LESSON 1
ANALYSING STRUCTURES OF PATRIARCHY
The word patriarchy refers to any form of social power given disproportionately to men.
The word patriarchy literally means the rule of the Male or Father. The structure of the
patriarchy is always considered the power status of male, authority, control of the male and
oppression, domination of the man, suppression, humiliation, sub-ordination and subjugation of
the women.
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Some feminist employ patriarchy only in this specific and limited sense, to describe the
structure of the family and the dominance of the father within preferring to use broader terms
such as ‘male supremacy’ or ‘male dominance’ to describe gender relations in society at large.
However feminists believe that the dominance of the father within the family symbolizes male
supremacy in all other institutions.
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No woman is born and not all women became feminist, but some women and men do.
How one becomes a feminist varies with each individual, but the impetus for developing a
feminist consciousness often arises when a person experiences a contradiction between who that
person thinks she or he and what society wants her or him to be. It may arise says it offers to an
individual and what that individual actually experiences. In advanced (post) industrial societies,
women are typically told that, under the law, they have equal opportunities (in the liberal
democratic sense) to compete for political and economic power. However, in fact, indirect or
structural barriers to full political and economic participation reduce most women’s rights and
choices. In more-traditional societies, particularly those that experienced some kind of colonial
or neo colonial rule, colonially imposed laws and certain cultural and religious traditions
combine to deny equal opportunities to women, even under the law. The gendered division of
power in both cases circumscribes women’s choice to be and do things deemed outside of their
assigned gender roles.
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Women are creatures of nature, men are creatures of culture, their world is synthetic or
man-made, a product of human ingenuity rather than natural creativity. Patriarchy in this view,
establishes the supremacy of culture over nature, the later being or risen above. Ecological
destruction and gender inequality are therefore part of the same process in which ‘cultured’ men
rule over ‘natural’ women.
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Resolution of the 1971 Conference, ‘Revolution: From the Doll’s House to the White House: Report of the Fifth
Annual Conference of the National Organization for Women (NOW) Los Angeles, California, Sep.3-6, 1971,
National Organization for Women Papers, Schlesinger Library, Cambridge.M A..
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Charlotte Bunch for the Furies Collective, “Lesbians in Revolt”, The Furies, January 1972. See Anne Koedt’s
important Article on this subject, “Lesbianism and Feminism”, in notes from the Third Year (1971), 84-89; and
Lucia Valeska, “ The Future of Female Separatism”, Quest, Vol.12 (1975), 2-16.
20
The new group drew national attention by taking the position that lesbianism was the
purest expression of feminism. The group articulated its ideology in “ the woman identified
woman”, now one of the definitive position papers on contemporary lesbianism feminism. In it
radical lesbians stated: “As the source of self-hate and the lack of real self are rooted in our malegiven identity, we must create a new sense of self …it is the primacy of women relating to
women, of women creating a new consciousness of and with each other which is at the heart of
women’s liberation”.
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Wood Press, New York, West Port, Connecticut, London, 1989.
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Interpreted as a restriction of girl children’s right to live female disadvantages in child
morality is rightly taken as one of the most significant indicators of gender bias in India. This
phenomenon is not due to greater natural frailty of girl children; but results from parent’s
practices discouraging the life chances of unwanted daughters through selective neglect or
infanticide. Despite socio- economic development, fertility decline and falling mortality for both
sexes.
Pre-natal sex selection techniques are spreading in India to weed out unwanted daughters
before birth, rather than the age –old post- natal methods (infanticide).
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REFERENCES
Bhasin, kamla(1999), “what is Patriarchy?”, Women Unlimited , Delhi.
Bhasin, kamla and khan, Nighat Said (1980), “Feminism and its Relevance in South Asia”
Women Unlimited, Delhi.
Charlotte Bunch for the Furies Collective, “Lesbians in Revolt”, The Furies, January 1972. See
Anne Koedt’s important Article on this subject, “Lesbianism and Feminism”, in notes from the
Third Year (1971), 84-89; and Lucia Valeska, “ The Future of Female Separatism”, Quest,
Vol.12 (1975), 2-16.
Heywood, Andrew (2003) “Political Ideologies”, Pal grave Macmillan, pg.240-255 and Eco
feminism pg.288-289.
Irvin D. Solomon, “Feminism and Black Activism in Contemporary America: An Ideological
Assessment “, Green Wood Press, New York, West Port, Connecticut, London, 1989.
Karat, Brinda (2005), “Socialism and Women ‘s Emancipation” pg.33-47 in Survival and
Emancipation: Notes from Indian Women’s Struggle, Three Essays, Collective.
Lisa, Turtle, Encyclopedia of feminism, Harlow, Long man, 2004.
Peterson. Spike and Runyan, Anne Sisson, “Global Gender Issuse: Dilemmas in World Politics”,
West View Press Inc., USA, 1993.
Resolution of the 1971 Conference, ‘Revolution: From the Doll’s House to the White House:
Report of the Fifth Annual Conference of the National Organization for Women (NOW) Los
Angeles, California, Sep.3-6, 1971, National Organization for Women Papers, Schlesinger
Library, Cambridge.M A.
Tong, Rosemarie(1989), Feminist Thought : A Comprehensive Introduction, Boulder: West
View Press.
Walby, Syivia (1994) “Towards a Theory of Patriarchy “ in the Polity Reader in Gender Studies.
Polity
25
LESSON 2
GENDER, CULTURE AND HISTORY
Man is said to be the most intelligent being that god ever created. He could sway the direction of
wind, he made wonders with mud and soil, and he could change the course of rivers. He no more
looked at nature with awe. He started believing every thing under his control. He could tame the
most furious and deadly animals with force and technology and use them for its own benefit.
Similarly, he enslaved women and the tool he used was the ideology of patriarchy.
Introduction
The objective of this paper is to show the relationship between the culture, history and
gender with the social construction of femininity and masculinity in India .we saw absence of
women equality and equal status is missing in the pages of history. What could be reason for
this? Was it a deliberative attempt that mutes the voiceless? History is an aspect of one’s culture.
History registers only those aspects which is highlighted in one’s culture and our culture is such
that only men and their activities have been highlighted. History was the story of great heroic
deeds of great kings and individuals. There has been a conscious effort on the part of feminist to
resurrect the lost data on women folk, their lives, their aspirations, and their deeds of heroism. It
has been buried in the past and memory has faded because their retriever called history has
conspired with patriarchy to push them into world of anonymity. Sadly though, we often see not
the exaltation but the exploitation of women in the media. How often are they treated not as
persons with an inviolable dignity but as objects whose purpose is to satisfy others' appetite for
pleasure or for power? How often the role of woman as wife and mother is undervalued or even
ridiculed? How often is the role of women in business or professional life depicted as a
masculine caricature, a denial of the specific gifts of feminine insight, compassion and
understanding, which so greatly contribute to the "civilization of love"? The rapid acceleration
in the growth and development of the mass media over the past fifty years is the most significant
of the factors that have led to the redefinition of contemporary women status. The growth of
television especially has produced socio-cultural changes in women life could barely analysis of
‘images of women’ raised many question for feminist critics in context of mass media: were the
roles ‘believable’ or product of (generally male) fantasy? How did women embrace the diversity
and complexity of women in a period of such political and social change? A desire for selfrecognition through the screen representation of real women’s complex lives was combined with
a desire for roles that would be inspirational to female audiences. The possibility for equality is
understood to lie in the representation of real women (project through to be the aim and
responsibility of women directors in particular).
Sex and Gender: Equality and Differences- Biological Determinism and, Social, Cultural
(Matrilineal and Patrilineal) and Historical Constructs.
Patrilineality is a system in which one belongs to one’s father’s lineage; it generally
involves the inheritance of property, names or titles through the male line as well. Matrilineal or
Matriarchy is a term, which is applied to a gynocentric form of society, in which the leading role
is by the female and especially by the mothers of a community. The word matriarchy is coined as
the opposite of patriarchy from Greek mater “mother” and archein “to rule”. Matriarchy is
defined by some as distinct from matrilocality, which some anthropologists use to describe
26
known societies where the maternal side of the family manages domestic relations, owing to the
husband joining the wife's family, rather than the wife moving to the husband's village or tribe.
If, additionally, family property passes down the maternal line (matrilineality), the wife
effectively is supported by her extended family, especially her brothers, these maternal uncles
serving children of the couple as "social fathers", while the husbands tend to be more isolated.
The term patriarchy is distinct from patrilineality and patrilocality. Patrilineal defines
societies where the derivation of inheritance (financial or otherwise) originates from the father’s
line. Patrilocal defines a locus of control coming from the father’s geographic/cultural
community. Most societies are predominantly patrilineal and patrilocal, but patriarchal society is
characterized by interlocking system of sexual and generational oppression.
According to Gerda Lerner, patriarchy means the manifestation and institutionalization of
male dominance over the children in the family and the extension of male dominance over
women in society in general. It implies that men hold power in all the important institutions of
society and that women are deprived of access to such power. It does not imply that women are
either totally powerless or deprived of rights, influence and resources. One of the most
challenging tasks of women’s history is to trace with precision the various forms and modes in
which patriarchy appears historically. The Encyclopedia of feminist theories defines patriarchy
as the hierarchical relations between men and women, manifested in familial and social structure
alike, in a descending order from an authoritarian if often times benevolent male head-to-male
dominance in personal, political, cultural and social life as well as to patriarchal families where
the law of the father prevails.
