Suhani Jalota meets the Queen in 2018
A young campaigner shortlisted for a prestigious award that honours those working to end extreme poverty has credited the invaluable support of both the Queen and the Duchess of Sussex for elevating her work to a global stage.
Suhani Jalota, 26, founded the Myna Mahila Foundation, which aims to provide affordable sanitary hygiene for women, while breaking the social taboos surrounding menstruation.
The charity has been enthusiastically supported by the Duchess of Sussex, who flew to India to meet the girls it helps in January 2017, some six months after meeting Prince Harry, writing passionately about its work for Time magazine.
She was so impressed by its work that she became an advocate for the charity, inviting Miss Jalota to her wedding the following year and including the foundation on her wedding gift list for donations.
Meghan Markle visiting the Myna Mahila Foundation at the Natwar Parekh Compound in Mumbai in 2017
Credit: Suhani Jalota
Miss Jalota has also been championed by David Beckham, who met her in 2018, and this weekend congratulated the “inspiring” campaigner, saying it was “great” to hear she was one of three finalists shortlisted for a Global Citizen’s Youth Leadership Award.
The winner will be awarded $250,000 to support their organisation.
Miss Jalota acknowledged that the much of subject matter was “complicated and non-glamourous,” making her all the more grateful for the Duchess’s passionate support.
The pair met by chance in 2016 at a Glamour magazine awards luncheon in April 2016, three months before she met Prince Harry.
The then-Miss Markle, an actress in legal drama Suits, was fascinated to hear about Miss Jalota’s work and a few months later, emailed her to say she would love to visit her and the women at Myna in the slum.
“She gave so much energy, confidence and credibility,” she told the Telegraph.
“She’d done her research, she said let’s focus on action. It changed their lives, my life, the organisation’s trajectory.”
Then, in 2017, Miss Jalota was named a Queen’s Young Leader, one of many community stars from around the Commonwealth chosen to meet the Queen at Buckingham Palace as part of the monarch’s legacy project.
Employees at the Myna Mahila Foundation with Suhani Jalota
Credit: INDRANIL MUKHERJEE/AFP
The Queen’s Young Leaders Programme ran for four years, from 2014 to 2018. When it closed in 2018, the network of 240 campaigners became part of The Queen’s Commonwealth Trust, which was launched the same year.
Miss Jalota said: The Queen Young Leaders programme, the Queen’s Commonwealth Trust and the Duchess of Sussex have been instrumental in amplifying our impact.
“People from all over the world learnt about us and wanted to collaborate or support us. In India, our credibility increased multifold as well.
“Since Myna Mahila is a small organisation, support from the royal family and the Queens Commonwealth Trust has increased our growth much faster.”
Suhani Jalota, centre, with Meghan Markle, and former Glamour editor-in-chief, Cindi Leiveon, when they first met in 2016
Credit: Suhani Jalota
Miss Jalota said that being shortlisted for the Global Citizen’s Youth Leadership Award was a “dream come true” and recognition that could propel the foundation to its next stage.
The prize money would help reach women and girls on the ground who they have struggled to access, partly through the development of an app to provide education and information, and also through new centres they plan to open in the slums.
The other two finalists are Christelle Kwizera, founder of Water Access Rwanda and Ryan Gersava, who founded Virtualahan, which uses technology to breaks down employment barriers for those with disabilities.
The winner will be announced at a virtual ceremony hosted by John Legend on December 19.
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