will be launched early next year.
To ensure that awareness is not detached from action, a tech-enabled intervention is planned to allow women to access helplines and support groups through the app.
Talking about the partnership, Niyati Merchant, Co-founder and COO, Arre Voice, said, “As a women-first audio social platform, we wish to provide women part of the growing Arre Voice community, access to content and tools aimed at creating a safe social space. This is an ever evolving endeavour for us, based on real-time community feedback and enabled through tech-led interventions. Akshara Centre has been actively working towards educating young men and women towards creating a society that allows for a dignified, violence-free life for women. Through this partnership, we hope to extend these initiatives to our users.”
Dr. Nandita Shah, Co-founder, Akshara Centre said, “We are so proud to be associated with Arre Voice. At Akshara Centre we are trying to build an “in person” platform for young women to not only share issues and problems but also share strategies to combat difficulties as a woman and for us, this partnership with Arre Voice is an extension of the same online i.e., giving a voice, building bonds and creating networks. We are sure that the online platform will scale the conversation exponentially.”
The conversation has already begun on Arre Voicewhich is now live with Akshara Centre’s handle (@akshara_centre).
Any woman and person who identifies as a woman has a chance to access the app currently. The platform will soon be opening to other genders but the Instagram community is live for all @arre_voice.
About Arre Voice
Arre Voice is a short-form, women-first audio social app. The app has a rapidly growing community across relationships, storytelling, K-pop, K-Drama, music, mental wellness, spirituality in multiple languages. These will soon be available in more Indian languages & dialects and content genres followed by a global rollout.
Be a part of the Arre Voice Community by requesting an invite here and invite those who might need the support to voice out against the violence of any kind.
Follow us to tune into the diverse and unfiltered expressions of women, via their voice.
About Arre
Arre is one of India’s leading digital content and media-tech brands that is home to Arre Studio, which produces and publishes original content with professional creators across genres, languages, formats, & platforms and Arre Voice, a short-form, women-first audio social app aimed at building a new generation of creators. Through Arre Voice and Arre Studio, Arre is building a social content ecosystem that straddles amateur and professional creators.
Arre Studio’s content ranges from essays to short format videos to full scale web series, podcasts, short films & documentaries enjoyed by more than 300 million people across the world. The content is distributed through its social platforms and in collaboration with multiple partner platforms including Audio and Video OTT platforms like Amazon Prime Video, MX Player, Audible, Disney+Hotstar, JioSaavn, LionsgatePlay etc. The Arre Studio slate includes shows such as A.I.SHA, Official Chukyagiri, Official CEOgiri, 1962: The War in the Hills, Transistor, Sorry Bhaisaab and most recently Murder in Agonda on MiniTV.
About Akshara Centre
Akshara Centre for twenty-five years, has been working to make gender-based violence and discrimination unacceptable. We believe that men also need to be part of this process of change. We work individually to change the hearts and minds of young women and young men, we work towards a larger gender narrative change by undertaking education, trainings, and campaigns and importantly we work with government to improve their responsiveness to violence against women, to improve services and policies as well as bring gender inclusion in the governments planning processes. we have been associated with UNWomen, Committee for status of women, UNHabitat and world social forum.
