As a key actor entrusted to create an enabling environment for the HIV programme by the AVAHAN Consortium, supported by Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) CFAR harnessed the domain of news media and used it as a catalyst to
(a) strengthen the programme response and
(b) leverage the programme further to raise the structural issues faced by ‘at high risk’ communities and make their concerns inclusive to any process of social development.
The intervention in both phases (2005-2009 and then till 2012) was led by communities, i.e., people living with HIV, female sex workers, transgender persons and sexual minority groups who demanded qualitative and continued HIV prevention services and strove to be integral to the process of delivery of services and implementation of the HIV programme.