What is the difference between sex and gender?
Sex refers to biological differences; chromosomes, hormonal profiles, internal and
external sex organs. Gender describes the characteristics that a society or culture delineates as
masculine or feminine. In sociological terms 'gender role' refers to the characteristics and
behaviours that different cultures attribute to the sexes. What it means to be a 'real man' in any
culture requires male sex plus what our various cultures define as masculine characteristics and
behaviours, likewise a 'real woman' needs female sex and feminine characteristics. To
summarise: 'man' means male sex plus masculine social role; (a 'real man', 'masculine' or
'manly'); 'woman' means female sex plus feminine social role. When is it sex difference and
when is it gender difference? How do you know when to call something a sex difference rather
than a gender difference? Using the definitions given for sex (biological differences between
males and females) and gender (socially defined differences between men and women), sex
differences therefore refer only to those differences that can be attributed solely to biological
difference. Medical literature most commonly addresses biological sex differences.
Biological Determinism
The terms sex, gender and sexual orientation are often used interchangeably. Despite
sounding similar, they actually have three distinct meanings. Sex means Biological maleness or
femaleness. Males have XY chromosomes. Females have XX chromosomes. Sex is determined
the instant a woman's egg is fertilized by a man's sperm. If an X sperm fertilizes an X egg, the
fetus will be female. If a Y sperm fertilizes the X egg, the fetus will be male. Gender means The
behavioral, cultural, and psychological traits typically associated with one sex. Babies are
27
usually assigned a male gender at birth if they have a penis, and a female gender if they have a
vulva. Gender identity is how someone feels about their gender assignment. Sex difference is a
distinction of biological and/or physiological characteristics typically associated with either
males or females of a species in general. Differences between men and women include all the
features related to reproductive role, notably the endocrine (hormonal) systems and their
physical, psychological and behavioral effects. Such undisputed sexual dimorphism includes
gonad differentiation, internal genital differentiation, external genital differentiation, breast
differentiation and hair differentiation.
The sociological approach to "gender" (social roles: male versus female) will focus on the
difference in (economic/ power) position between a male CEO
The philosopher and feminist Simone de Beauvoir applied existentialism to women's
experience of life: "One is not born a woman, one becomes one.” In context, this is a
philosophical statement, however, it is true biologically — a girl must pass puberty to become a
woman — and true sociologically — mature relating in social contexts is learned, not instinctive.
Within feminist theory, terminology for gender issues developed over the 1970s. In the 1974
edition of Masculine/Feminine or Human, the author uses "innate gender" and "learned sex
roles", but in the 1978 edition, the use of sex and gender is reversed. By 1980, most feminist
writings had agreed on using gender only for socio culturally adapted traits. In gender studies the
term gender is used to refer to proposed social and cultural constructions of masculinities and
femininities. In this context, gender explicitly excludes reference to biological differences, to
focus on cultural differences. A Gender difference is a distinction of biological and/or
physiological characteristics typically associated with either males or females of a species in
general.
Sex/Gender Equality
In the Indian constitution, our Fundamental Rights Article 15 talks about, the state shall
not discriminate against any citizen on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth
or any of them. Our constitution has given the right to prevent discrimention on the basis of sex
and empower gender equality. Some of the other important laws and regulation in this regard are
as follows:
Sex determination Act (SDA) 1975: Prohibits sex discrimination in employment,
education, the provision of goods, facilities and services and in the disposal or management of
premises. Sex Discrimination (Gender Reassignment) Regulations 1999 prevent discrimination
against transsexual people in employment and vocational training. Vocational training refers to
education provided in further and higher education establishments only. It does not include
education provided in schools but schools in their capacities as employers and providers of
vocational training (such as teacher training) must comply with the law. The Gender Recognition
Act 2004 allows transsexual people to gain legal recognition in their acquired gender. The Act
enables transsexuals, over the age of 18, to gain legal recognition in their acquired gender thus
allowing them to marry and to be given birth certificates that recognize the acquired gender.
Employment Directive Employment Equality (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2003, Outlaws
discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation in fields of employment and vocational training
28
including further and higher education institutions. The Gender Duty will aim to ensure that
public bodies’ policies and services are sensitive to the different needs of women and men;
public bodies act fairly as employers towards women and men; and, in both they work to tackle
inequalities and deliver fair outcomes. This general duty will require public authorities to have
due regard to the need to eliminate unlawful discrimination, and to promote equality of
opportunity between men and women. The Women and Equality Unit within DTI is currently
analyzing responses to recent consultation on policy proposals to introduce a public sector duty
to promote gender equality. This duty will apply to education institutions.
http://www.womenandequalityunit.gov.uk/legislation/index.htm
Women’s images (Images of Women, Roles, Responsibilities & Rights, Stereotypes and
Iconography)
The word ‘image’ is used in many different ways and contexts. The words Rupa, Bimba,
Murti, Pratima are synonymously used in diverse contexts. Thus, everything is the rupa of
Brahman. Temples display the worshipable forms of Gods called Murtis, Pratimas or Vigrahas.
Generally, when we speak of the image a society projects of its women, we have in mind its
ideals of womanhood, or its popular stereotypes or the vision implicit in its institutionalization of
the role or position of women, or the vision of poets, artists and prophets relating to women.
Image regularly accompany desires, feelings, actions, perceptions and opinions, their ultimate
value lies in their being rooted in a spontaneous and revelatory power of the mind. An image is
generally considered to be the likeness or representation of the object- real or unreal. It is
something which may be apprehended sensuously or mentally as a distinct form which refers to
something other than the presentation itself by virtue of some intrinsic feature such as resemble
rather than mere convention. The image of women is ultimately the image of shakti, of
corresponds to man’s higher nature and potentiality. So, nature and power are imaged as
feminine.
The success of modern feminism in its moderate version requires the economic
independence of women but how that is to be combined with the proper care of children and
home and the stability of domestic life is not a problem which has been fully resolved yet. The
traditional image of womanhood, thus, emphasizes the complementarily of men and women
rather than the independent equality of women which would introduce competition and strife. It
looks on woman primarily as the mother who is the centre of the family and social tradition. It
does not exclude women from the pursuit of higher life. It projects them as the embodiment of
love at various levels. Siva-parvati and radha- Krishna are divya- mithunas (divine couples)
illustrating selfless love for men and women on earth. The literature written under the influence
of trantricism, i.e. tantrika ideal of union of shiva and shakti (in shakta and shaiva schools),
pragya and upaya, or their variants (in Buddhist schools of mantrayana, sahajayana and
vajrayana) , radha.
Radha and Krishna (in Gaudiya Vaishnavism), Sita and Rama (in shri Rasika school),
Lakshmi and Narayana (in shri Vishnavism ) gave equal, if not more, importance to female
principle. Shakti in this view represents self-critical consciousness, dynamism, creativity, grace
and Ananda (rapture, bliss). Various forms of Bhakti movement also take the character of
Trantricism. There is enormous literature, particularly devotional (Stotras) in Sanskrit, which is
inspired by the Tantrika view of pre-eminence of female principle of its equality with male
29
principle. Hybrid Sanskrit of the Buddhists, Jains and Tantrikas who espoused the lower caste
women in its religious rituals and practices changed the language and style of paninian Sanskrit.
Vedic women- seers had composed the hymns, numerous women poets wrote verses in Sanskrit.
These have survived in anthologies. Some works may be found in the manuscripts. Maitreyi
debated and discussed philosophical issues with Yagyavalkya in Upanisadic age, Avantisundari
held fast her opinions on literary issues. Much of this intellectual freedom and creativity
vanished gradually in medieval age and the centuries that followed.
With the advent of freedom of the country and the dawn of new ideas of liberty, equality
and fraternity. Without distinction of caste, creed or sex and new concepts and tensions of
modern society, new images of women are in making contemporary Sanskrit literature.
Agnishikha, a collection of poems by Pushpa Trivedi , ira ( experimentalist poems ) by
Devadatta Bhatti, Amrapali (a drama) by Mithilesh kumari Mishra, Pramadvara (a drama) by
Abhiraja sindhu Kanya (a novel ) by Shrinath Hasurkar and many other literary works are
experiments in new images of women reflecting the cravings and aspirations, conflicts and
tensions of that period of times.
The male construction of female as an object of sex has been going on through a variety
of forms of expression- literature, sculpture, songs, paintings and photographs, dance and media.
The fantasy world that veils experience of female is the world of sex as seen through male eyes.
The fantasies women take are male fantasies about women (Pratibha Jain and Rajan Maham:
1996).
Indian sculptures present various facets of the image of women in Indian society. They
reveal the high position and esteem that she commanded in her position from a pursuer of
knowledge, connoisseur of art and custodian of culture to a mere object of entertainment. This
degeneration in the social image of women is reflected in the secular as well as religious,
sculptures during the 8th and the 10th century.
