Shonita Joshi writes:

 We held an Animal Welfare Week at the Google Hyderabad office from the 28^th. February – 4^th.  March.

 The aim of the event was not to make people go vegetarian or vegan, or to impose on them any strong beliefs that we might have. We just wanted people to know what is happening around us, know the power of their choices and mainly just start talking about animal related issues. In the process, we wished to make ourselves aware by conducting extensive research and going deeper into the topics.

My friends and I placed posters on every person’s desk, “Did you know?” facts behind every bathroom door and lunch hour movies and stalls promoting the event. We were expecting about 30-50 people for all the events, but we had over 200+ Googlers join in and it was the most amazing week

On Tuesday, we showed parts of the movie Earthlings and gave a short talk.

Wednesday:- We held a group discussion event and talked about the most controversial topics:

•  Animal sacrifices
• Problems of animal rehabilitation
• Extent to which animals can have rights
• Milk Myths
• Euthanasia in animals

We had a large participation and got a lot of people talking and discussing various aspects of the issues that we had clearly overlooked.

On Thursday, we held a photography event wherein people could submit their snaps with a short text in any one of the following categories:

1. Beauty in the beast (wildlife pictures)
2. Mamma, I’m coming home (rescue pictures)
3. Pet Pals (you and your pets)

The office is still voting on the winners – to be announced.

On the finale – Friday – was the big debate:- Is vegetarianism a sustainable and viable option for mankind?

It was absolutely fantastic! Not only were the non- veggies hyper about proving how right they were, raising some valid points, but the veggies were equally enthusiastic in proving them wrong.

For the event we created a website and formed a group called HEAL- Humans for Ethical Animal Living. We gave trophies for winners, gift vouchers, participation certificates and stickers for everyone.

I am so happy about this event. The whole week, we had people discussing at every table, talking about issues, stopping me in hallways and lifts and it was the perfect way to introduce this issue to people.

Note from QCA: Thank you, Shonita, for organising an excellent week, in which you must have raised the awareness of many to the plight of our fellow animals. We know you have more plans, so please keep us updated.