People / Sanya Rajpal
Unsung Hero: Sanya Rajpal
At just 20-years-old, Bristol University student Sanya Rajpal is a veteran political activist.
She’s been actively involved in politics for young people in Bristol for a number of years, through the city’s Youth Council and the Youth Parliament. Her campaigning zeal comes directly from what she hears in schools and colleges across the city: “Whenever I spoke to them the issue that I came across was the lack of education in practical areas of life.”
Her film Stop and Search Solutions, made in collaboration with young people’s charity Fixers, was born out of a realisation that there is a lack of education in practical areas: “I felt that young people weren’t really taught about their legal rights or their financial rights or how being empowered can incite social change.
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“I really wanted to make something which would be a lasting resource for young people to use and would allow people to find out their rights, if they feel they are being stopped by the police a lot or if they have friends who are.”
Sanya has worked closely with the police to produce the film: “The police have all the information, knowledge and power and the young person has none – that leads to a lot of negative feelings towards the police.
“Young people can sometimes find it uncomfortable being in a position where their space is being infringed upon when they have no way of controlling it,” says Sanya.
“They don’t know what they can and can’t say or what they should be hearing. That’s due to a lack of education.”
“I’m lucky I have never been stopped and searched myself so it is not something that has come out of a personal struggle but I spoke to young people and that is what they are facing.
“The police were apprehensive at first, but once they found out that my intentions were to educate young people that transformed. They realise there is a problem, everyone realises there is an issue, everyone wants to do something about it but nobody really knows how to go about it because there is no communication and that is what I wanted to change this lack of communication.”
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