The sculpture identifies the image of women regardless of its peculiar divine character,
legend and function .among the various aspects of women, three types of the sculpture
representations have been selected which project women images as , individual and independent
members of society and women displaying interest in fine arts, specially dance and music and
women displaying her physical charms. The sculptures of Saraswati, Gajalakshmi, Gauri and
Mahisamardini were derived from the images of those women who led an independent life in
society .the worship of their images indicated that they were ranked high in society. In craving of
their images, the emphasis was not on the depiction of physical beauty but on the qualities of
their head and heart.
Besides the sculptures of celestial women, there are quite a large number of them
displayed on the exterior of the temples, which represent women as performing dance, playing
musical instrument or revealing their physical charms in different postures by way of bedecking
ornaments, busy at toilets etc (Heinz Mode: 1979:27). These sets of sculptures have no religious
or divine veils or symbolism but they are certainly important for studying the social images of
women. This image of women as displaying physical charm emerged predominant with the
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eclipse of her mental accomplishments, creativity and her enforced seclusion and consequent
isolation from the productive processes of contemporary society (Pratibha Jain and Rajan
Maham: 1996).
Institutions of family, kinship, religion and popular culture
The definitions of the family have varied tremendously from culture to culture, and for
different social groups within each culture. Some groups practices polygamy and others
monogamy, for some, the most important unit was the nuclear family of a man, a woman and
their children, while for others the extended kin network was most important, in some groups the
family was primarily a unit of production, while in others it was primarily a unit of production,
in some group married couples lived with the wife’s (matrilocality or uxorilocality ) and in
others they set up their own household (neolocality ), in some groups non- related individuals
such as slaves or servants were considered part of the family, and in others they were not, in
some groups adoption or good parentage created significant kinship like ties (termed fictive or
spiritual kinship ), while in others only blood mattered, in some groups martial partners were
chosen by parents or the family as a whole, and in others by the individual themselves. All of
these variables interacted and often changed over time because of internal developments or
contacts with other culture.
Though patterns and structure differed tremendous sly every group had notions of proper
family life which reinforced through law, codes, religious prescriptions, taboos, education, or
other means. But all of these together have operated to link woman’s experience more closely
than men’s to family life in most cultures. Marriages in the ancient world not only linked two
individuals but also two families, so that the choice of a spouse was much too important a matter
to be left to young people to decide. Marriages were often arranged by one’s parents, who
assessed the possible marriage partners and chose someone appropriate (Merry E. WiesnerHank: 2001:27).
Kinship
The earliest power structure in human society were kin groups in which decisions were
made at the local level within these kin groups individuals had a variety of identity, they were
simultaneously fathers, sons, husbands, and brothers,or mothers, daughters, wives and sisters.
Each of these identities was relational (parent to child, sibling to sibling, spouse to spouse) and
some of them, especially parent to child, gave one power over others. The interweaving of these
relationships and their meaning varied from culture to culture, but one’s status in the others, and
often changed throughout one’s life. A woman situation as daughter or sister in a specific kin
group, for example, shaped her relationship with her husband, her becoming a mother often
further altered her status vis-à-vis her husband or other kin group members. A man’s relationship
with his father and his status in the kin group often changed when he married, and in some areas
changed again if he became the father of a son.
In many areas kin group remained very significant power structures for millennia, and in
some areas they still have control over major aspects of life, such as one’s choice of a spouse or
share of inheritance. Kin, tribal and village structure of power were almost always gender and
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age related, and in most parts of the world, adult men had the most power. the leaders of a village
was often termed the ‘big man’ or some variant of this, and village or tribal councils or voting
bodies were made up of adult male heads of household or heads of families. There are some
culture where this was not the case. Among some Native American groups kin groups were
organized matrilineal and residence was matrilocal, so that one’s mother’s kin were more
important than one’s father’s kin and related women often lived together. Some group had a
tribal council of adult women along with that of adult men, which had power over certain aspects
of life, such as martial partners or the fate of prisoners captures from another tribe during warfare
.some African peoples, such as the Igbo of Nigeria also had separate women’s councils that
organized aspects of life in which women predominated, such as agricultural production and
locals trading networks (Merry E. Wiesner Hank: 2001).
Religion
In India as well as china gender structure developed in the classical era which lasted for
millennia, and which were shaped to a great degree by religious and intellectual systems.
Hinduism is a synthesis of many traditions it often contains conflicting ideas about
gender hierarchy, with some structures and ideas clearly placing women in an inferior position,
others stressing the complementarily of men and women, and others valorizing women and the
feminine. The normal life-cycle of a person from one of the upper castes,, particularly from the
highest caste, the Brahmins, marked women as inferior. When a boy in one of the three upper
castes reached the age of about eight or twelve, he went through a ceremony giving him the
sacred thread to wear over his shoulders marking him as one of the ‘twice born’. By contrast, a
girl in the upper caste did not receive a sacred thread, nor go through a period of studying sacred
texts.
During the Vedic age (1200-600 BC) women appear to have been able to study and a few
highly educated women are mentioned in the Upanishads, such as the philosophers Gargi who
engaged in a debate about the true self. In later centuries service to her husband was to replace
education for a Brahmin woman, so that while her brother were off, studying a Brahmin girl
learned housekeeping and domestic religious rituals. Her entry into adulthood was marked by
marriage, not only by a separate ceremony, which generally occurred at a much younger age than
that of her brother- her teens or even earlier. She then went to live her husband’s family, and
heard the names of his ancestors, not hers, recited in religious ceremonies, if she were a
Brahmin. She was instructed to worship her husband as if he were a god, making and serving
him all of his food so that it was pure enough, entertaining him and demonstrating her devotion.
At the end of her life she could expect a period of widowhood, which might be quite long
given the disparity in normal ages at marriage for men and women, a dismal time during which
she was considered inauspicious i.e. unlucky, and so not welcome at family festivities or rituals.
Reports of killing of young wives because their families are slow or remiss in making dowry
payments are more numerous, and dowry deaths, along with the status of widows, are a central
concern of Indian feminist. In many ways women clearly have a secondary status within
Hinduism, but there are also traditions that stress the power of women. Many of the Hindu
deities are goddesses, who range from beneficent life-givers like Devi or Ganga, to faithful
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spouses like Parvati or Radha, to fierce destroyers like kali or Durga, and may have been viewed
as empowering by women.
Buddhism rejected certain aspects of Hindu teaching about men and women, but it also
accepted others, like Hinduism, it incorporated many ides and traditions, some of them
contradictory and later split into different branches with different emphasis. Many Buddhist texts
view that feminine as horrific encouraging those who would achieve enlightenment to mediate
on images of women’s diseased, dying, or dead bodies in order to cultivate detachment from
desire. Despite the popularity of some female bodhisattvas such as Kuan Yin in china, human
women who chose a life of religious devotion as nuns were often regarded with suspiciousness.
The ideal woman in Buddhism-both historically and in sacred texts-was more often a lay woman
who supported a community of monks or who assisted men in their spiritual progress. By about
the fifth century in India, nuns appear to have become much poorer and less popular, with the
communities of monks who were regarded as spiritually superior receiving more support.
Christianity
The mixed messages about the relative value of men and women found in Buddhism may
be found in Christianity, which is based on the teaching of Jesus of Nazareth, called the Christ.
Some of Christianity‘s most radical teaching about gender also came to have negative
consequences for women. In its first centuries, some women embraced the ideal of virginity and
either singly or in communities declared themselves ‘virgins in the service of Christ’. This was
threatening to most church leaders, who termed such women, at best, “brides of Christ”, that is in
a dependent relationship with a man. Even Christian mythology perpetuates such gender
stereotypes, portraying the women as inferiors. It says that Adam was first created by god and
eve was created later, to fulfill Adam’s need. Thus, she is the inessential, the other, who has been
created to keep men at ease. Christianity preaches, God is the father, a male Jesus was a man.
Christianity has always given importance to men in its biblical texts.
Islam
If the interplay between the gender and religion is an issue in contemporary Christianity ,
it is even more of an issue in contemporary Islam, and all sides draw on history to buttress their
position. Muhammad which gave advice on matters which went beyond the Qur’an were
collected into books termed Hadith, which are second only to the Qur’an in authority in these
works marriage is recommended for every one, heterosexual sex is approved fro both procreation
and pleasure, and homosexual acts are condemned; the emphasis on marriage has meant that
unmarried men are not accepted as teachers, judges or religious leaders in traditional Muslim
societies. many scholars not that the Qur’an holds men and women to be fully equal in God’s
eyes, both are capable of going to heaven and responsible to carry out the duties of believers for
themselves. The Qur’an does not make clear distinction between men and women, it allows men
to have up to four wives and to divorce a wife quite easily, sets a daughter’s share of inheritance
at half that of a son’s and orders that the prophet’s later wives be secluded. Gender structure also
have other bases, including religious-the sharia’s- which is regarded as having divine authority,
though women played a major role in the early development of Islam- as they had in
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Christianity- and appeared to have prayed and attended religious ceremonies, in public, after the
first generation the seclusion of women became an official part of the Sharia. Men are to fulfill
their religious obligations publicly, at mosques and other communal gatherings, and women in
the home, though they generally have access to a separate section of the mosque unless they are
ritually unclean (because of menstruation or childbirth).
