Hila was born on Kibbutz Sasa in the Galilee region of Israel. Hila is a certified attorney, with an LL.B. in Law and Government Studies, and has been practicing law since 2013. 

 

Hila conducted her 4-month internship with a grassroots NGO called Apne Aap Women’s Collective (AAWC) located in Mumbai's red-light district, which supports women in prostitution and their children, in order to prevent “second-generation trafficking” into the sex industry. There, she assisted the organization with its communication and fundraising efforts and created and led a series of life-skills workshops for its beneficiary girls.

Mumbai’s district of Kamathipura is India’s second-largest red-light district, where most women live in dire conditions. Apne Aap Women’s Collective seeks to provide the tools and resources for empowering trafficked brothel-based prostitutes, their daughters, and other marginalized children, to enable them to break the cycle of intergenerational prostitution.

Udaan, the Hindi word for “flight," is the name of their girls' empowerment program, in which girls in the red-light area are empowered to assert their rights and develop academic and professional skills, which will allow them to pursue aspirational professions and gain genuine socio-economic mobility, ultimately enabling them to bring their mothers out of prostitution as well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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