‘Onward Together’: A photo exhibition that highlights Covid-19 pandemic’s ‘disparities and prejudice’

The Covid-19 pandemic has been challenging for all of humanity, but for some people, its impact was more devastating. It is no secret that marginalised communities in India and across the world bore the brunt of the pandemic — from it rendering them homeless, to them losing their jobs, and not having access to healthcare and hygiene, among other such setbacks.
Keeping this in mind, COVIDActionCollab — a collective of NGOs and other partners working together to address the devastating impact of the pandemic — has organised a social impact photo exhibition in Delhi — titled ‘Onward Together‘ — that features stories from communities affected the pandemic.

According to a press release, the exhibition focuses on “resilient stories” of “transgender individuals, sex workers, migrant labourers, construction workers, and urban-poor among others”.
A panel on display at the ongoing exhibition. (PR handout)
For instance, the story of anganwadi workers of Odisha has been covered in the exhibition, particularly that of one Sabita, who has been working for the last 12 years in the village of Naruda in Puri drict. When Covid disrupted her flow of work, Sabita took matters into her own hands. She was quoted as saying, “For the longest time, we did not know how to pick up education, especially for the smallest kids as online classes were not an option. We started using WhatsApp and disseminated all the information, lesson plans, and action songs regularly through it.”

When Covid disrupted her flow of work, Sabita took matters into her own hands. (PR handout)
She also had to address the health emergency caused the pandemic even though its impact was not felt so much. The vaccination process, however, had to still be implemented. Door-to-door awareness campaigns were initiated, along with information on hand hygiene, immunization, etc., with COVIDActionCollab’s on-ground partner in Odisha, Gopubandh Seva Parisad (GSP) and its volunteers.
Sabita said she now has to “double the amount of time and effort” in order to match the “learning levels that exed before Covid-19”.

Then, there is the story of Priya Babu, a writer and activ from the trans community, whose Madurai Trans Kitchen has been empowering members of the community. It is a first-of-its-kind restaurant in the region — an initiative supported Swasti Health Catalyst, where Babu works as a regional programme manager. The restaurant is run members of the transgender community which provides them financial independence and freedom.
Priya Babu (PR handout)
While Rukhsar Kureshi has been single-handedly managing a tailoring training centre at Jhabua in Madhya Pradesh, for women to be self-sufficient and independent, teachers and wellness facilitators from Jharkhand’s Ramgarh Anita, Isha, Indra, Usha, Nirmala, and Bharati — each from underprivileged communities — overcame their anxieties to educate themselves about Covid-19 vaccines in order to spread awareness.
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Rukhsar Kureshi (PR handout)
Photographers Satish VM and Shiv Kumar have conceptualised the exhibition, with Shiv working with the communities for almost three decades now.
Teachers of Ramgarh (PR handout)
“In the past 2.5 years, COVIDActionCollab has provided over 2.5 billion service instances and connected with close to 1.5 crore people. These might seem like mere numbers, but what we truly did was connect with individuals — real people with real stories we believed should be shared and celebrated. These communities and their tenacity were on display in the photo exhibition that we put together, giving the public a favourable impression of how communities, the government, media, and the commercial sector can collaborate to improve the lives of such individuals,” Shiv told this outlet.
A panel on display at the ongoing exhibition. (PR handout)
Satish VM added that the pandemic was a “tipping point for India’s weaker sections” and that their “pre-exing disadvantages had been impacted the lockdown, highlighting disparities and prejudice”.
“The photo exhibition was a key to self-realisation, showing us how we can collectively handle a crisis intervening, influencing and collaborating to help such people and make their lives a lot easier. The pictures shed light on the dark side of the pandemic showing the sufferings of these people. I thoroughly cherish the process of speaking to the people and learning from them about their hardships and struggles, and in some sense, it felt like I was a part of their journey,” he shared with .
‘Onward Together’ is currently going on at the India Habitat Centre; it opened on September 1 and will conclude on September 3.
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