Every religious tradition has idea about proper gender relations and the relative value of
the devotion and worship of male and female adherents, every one stipulates or suggests rules for
the way men and women are to act. Thus, within most religions there is a fundamentalist wing
advocating stronger gender distinction and hierarchy, and a more liberal wing, advocating greater
gender egalitarianism. The ultimate outcome of these development is , of course, uncertain, but it
is clear that religion will continue to be one of the strongest shapers of gender structure in the
future, as it was in the past (Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks :2001).)
Status of women through the Ages
Women’s movement in India have posed challenges to established patriarchal institutions
such as the family, and to dominant social values and structures, most significantly in the arena
of legal interventions in the areas of violence against women. Within feminist activism and
discourse in India, debates on the role of law have been central. Feminist interventions and
attitude to law are varied, and multiple, but are united in that they contain an implicit or explicit
critique of patriarchy. Debate on law have also politicized, and brought to the forefront, an
understanding of violence against women, based on the perception that there is systematic and
systematized aggression against women, naturalized through different forms of violence. These
includes rape, sexual harassment in the working place and in public places, pornography,
trafficking, prostitution, selective sex determination, female infanticide, child marriage, dowry
and domestic violence. In other words, a range of events and incidents experienced by women
both within the home, and outside; where perpetrators can be male or female family members,
members of the wider community or representatives of the state are conceptualized as violence.
The advancement of women's genuine emancipation is a matter of justice, which can no longer
be overlooked; it is also a question of society's welfare. Fortunately, there is a growing
awareness that women must be enabled to play their part in the solution of the serious problems
of society and of society's future. In every area, "a greater presence of women in society will
prove most valuable, for it will help to manifest the contradictions present when society is
organized solely according to the criteria of efficiency and productivity, and it will force systems
to be redesigned in a way which favours the processes of humanization which mark the
'civilization of love'" .The "civilization of love" consists, most particularly, in a radical
affirmation of the value of life and of the value of love. Women are especially qualified and
privileged in both of these areas. Regarding love, women can bring to every aspect of life,
including the highest levels of decision-making, that essential quality of femininity which
consists in objectivity of judgment, tempered by the capacity to understand in depth the demands
of interpersonal relationships. The communications media, including the press, the cinema, radio
and television, the music industry and computer networks, represent the modern forum where
information is received and transmitted rapidly to a global audience, where ideas are exchanged,
where attitudes are formed - and, indeed, where a new culture is being shaped. The media are
therefore destined to exercise a powerful influence in determining whether society fully
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recognizes and appreciates not only the rights but also the special gifts of women. Women
themselves can do much to foster better treatment of women in the media: by promoting sound
media education programmes, by teaching others, especially their families, to be discriminating
consumers in the media market, by making known their views to production companies,
publishers, broadcasting networks and advertisers with regard to programmes and publications
which insult the dignity of women or debase their role in society. Moreover, women can and
should prepare themselves for positions of responsibility and creativity in the media, not in
conflict with or imitation of masculine roles but by impressing their own "genius" on their work
and professional activity. The media would do well to focus on the true heroines of society.
Image of women in the world of advertisement:
Slowly but surely, our advertising industry is fashioning out a new woman for us.
Short skirts and noodle-strap tops, see-through shirts with shorts that barely cover her
derriere, hard drinking and hard partying. Impossibly slim and dizzyingly tall, a go-getter career
girl with snazzy mobile phones to match every outfit. Anything-but-black hair colour that comes
out of a bottle, green and blue eye lenses.... And she's selling soap, jeans, shoes, cars, mobiles,
washing machines, skin whitening creams and lotions, perfumes and watches. (Geeta Seshu)
The basic criterion was simple: Anything that used an image of a woman to sell the
product. The ads were categorized into those that used women in traditional roles (mothers and
wives); ads that used the image of a beautiful woman somewhat out of context (like a bikini clad
young woman selling a car); and of course, a category specifically selling beauty products.
What came across was the insidious change in the overall 'look' of the women in the
adverts. 'contradictory messages' continue to co-exist - the sari-clad, large bindi, magalsutra and
sindhoor sporting women, and the sex symbol images in which the bodies of motorcycles and
women are placed side by side in a comparison of curves!
For the advertising, film and television world, the sari-clad image has - weirdly enough become a pan-Indian symbol of marriage for women. Some details connected with the sari-clad
image don't conform to the traditional image in certain communities.
Magazines are full of ads that depict either explicit or implied sexual assault of women
by men. There is little diversity in the image of women’s beauty. The message seems to be: be
Indian, be sexy, be thin, be glamorous even when your back aches, be a superwoman but what
ever you do - don't think!
Let’s have a look at another TV advertisement of a famous Cosmetic Company. It
displays that---- ‘A young girl failed to collect any job in the job markets. Later she started to use
beauty cream and she became beautiful within two weeks and gets a rich job easily.’ What does
the advertiser want to mean by this advertisement? Are all the jobs reserved for white skinned
women? There are huge advertisements (Soap, cream etc) are shown in the various TV channels
where that the black skinned women are underestimated. These advertisements make very
35
sorrow to the black skinned women and make a negative sense to the male persons against black
skinned women.
Few days ago I saw an advertisement of a car fair in a daily news-paper where some new
model cars were with two young girls. Those girls wore nice and short dress. I did not
understand why these girls are beside these cars. I know that new cars are used by rich
businessmen or high officers. Are not these girls used as goods or sex object? We can see on the
TV commercial everyday in many advertisements that women are using as goods and sex objects
if you look these by your naked eyes. Add producers, TV commercials and women/models who
act in these kinds of advertisements should think about the add concept before making those. We
know media is the conscience of the society. The society can be affected by the media both
positively and negatively. We hope the media will take step to make awareness in the society and
help to reduce the negative sense on add concept.
“Mirror mirror on the wall who is the fairest one of all?” Society’s standards for body
shape and the importance of beauty is promoted by various media. The media links beauty to
symbols of happiness, love and success for women. Media portrays these images as achievable
and real. Until women accept their body image, they will continue to measure themselves against
societies “perfect image.” Media representations of body image contribute to social trends of
unhealthy lifestyles. Female children learn to worry about their appearance from an early age.
Huge quantities of girls between the ages of three and ten have one or more Barbie dolls. On
television children are bombarded with commercials showing tall and thin women promoting
dieting products and leading a “dream” life. Being exposed to numerous “perfect” female images
leads girls trying to defeat their imperfections into their adult life. Parental messages about
appearance also have large impacts on young girls.
In the advertisement industry, females are judged by standards of ‘cuteness’ and
‘prettiness’ and these shifts with age into standards of ‘beauty’ and ‘glamour.”
In the daily fight for the emancipation of women and the pressures and influence of
advertising, women of all ages are coerced into physical and psychological self-torment trying to
achieve an optimum look or image. This is something not limited to a few. One can see the work
of television advertisers in high schools everyday as girls wear the same clothing, makeup and
accessories as their favorite stars. They may also try to imitate models they see in teen
magazines. While it is fairly obvious that such a phenomenon exists, what is not so obvious are
the detrimental effects. The Influence of the Media on Women's View of Beauty and Self-Worth
another way in which the media has had a great influence over women is by controlling the
image of what is beautiful for a woman in our society. The more technology that is created, the
more unrealistic our ideas of the "perfect" woman become. "The body beautiful is a woman's
responsibility and authority. She will be valued and rewarded on the basis of how close she
comes to embodying the ideal. Whatever the current borders of beauty, they will always be well
defined and exceedingly narrow, and it will be a woman's task to conform to them-for as long as
humanly possible" This leaves little room for interpretation to the idea of beauty. There is no
flexibility in it; the media creates an image and women try to live up to it.
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Such words are used for women by general public places by so called educated and
decent males in the society– e.g., “good taste,” “public sensitivity,” “general community
standards of decency and civility,” “excessive violence, nudity, obscenity and vulgarity,” The
power of advertising to change, shape and mold the public's opinion has had a major impact on
the lives of women. Women are the main target for many advertisements and are used in many
forms of advertising. The media has historically used propaganda to define who women are and
what they should be.
Harsh reality of women in Indian Journalism
The recently released `Status of Women Journalists in India' report, commissioned by the
National Commission for Women (NCW), presents a disturbing picture of women journalists.
Prepared by the Press Institute of India (PII), this report is the first such attempt in the country to
look at the harsh reality - for women - in this often glamorized profession. PII's National Study
Group (NSG), consisting of media representatives from across the country, approached 3,500
women journalists working for 141 newspapers and publications (including several regional
language dailies and magazines) for the preparation of this report. However, only 410 women
responded.
