Aastha Dang

Aastha Dang
Designation: Senior Evaluation Specialist, 3ie
Aastha supports 3ie’s women empowerment and livelihood programs, including Swashakt Evidence Program and Sanitation Livelihood Project. Her work focuses on conducting gender-responsive evaluations by examining critical questions on changes in women’s empowerment outcomes and gender relationships.
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Blogs by author

How sanitation collectives in India help the marginalized earn livelihood and respect

Aastha Dang, Indira Patil 18 November 2022 blog  
Deepa (name changed), a 36-year-old transgender woman, had to flee her home in southern India when she was 18. She came to Delhi and subsequently underwent sex reassignment surgery. Recalling her days in the capital, she says, “I used to beg in trains and at traffic signal junctions for survival. During marriages or other celebrations, I would go to people’s houses demanding money”. She further adds, “Society treats us with disdain because of who we are and what we do. However, lack of viable job opportunities forces us to resort to these methods of earning a living”.

Sanitation-linked livelihoods project: Six key insights from a learning study

Indira Patil, Aastha Dang 15 September 2022 blog  
In this blog, we discuss the key findings emerging from our study—supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and conducted in partnership with the Technical Support Units (TSUs) of the states.

A framework for examining women’s economic empowerment in collective enterprises

Bidisha Barooah, Shreya Banerjee, Aastha Dang, Krishna Kejriwal, Ridhi Aggarwal 30 August 2022 blog  
Swashakt, launched with the support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in 2020, has now reached more than 6900 women across 480 villages in 10 Indian states who have become a part of farm or non-farm women’s collective enterprises. In this blog, we discuss how we define and measure women’s economic empowerment in the context of our program.