Call for proposals: Protecting the Rights of Religious Minorities on Preventing or Challenging Rights Violations/Discriminations

Follow us @ngobox

Call for proposals: Protecting the Rights of Religious Minorities in South/Southeast Asia, Local & National Pilot projects on Preventing or challenging rights violations/discriminations

About the Organization:

Minority Rights Group International campaigns worldwide with around 150 partners in over 50 countries to ensure that disadvantaged minorities and indigenous peoples, often the poorest of the poor, can make their voices heard. Through training and education, legal cases, publications and the media they support minority and indigenous people as they strive to maintain their rights – to the land they live on, the languages they speak, to equal opportunities in education and employment, and to full participation in public life.

Objective:

Minority Rights Group is seeking proposals for local projects that work toward supporting the rights of religious minorities and/or promoting and protecting the right to freedom of religion and belief in the following countries: Nepal, Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Indonesia, Thailand.  Proposals must seek to prevent or challenge freedom of religion and belief rights violations or discrimination against religious minorities.

Projects must pilot innovative approaches at the local and national level. Potential areas of approach can include:

• Advocacy: Lobbying authorities, conducting research to inform reporting, producing evidence/reports for advocacy.
• Capacity building: Trainings and workshops to develop the ability of communities to organise and protect their human rights as religious minorities.
• Government accountability: Community-local authority problem solving workshops and dialogues, monitoring service delivery to all, legal aid initiatives.
• Conflict management: Monitoring conflict and community tension, actions relating to identified drivers of conflict, dialogue with local authorities, research into conflict drivers and ways to reduce impact.
• Peace-building: Intercommunity projects; arts, education or sports projects; intercommunity dialogues, problem-solving initiatives.
• Law: Trainings including paralegal and rights training, legal support initiatives.
• Covid-19 Impact research: Monitoring and documentation of government & non-state actors’ response to Covid-19 and its impact on religious minorities and advocacy for how minority rights can be better protected.

Criteria for Applicants:

• Be a non-governmental or community-based organisation working on related issues.
• Have an established track record of similar work in one or more of the project countries.
• Have an organisational bank account.
• Be committed to peaceful resolution of conflict and must not be engaged in or support in any way violent or separatist activities
• Be committed to involving all ethnic and/or religious communities in your broader activities.

Grant:

• Projects can be a maximum of 5,000 Euros.
• Projects must be implemented between March and August 2021. The project duration is maximum 6 months.

Selection Criteria:

• Innovative projects that pilot new approaches to promoting and protection religious minority rights.
• Clear project objectives with concrete outcomes & outputs.
• Clearly justified budget that represents value for money.
• Clearly identified target beneficiaries and plan to reach those beneficiaries and advocacy targets effectively.
• Projects that address gender issues, pay attention to multiple forms of discrimination, and include vulnerable groups in project implementation and/or organisational structure.
• Projects that encourage effective collaboration with other CSOs.

Please send the completed application documents (application form and budget) to forbgrants@mrgmail.org by 15 January 2021.

For more information please check the Link