The report says many women journalists (even from established newspapers) work as
daily wage labour, without an appointment letter, signing a muster roll at the end of the month
to get Rs 1,500-3000. "In Madhya Pradesh (MP) and Chhattisgarh (where media giants like
Dainik Bhaskar and Nai Duniya flourish), there is no woman journalist who has a permanent
job. The `lucky' ones are those on contract for two-three years," says Sushmita Malaviya, who
is part of the NSG. "If a journalist has to be axed, it is most often a woman," she says. In fact,
Malaviya noticed a pattern in MP, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Jharkhand: 30+ women were the first
to lose their jobs. In the conflict-ridden northeastern part of the country, only 35 women work as
print journalists in the seven states. Only 35 per cent of these are full-time employees; 40 per
cent say they have never been promoted. The 'secret' contract system, in which none of the
journalists know what the others are getting, is often used to play one journalist against the other.
Women journalists across the country are rarely promoted; some go without a promotion
for decades. Where women have been promoted, they have faced trouble and rebellion from
male colleagues. A Trivandrum-based journalist says promotions don't come to them because
there's no "bar-room bonding" for them as there is for their male colleagues. Another said:
"Women journalists are conscientious, diligent and people relate more easily to us. However,
male bosses do not give credit for professionalism, instead they speak of women exploiting their
gender." Child care facilities and maternity leave are still not a right in most media organisations.
A senior woman journalist from Bihar said that when she returned from her maternity leave she
was demoted. Another from MP said she was fired when she left to have a baby. Lekha, who
works in a reputed national English magazine, says before her baby arrived, she was considered
very "responsible". But after she became a mother, an impression was created that she was not
"reliable" anymore. While a majority of the women respondents said that having children did not
affect their professional abilities, they were forced to slow down because of their organisations'
bias against working mothers. This bias forces bright women into less paying, less prestigious
37
and often less exciting jobs. Sadly, as Pande comments: "Women's productive years are also
their reproductive years."
The report also dwells extensively on the divide between the English and regional
language press: women journalists working for dailies in English get a better deal in terms of
salaries, job security, facilities and choice of assignments. "This differential treatment is apparent
even when the same management brings out both the English and local language daily."
However, something that is rampant in both the regional language and English press is
sexual harassment. About 22 per cent of the 410 respondents said they had been sexually
harassed at some point of time, but only 15 per cent made a formal complaint. A significant 40
per cent said they did not complain because the issue is not taken up seriously in their
organisation or that they would be seen as over-reacting to a situation. Dr Poornima Advani,
Chairperson of NCW, said that despite a Supreme Court order, several media organisations
have still not set up the committee required to look into cases of sexual harassment. The report
claims that some women have learnt to "manage" sexual harassment instead of seeking redressal.
Advani added that despite the small sample size, the report clearly spells out the challenges
women journalists in India face, even today.
Media Portrayals of Girls and Women
We all know the stereotypes—the femme fatale, the super mom, the sex kitten, the nasty
corporate climber. Whatever the role, television, film and popular magazines are full of images
of women and girls who are typically white, desperately thin, and made up to the hilt—even after
slaying a gang of vampires or dressing down a Greek legion. Many would agree that some
strides have been made in how the media portray women in film, television and magazines, and
that the last 20 years has also seen a growth in the presence and influence of women in media
behind the scenes. After watching television and flipping though ads and articles in several
magazines, the stereotyping of men and women is so apparent but at the same time society is so
blind to it. In society parents teach their children gender role at a very early age.. Males are
traditionally expected to show aggressiveness and toughness, and females are expected to be
passive and nurturing. For example, little girls play with baby dolls and play "house" and little
boys play with toy guns and play "cops and robbers." Mass media are powerful factors that
influence society's beliefs, attitudes, and the values they have of themselves and others as well as
the world. If a male is seen in media doing "feminine" things, such as shopping or cleaning he is
seen as weak, and women who are seen doing "masculine" things such as car repair and
management positions she is seen as callous and cruel. Even though media still pretends that men
and women in society are equal, it isn't the case. Women are still seen as homemakers and men
are still seen as professional, successful and independent. In the past fifty years women have
been marginalized and were represented as the weaker sex. The objectification of women is
commonly used to refer to the presentation of women in the media as an object. Women's bodies
are routinely used as objects to sell various products. In certain pictures women are presented as
being vulnerable and easily overpowered especially in ads were they have on revealing clothing
and take on submissive roles. These images are found in music videos as well, where the focus is
only a particular body part. In today’s society if people watch television programs such as
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Chingy featuring Snoop & Ludacris – Holidae; Charlie's Angels; the Z100 commercial with
Britney Spears; or Baywatch they will see that the feminine image is presented differently than
the masculine. In these programs men are typically placed in sexual situations fully clothed,
while women are presented in provocative clothing or less. The camera will frequently zoom in
on body parts to focus on the woman’s buttocks, midriff, and legs. Society is still dominated by
men who control what people see. As a result women are increasingly portrayed as sex symbols
as a way for a media company to turn a profit. The Internet has grown to be the biggest exploiter
of women. Through pornographic chat rooms and on-line “dating” services, women are
commonly depicted as nude in images that has them submissive to men. In a world dominated by
patriarchy, with men exercising authority over women and children
Gender is the psychological characteristics and social categories that are created by
human culture. Doing gender is the concept that humans express their gender when they interact
with one another. Messages about how a male or female is supposed to act come from many
different places. Schools, parents, and friends can influence a person. Another major factor that
influences millions of impressionable females and males is television. Not only does the
television teach each sex how to act, it also shows how one sex should expect the other sex to
act. In the current television broadcasting, stereotypical behavior goes from programming for the
very small to adult audiences. In this broadcasting range, females are portrayed as motherly,
passive and innocent, sex objects, or they are overlooked completely or seen as unimportant
entities. Stereotyping women is not only rampant in the adult world; it also flourishes in the
kiddie universe as well. With society becoming more aware of the influence of the mass media,
and exposure increasing, inaccurate views of gender continue to twist reality by altering viewer
perception. These gender stereotypes, both visible and invisible, need to halt the casting of
women in traditional and inferior roles, and begin placing them in equal roles comparable to that
of their male counterparts. Women are forced to live within the constraints that the media puts on
them because these constraints become societies "ideal." The media can even go so far as to pick
a hair color that society will adopt as more desirable for them. It is important that women start to
differentiate myth from fact when the media is concerned. Many disorders that women have
when image is concerned come from trying to perpetuate a beauty myth inflected by the media.
Media needs to be held accountable for the societal ideas that they are perpetuating.
Feminism and Technology
The development and the impact of feminist theory within the field of digital technology,
particularly in relation to the social use of and meaning surrounding the growth of the internet.
Cyber feminism have offered a rich new area of study for feminist historians, scientists and
sociologist alike, who have generated new categories for critical analysis and posed new question
about the nature of identity and visually in a computer-dominated era. The term cyber feminism
have emerged as central to this new discourse, both have been interpreted, represented and
appropriated in a number of different ways in academia and in mainstream media. Cyber
feminism simply a rebinding exercise or it is a real shift in the way feminism tackles patriarchy
and other given hierarchies embedded within the contemporary society. Cyber feminism is an
insurrection on the part of the goods and materials of the patriarchal world, a dispersed,
distributed emergence composed of links between women, women and computer, computer and
communication links, connections and connectionist nets. Stabile argues in her book ‘feminism
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and the technological fix that feminist interpretation of technology is no longer a strictly
polarized field of enquiry, and she cite more recent work which mediates between two opposing
voices apparent within the body of feminist literature on technology. Attempting to bridge the
gap between two technophobia and the new techno mania. Feminist theorist have now produced
a body of work analyzing how techno science has inscribed itself on the bodies of female as
feminized subjects. Similarly, Judy Wajcman in her book ‘feminism confronts technology shows
how recent feminist thought has sought to engage with a revised notion of technology, and how
new theoretical insights have therefore emerged which recast women’s relationship to
technology, over-riding the essentialism, binaries and humanism which characterize most
previous accounts
The Portrayal of Women on Television
Earlier there was the under-representation of women on television, which can be spoken
in terms of the ‘symbolic annihilation of women which left women largely invisible in the
‘world’ that television claimed to bring into home and when women did appear on screen they
were usually represented in traditional domestic roles and frequently reduced to ‘female type’.
Much has changed since the 1970s, and women are now much more visible on television, in far
wider roles. After 1980s there have been not only quantities, but also a qualitative shift.
‘Contemporary popular television fiction offers an array of strong and independent female
heroines, who seem to defy not without conflicts and contradictions stereotypical definitions of
femininity. Such representatives and especially the ‘conflicts and contradiction’ which they
address, offer new pleasures of identification for female viewers. Television is a business and if,
in the 1980s and 1990s, female consumers can be attracted to programmes and advertisers’
products by the addition of a dash of feminism, then that is as much a matter of economics as of
politics. Time has changed for women now and many women are working as a producers of
television content ( as writers, performers, directors and produces) and increasing number of
hour of watching television are also increased, now with satellite, cable and digital services,
television has been inscribed as a technology.
The portrayal of women is widely known to represent and reinforce the mainstream
ideology of contemporary western culture: patriarchy. While television representations of
women have changed greatly in the last twenty years alone, in order to accommodate the
changing role of women in society, one is led to ask how much the ideology has changed behind
the more modern representations of women. Television is regarded by many viewers to be the
most 'real' form of media. If this is the case, then it is important for us to question how real the
representations of women are on television and how this affects the attitudes of those who watch.
