Social activist Urmila Chanam has been awarded Voices of Our Future Award by World Pulse, a social networking platform connecting women from 190 countries across the world with a vision to amplify women’s voices to speed up change and improve the lives of millions around the world. Chanam from Manipur was among three from across the world who received the award. The other two recipients are Sadaf Kashif from Pakistan and Carolyn Seaman from Nigeria.

The three received the award for utilizing technology to achieve high impact on community issues of menstrual hygiene, child marriage and girls empowerment. The award includes a cash prize of $1500 USD, full promotions on WorldPulse.com and via official World Pulse marketing and media channels to bring greater visibility to the issues these leaders have championed for. The three winners were selected following a stringent procedure based on their vision, their ability to map resources, implementation, use of technology and extent of outreach.

Chanam positioned menstrual hygiene and the taboos and myths around periods as the biggest barrier to woman’s health in this global platform. She chose to focus on raising awareness and resources for “Breaking the Silence,” a campaign that has already won her awards like the UNFPA National Laadli Award in 2015 for the Best Social Media Campaign in India.