Software giant Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has showered praises on the city-based team Avahan after his recent visit to India earlier this year.
Tweeting in his blog, the gatesnotes, he stated, “One of the reasons for my recent trip to India was to congratulate the team of Avahan on their fantastic work and the transition to management by the government of India-this is an incredible achievement. The Indian government will be scaling the programme and supporting it over a long term.”
Referring to his recent visit to the city, Bill Gates termed the support drop-in-centres for sex workers as one of the success stories, in the country’s effort to reduce the spread of HIV.
Lauding their efforts, he also stated that the centre, which was run by a local community, had a microfinance bank for about 19,000 sex workers.
“The programme is targeted at millions of people, most at-risk for contracting and spreading the virus,” he wrote in his blog, and added that the foundation helped Avahan get off the ground and has supported it for the last 10 years. Its transition to government management is a great example of what collaborating with government can achieve,” Bill Gates said.
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