Women are often punished for pursuing their careers at the expense of their men. Soaps often
show women as having jobs, but rarely pursing their careers, and if they do, more often than not,
they are unsuccessful. While television can be said to reflect the changing roles of women, it
seems to portray them in a light of approval or disapproval, positive or negative according to the
roles that patriarchy favors: the housewife is favored, whilst the woman in power is often shown
to be the villain. More importantly, women are often represented as not being as intelligent as
men, and having to rely on them. It is also shown that a woman is either intelligent or beautiful;
but rarely both. It is important to note also, the effects that these portrayals have on people, and
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while these interviews are by no means representative of the population, it proves that they do
affect people’s views of what women are really like.
Women on TV are just glorified home-makers
The study found rigid gender characterization in the serials that dominate the coveted ‘9
p.m. to 11 p.m.’ slot on satellite channels. For instance, the percentage of married women is 55
per cent, higher than the number of unmarried women (38 per cent). While 80 per cent men
across popular channels—Zee, Sony and Star Plus—wear modern clothes, 64 per cent women
are seen in traditional outfits. The study notes that scripts revolve around family interactions in
all channels —Star (84 per cent), Sony (56 per cent) and Zee (53 per cent)—with women
involved in 57 per cent of these scenes. Only 21 per cent of the women are shown at workplaces
as against 79 per cent of the men. Empowerment for women on prime time television is thus
confined to domestic space.
Serial-makers have empowered women with a major share of domestic responsibility.
She controls the house but this control is sanctioned by the elders. The black and white images of
women on television disturbing. “If a woman opts out of the joint family, she could be justified
in her decision and need not be shown in negative light,’’ Neena Gupta’s Saans was closer to
reality as the characters had shades of grey, However, the television industry contends that
women characters do have a distinct identity. So, stories on single women or working women
continue to be elbowed out by family sagas. When Udaan, a serial on Doordarshan in the 80’s,
showed a young girl as a bold police officer, it not only became a hit across the country, the
Indian Police Services also witnessed a steep rise in the number of women applicants.
Says director and actress Kavita Choudhry that family interactions, though identifiable, are not
essentially an enlightening experience for the audience. “A programme is able to exercise a
positive influence when its protagonists overcome real problems, their own weaknesses. To show
games of one-upmanship between a perfect woman and a vampish woman and play on the fears
and insecurities of a housewife is not an uplifting experience for her. Even though battles of ego
supremacy are identifiable by people, they end up increasing trivia and pettiness in society.’’
Channels and serial producers maintain that reality doesn’t sell. “Television hence focuses on
emotions and not career choices,’’.
Cable Television Raises Women's Status in India
Cable and satellite television have grown rapidly throughout the developing world. The
availability of cable and satellite television exposes viewers to new information about the
outside world, which may affect individual attitudes and behaviors. The villages that added
cable were associated with improvements in measures of women's autonomy, a reduction in the
number of situations in which wife beating was deemed acceptable, and a reduction in the
likelihood of wanting the next child to be a boy. And, the effects were quite large Cable also
increased the likelihood that a girl aged 6-10 would be enrolled in school, although it had no
effect for boys, and cut the yearly increase in the number of children or pregnancies among
women of childbearing age.
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Women in Indian Cinema
Hindi cinema has been a major point of reference for Indian culture in this century. It has
shaped and expressed the changing scenarios of modern India to an extent that no preceding art
form could ever achieve. Hindi cinema has influenced the way in which people perceive various
aspects of their own lives. Film-makers like Bimal Roy, Guru Dutt, Mehboob Khan and Raj
Kapoor in the 50’s and 60’s, marked an exception with their brilliant presentation of women
excelling as wife, mother and beloved. Some of their films portray the brilliant craftsmanship of
the ‘flesh-and-blood’ women, with all their inner depth and exquisite spirited individuality. Take
for instance, “Mother India”, “Pyaasa”, “Kaagaz ka phool” and “Madhumati”. A close look into
all these four films will show you how they celebrate the extreme gracefulness and vigor of
women in the face of personal adversity. These film-makers gave constant effort to present the
constructive world of the female protagonists’ emotions with their supreme artistry and depth of
human understanding. Again, the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s witnessed a severe decadence in the
portrayal of the ‘heroine’ in mainstream Indian cinema. It was then that the ‘female’ protagonist
was reduced to a ‘heroine’, connoting the image of mere glamour-dolls, dancing around trees
with heroes and performing cabaret numbers.
Today, directors like Deepa Mehta, Mira Nair and Meghna Gulzar are upright enough to
depict ‘taboo topics’ like lesbianism, polygamy and even surrogate motherhood, where its
woman who takes the lead role in proposing, making love and even in deciding to “lease” her
womb without the permission of her husband-to-be! While in “Fire” and “Kamasutra”, the
women brave the world to explore their sexual desires, in Mahesh Manjrekar’s “Astitva”, the
soulful Aditi gives birth to a child out of wedlock and shatters the vain world of male vanity
when ultimately the truth is disclosed. The film questions the feminist moral concerns through
the detailed examination of sexual and familial relationships. Again, very recently, in “Shunyo-ebuke”, a Bengali film by Koushik Ganguly, the protagonist is a flat-chested woman of the 21st
century who questions the very basis of judging the worth of a woman “by her cleavage”. In a
vain society where a well-rounded, curvaceous figure is regarded as a supreme embodiment of
female beauty, where her bust line holds more value than her brain and her emotions, this hardhitting film questions the projection of women as sex objects in Indian society. Thus, from
Hritwik Ghatak’s “Subarnarekha” to Rituparno Ghosh’s “Bariwali”, from Raj Kapoor’s “Ram
Teri Ganga Maili” to Madhur Bhandarkar’s “Chandni Bar”, we see the changing face of Indian
women enmeshed in their private world of inner turmoil and the external world of multiple
challenges. Women in India, defined by a set of relationships and models of conduct within the
framework of a created society, have over the years, learned to live under the twin whips of
heritage and modernity; and it is welcome if more and more directors in the coming years project
the awakening feminine consciousness, breaking arc archetypal patterns with their clarity of
perception.
Chak De India was aimed at promoting the sport of hockey in India, Bollywood superstar
Shah Rukh Khan said more than sports, it was about woman empowerment. ''Chak De India' is
about sports - it could be any sport, be it hockey, cricket, football or chess. However, more than
that it is about the empowerment of women, the right of the woman to choose what she wants to
do in Indian society.
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Awakening :empowering women through micro loans film: documents the social and economic
empowerment of women in Afghanistan and India whose roles have traditionally been restricted
by their cultures. Awakened to new possibilities through education and access to micro-loans
these women are redefining their roles in society. In Bihar, India’s poorest state, Sister Mary
Lobo organizes village women into groups where they learn to save small sums and invest their
capital as a group. In Afghanistan, the nation’s first woman-led micro-finance institution believes
the nation’s long-term success is dependent on women’s economic freedom
Significant Women Roles in Indian Cinema
Innovative women roles in Indian films, especially mainstream cinema, are few and far
between. Some creative directors, working within the mainstream format, however have given us
some meaty characters. Several women-significant films were made in the early days of Indian
cinema like "Achchyut Kanya," which touched the theme of untouchability. Bimal Roy made a
few films inspired by the novels of Sarat Chatterjee like "Biraj Bou", "Devdas" and "Parineeta."
"Biraj Bou" was a film based on a selfless Indian woman, who endured hardship and pain for the
sake of her husband. Films like "Ramer Sumoti," based on a Sarat Chaterjee work, were
remarkable and depicted the love and warmth which existed within the extended Indian joint
family. In later days, filmmaker Hrishikesh Mukherjee gave us memorable heroine-oriented
films in "Guddi," "Abhimaan", "Mili", "Khubsuroot", and "Majhli Didi". "Guddi" and
"Khubsuroot" were simple films in which the heroine matures from a chirpy girl into
womanhood. "Abhiman," inspired by "A star is born," dealt with ego clashes when a woman's
musical talent and fame surpasses that of her husband. "Majhli Didi" was again based on a Sarat
Chandra novel, about a woman's compassion towards an orphaned child. Basu Bhattacharyya's
"Griha Pravesh" was a realistic depiction of the obsession of a married man for a much younger
office colleague. Raj Kapoor's "Prem Rog" was a convincing portrait of the agony of a young
widow. A few years back, Basu Chaterji's "Triyacharittar" was a powerful film on exploitation of
women. (Subhajit Ghosh : 2002). Bengali filmmaker Tapan Sinha has created strong female
characters in several of his films viz "Jatugriho", "Adalat O Ekti Mey", "Apanjan", "Nirjan
Saikate" and others. "Jatugriho" dealt with marital discord, the bone of contention being the
infertility of the woman. "Apanjan" was remade in Hindi as "Mere Apne" by Gulzar, and had an
elderly woman as the protagonist who finds, in some unemployed street boys, a reason to live
when her own relatives forsake her. "Nirjan Saikatey" dealt with the plight of five elderly
widows, while "Adalat O ekti Mey" was on a rape victim shunned by everyone. Asit Sen's "Deep
Jele Jai," remade in Hindi as "Khamoshi" was on a nurse who eventually becomes insane playacting with a patient.
Strong female roles have also been witnessed in parallel cinema. Here, Mrinal Sen
appears to have an edge over others. His "Neel Akaser Neechey" (1959) was a beautiful film
about a brother-sister relationship between a Chinese hawker and a Bengali housewife.
"Punoscho"(1961) dealt with the question of economic need of the heroine, a theme later tackled
by Satyajit Ray in "Mahanagar." The roles of the female protagonist in Sen's "Bhuvan Shome",
"Khandahaar," "Ek Din Pratidin", "Antareen" and others have been an interesting mix of
innovation and fresh characterization. Satyajit Ray's films have female characters of substance.
In "Pather Panchali" the relationship between Durga, an innocent but mischievous girl and her
grandmother Chunnibala was beautifully depicted. "Charulata" based on a Tagore's novel dealt
with marital discord with much finesse. "Devi" was on religious bigotry when an elderly man
starts thinking of his daughter-in-law as a Goddess after a dream. Ritwik Ghatak's "Meghe
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Dhaka Tara" and "Subarnarekha" are considered path-breaking films about the agony of the
Bangladeshi refugees, shown through the eyes of the woman protagonist. Aparna Sen's "36
Chowringhee Lane" is an unforgettable film exploring the loneliness of an elderly Anglo-Indian
lady. Sen's other efforts "Paroma" and "Sati" questioned the traditional roles of women in Indian
society. Her latest award-winning work "Paromitar Ek Din" is also a women-centric film.
Nabyendu Chaterji's "Atmaja" had a power-packed role of a mother caught between the
divergent ideologies of her two sons, enacted with conviction by Gauri Ghosh. Nabyendu
Chaterji's latest "Sauda" (Bengali) reveals negative shades of some women characters. In this
film made in the 90s, the director, possibly the first in Indian cinema, portrayed how the wife and
the daughters of an accident victim, now in the operation theatre of a hospital, craved for his
death instead of his recovery, because the family has been promised a huge sum of money by an
industrialist (Vasant Choudhury) as compensation, whose car was involved in an accident with
the victim. The latest talent on the Kolkata filmmaking scene, Rituparno Ghosh, has womenrelated subjects as theme in all three of his award-winning films "Unishe April", "Dahan" and
"Asookh" and his latest "Bariwali" (featuring Kiron Kher). The women characters in the films of
Gautam Ghose & Buddhadeb Dasgupta are equally intriguing. In Gautam Ghose's "Antarjali
Jatra" a young bride is forcibly married off to a dying Brahmin, while marital disharmony was
the subject of films like Buddhadeb Dasgupta's "Griha Yuddha" and "Lal Darja" and Aparna
Sen's "Yugant". Sanat Dasgupta's "Janani" featuring Rupa Ganguly was a poignant Bengali film
about a woman who was ostracized and labeled a "witch," but in the end sacrificed her life for
her son.
Ordinary women characters, rising to extraordinary levels, were witnessed in films like
Sushant Mishra's "Aasha" (Oriya), Arinbam Shyam Sharma's "Imagi Ningtem" (Manipuri) and
Sanjeev Hazarika's "Meemansxa" (Assamese). "Aasha" dealt with a courageous lady journalist
hounded by corrupt politicians. "Meemansxa," dealt with the agony faced by a woman when she
moves to court after being molested by a powerful man. Shyam Benegal in films like "Ankur",
"Sardari Begum" and "Mammo" have given us some unusual female characters. "Mammo" was
an elderly lady who went through an ordeal when she comes to visit her relatives in partitioned
India from Pakistan. Govind Nihalani in "Rukmavati ki Haveli", "Dhristi", "Hazaar Chaurasi Ki
Maa" has given us women characters of myriad hues. "Dhristi" was on marital discord, while
"Hazaar Chaurasi Ki Maa" saw Jaya Bachchan giving a fine performance as a woman trying to
cope with the death of her son. Ketan Mehta's "Mirch Masala" with the powerful actress Smita
Patil demonstrated the strength of women, when a group of village women unitedly bring about
the fall of a tyrant police officer. Muzaffar Ali's "Umraao Jaan" gave Rekha one of her finest
roles in her career as a 'kotha ' dancer. A disabled dancer overcoming her problems to rise to
great heights in her field was the subject of "Nache Mayuri," with Sudha Chandran playing the
lead role. Prakash Jha's "Mrityudand" witnessed a new face of the educated Indian women,
willing to rebel and fight for her rights. (Subhajit Ghosh : 2002)
Likewise, Deepa Mehta's "Fire" brought to the fore hitherto taboo subjects like
lesbianism to the Indian screen for the first time. Women characters in Mahesh Bhatt's "Arth",
"Swayam", "Kaash" and "Tamanna" were interesting. Smita Patil and Shabana Azmi gave great
performances in "Arth" while in "Kaash," the wife tries to cope with a failed actor husband who
turns a derelict and a little son diagnosed with a terminal disease. Likewise Gulzar's "Andhi",
Mausam" and "Koshish" and Kalpana Lazmi's "Ek Pal" was noteworthy. "Aandhi," was on the
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life of a lady politician and in "Koshish," Sanjeev Kumar and Jaya Bhaduri gave mind-blowing
performances as a hearing impaired couple. Sai Paranjype's "Saaz" and "Sparsh" deserves a
mention. Amol Palekar's "Dayaara" and "Kairee," too, are exceptional. "Dayaraa" dealt with the
life of a transvestite. "Kairee" is about a little girl and her relationship with her aunt. "Rao
Saheb," "Chakra" "Mother India" and "Dahej" dealt with the theme of subjugated women who
were exploited.
Yash Chopra's portrayal of women have been extraordinary. Be it Nanda in the role of a
murderess in "Ittefaq" or that of Rekha and Jaya Bachchan in "Silsila" women in his films have
been consciously different from their peers. Recently the film "Astitva" ( featuring Tabu)
explored sensitively a women's role in a marriage when her husband discovers after twenty-five
years that his wife had a sexual relationship with a man which resulted in an offspring, and the
offspring is actually the same whom he had been considering his own son.
Lately in Assamese cinema several strong women characters was evoked, like in Bhaben
Saikia's "Agnisnaan", Jahnu Barua's "Firongoti", Dr Shantanu Bordoloi's "Adajya" and others. In
"Agnisaan," the female protagonist (Moloya Goswami) has a relationship with another man
when her philandering husband crosses all limits. "Firongoti" was based on the life of a lady
school teacher who tries to bring education among poor villagers.
In films from the South, K.S.Sethumadhavan's "Stri", Prema Karanth's "Phaniyamma",
Girish Kasarvalli's "Kraurya", Balu Mahendra's "Moonram Pirai" (remade as Sadma in Hindi) or
Adoor Gopalakrishnan's "Mathilukal" have intriguing female characterization. "Stri" dealt with
the wife of a drunken man, who in spite of all her husband's faults and their apparent differences,
could never forsake her husband. It did carry the message "Pati is Parmeswar," but in a beautiful
way. "Phaniyamma" dealt with the agony of a young widow, whereas "Kraurya" dealt with the
neglect of the elderly. In "Sadma," SriDevi gave a fine performance as a girl whose mental
condition reverts to that of a five-year-old when she meets with an accident. In conclusion,
several filmmakers have earnestly tried to portray women in a dignified, realistic, and an
intriguing way and have succeeded considerably. Of this genre, filmmakers like Satyajit Ray,
Mrinal Sen, Hrishikesh Mukherjee, Mahesh Bhatt, Amol Palekar, Tapan Sinha and Girish
Kasaravalli and a few others seems to have given us the best of such women-significant
films(Subhajit Ghosh : 2002).
Profile of women directors of Hindi films undergoing a change
Sushmita Sen announcing her intention to direct a biopic on Rani Laxmi Bai and Neelima
Azeem also declaring her intention to step into the arena of film direction, a new paradigm shift
is being experienced in the arena of film direction of India. In a close parallel to what is being
done by their male counterparts in the industry, now the female actors are also ready to wield the
megaphone. The difference in the present times however, lies in the fact that the actors are the
female actors who are still in the prime of their career are now jumping on to wield the
megaphone. The category is getting quotient of glamour in more than adequate proportion. In the
modern times, the inclination on part of the mainstream female actors to test the choppy terrain
of direction seems to stem from the urge to be on par with their contemporary male actors. The
urge also seems to have been triggered from the success stories that their male contemporaries
are achieving by stepping into the field of direction. However, the experimentation that Sushmita
Sen and Neelima Azeem are trying to attempt would make a hole in the way in which a life span
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of a female actor in the Indian film industry is concerned. A new and refreshing phase for the
film industry indeed is in the offing as films from the perspective of a female actor would make
their debut. Already women directors are making waves, but of these, it would be difficult to
single out one who would have acted in front of the camera and has now shifted to wield the
megaphone. It is the sheer economics as well, that seems to be the triggering factor in making
this change being introduced in the industry. Any fresh wave that comes in is an indication about
a vibrant and pulsating industry and is a pointer towards the spirit of dynamism present in the
industry.
Way forward
Freedom of Expression is a fundamental human right as stated in Article 19 of the UN
Declaration of Human Rights. On the 60th anniversary of that declaration. At this year’s World
Press Freedom Day celebration, UNESCO explored how media freedom and access to
information feed into the wider development objective of empowering people. Empowerment is
a multi-dimensional social and political process that helps people gain control over their own
lives. This can only be achieved through access to accurate, fair and unbiased information,
representing a plurality of opinions, and the means to actively communicate vertically and
horizontally, thereby participating in the active life of the community. However, in order to make
freedom of expression (FEX) a reality, a legal and regulatory environment must exist that allows
for an open and pluralistic media sector to emerge; political will to support the sector and rule of
law to protect it must also exist, and there must be law ensuring access to information, especially
information in the public domain. Finally, news consumers must have the necessary media
literacy skills to critically analyze and synthesize the information they receive to use it in their
daily lives and to hold the media accountable for its actions. These elements, along with media
professionals adhering to the highest ethical and professional standards designed by practitioners,
serve as the fundamental infrastructure on which freedom of expression can prevail. On this
basis media serves as a watchdog, civil society engages with authorities and decision-makers,
information flows through and between communities.
The fuel that drives this engine is information and therefore access to information is
critical. Freedoms of information laws, which permit access to public information, are essential,
but so are the means by which information is made available, be it through ICTs or the simple
sharing of documents. Open and pluralistic media are, perhaps, most precious when they simply
provide the mirror for society to see itself. These moments of reflection are instrumental in
defining community objectives, making course corrections when society or its leaders have lost
touch with each other or gone astray. Increasingly, this role has fallen to the smaller community
media sector as financial imperatives drive corporate media away from these core principles and
into profit centers that do not cater to smaller or marginalized populations. This concept paper
aims to set a framework for WPFD 2008 by examining some of the mechanisms through which
community empowerment can be achieved.
In order for citizens to engage in public debate and to hold their governments and others
accountable, key elements of living in a participatory democracy, citizens must have access to
free, pluralistic, independent and professional media. The idea that communication and dialogue
between different members of society will occur naturally cannot be taken for granted, and the
media provide a means of access to information and igniting dialogue. Fueling the democratic
discourse the media can fulfill a watchdog role by reporting on the activities of governments,
46
civil society and the private sector. A plurality of media outlets is key for this to occur because of
the breadth of material to report on and to ensure that different opinions will be heard. The media
enables citizens to be informed and participate in their society, which generates real
empowerment. Accurate, fair and unbiased reporting is the best defense against ignorance and
uninformed decision-making.
Even though many media outlets have made provisions for audience participation and
have therein become more accessible to the people they serve, nowhere is accessibility and
specificity of purpose so well defined as with community media. Currently radio is the most
widespread form of community media in the developing world because it is cheap to produce
and to access, can cover large areas, and overcomes illiteracy.
Community Media, Media with a mission Community radio defines itself more by its
mission than its size or location. It usually evokes a grassroots attitude and a bias toward the free
flow of opinions and ideas. It seeks to educate and entertain, to inform and amuse, and to create a
big tent under which its listeners can engage and challenge each other as well as their political
leadership. These operations tend to be smaller, community based and managed, with a reliance
on local support that may include advertising but more often is reflected in donations and
volunteerism. Community media will often fill the void left by larger corporate media entities
that operate under different imperatives that may not include the underrepresented or
marginalized populations in a society.
While not always the case, women and young people will find a home for their issues and
encouragement of their participation within the community media framework. The inclusion of
women remains a challenging development issue because they are habitually excluded from the
decision-making processes within their own societies, whilst being the first point of contact on
many health and educational issues. Similarly, more attention should be given to the inclusion of
youth within the media and to developing their media literacy skills. Over the long-term, local
media can create a coherent narrative of a region’s development and help people formulate goals
and plans for how to improve their situation. The media can help contextualize national
development programs within community frameworks and bring these goals closer to their
intended beneficiaries. Effective local media can also help people understand the history and
evolution of oppression or discrimination and give them the necessary perspective to make
rational choices to emerge from it. With this information, people have the means to participate in
democratic processes and shape their own futures locally and nationally.
Making every citizen a “reporter” Professional journalists are the core of a reputable
media environment. However, they are by no means the only ones actively chronicling the world
around them. New technology is giving an unprecedented opportunity to citizens to inform
others. . In crises, citizens reporting like journalists may be the only way for human rights abuses
and other violations of a criminal or environmental nature to be brought to face broad public
scrutiny. Citizen reporting may also be a way to work against censorship, following protests or
political turmoil. If information becomes decentralized, censorship becomes less effective
because it is no longer containable within the media outlets. Information can change the way we
see the world around us, our place in it, and how to adjust our lives in order to maximize the
benefits available through our local resources. Fact driven decision-making can significantly
47
alter our political, social and economic perspectives. The right to access information can be
interpreted within the legal frameworks that support Freedom of Information as it applies to
information held by public bodies, or in a wider sense to encompass both access and circulation
of information held by other actors, where it becomes intrinsically linked to Freedom of
Expression.
The Basis of informed decision-making Information is power. Freedom of Information
and Freedom of Expression work against the concentration of information within the hands of a
few. Of course, all information is subject to interpretation. For this reason, the clearinghouse
function of an open and pluralistic media sector is critical to a better understanding of any issue.
In terms of encouraging the empowerment of citizens, Freedom Of Information is at the heart of
a participatory democracy. Consider the consequences of an uninformed electorate going to the
polls; consider the consequences when information flows are curbed or manipulated in times of
political crisis or ethnic strife. Freedom of Information promotes a true sense of ownership
within society and therefore gives meaning to the concept of citizenship.
The practicalities of access Freedom of Information does not guarantee access. Even if
governments were to become models of disclosure through e-governance by putting their
information online, without a means to access that information people would not be more
empowered. Internet connectivity and IT resources have become crucial to unhindered access to
information. This is also true for accessing national or international news or even simply to
provide a plurality of media options. If the absence of connectivity or equipment can highlight
the digital divide and the ensuing knowledge gap that separates developing and developed
countries, groups within a country can also become further marginalized by their inability to
access information on the internet. The Sixth National Meeting of the Network of Women in
Media, India; Pune, 8-10 February 2008, media women gathered at the sprawling campus of the
Yashwantrao Chavan Academy of Development Administration (YASHADA) in Pune for the
sixth national meet of the Network of Women in Media, India. The Network of Women in
Media, India, registers its concern about the Broadcast Bill (Broadcasting Services Regulation
Bill, 2007) and Content Code (Self-Regulation Guidelines for the Broadcasting Sector). As
media professionals aware of the important role of media in society.The Supreme Court of India
has also clearly stated that the airwaves belong to the public and that their use is to be regulated
by a public authority in the interests of the public. The first step towards media regulation that
respects and protects freedom of expression is the setting up of a properly constituted, competent
and independent public authority empowered with a clear mandate and guaranteed autonomy.
17th Annual conference of the Asian Media Information and Communication Center (AMIC)
also talked about the importance of media in contemporary times for gender sensitization.. The
event focused on how an active and vibrant media can achieve the Millennium Development
Goals (MDG). MDG’s were formulated in September 2000 when the United Nations (UN)
gathered at the Millennium Summit to cooperate towards reducing poverty and other forms of
human deprivation. The 8 goals embodies specific targets in eliminating poverty worldwide
including achieving gender equality The question of gender equality is a subject of much debate
across Asia today as more and women enter the workforce, especially at top professional levels
which were previously male domains. This is changing relationships between men and women
both at work and in the home. Traditionally the importance of motherhood is what has defined
the role of women in Asia, but this is also changing as women become more financially
48
independent. Yet, these ideas may even have to undergo some change in thinking. In the new
economical era, as working women begin to shape the economic and social scenes,
empowerment is more about the ability to make choices. Looking at the society, mass media can
be considered a powerful agent in society in transmitting values, perceptions and influencing
attitudes. Perhaps the media industry itself may be the best indicator of this changing role of
women in Asia. Looking within the industry there is a general positive shift in the profile of
women. Women journalists are on the rise and in broadcasting women are more prominent as
compared to other industries. On the same note there is a long drawn criticism regarding the
negative or stereotypical portrayals of women in media especially on television which the most
popular medium. If women are continued to be portrayed in the traditional roles or portrayed as
sex objects achieving gender equality becomes a distant dream. There is a constant struggle
between gender sensitivity and commercialization within the industry. The political solution is to
employ strategies to improve girl’s development, and then changing traditional culture will be
one of the most significant solutions. In this respect, media will play an important role.
Conclusion
Consumerism and the consequent vulgarization of the fabric our cultures are bound to
grow unless serious effort is made to curb the menace. It is essential to enlist the support of
policy makers, parliamentarians on the appropriate policy and guidelines for the media to ensure
that there is no negative portrayal of women. Although many excellent women have contributed
regularly to the journalism, media, television, a constant problem has been identification of the
right kind of approach. Because professionalism needs ability to produce articles which are
sensitive to the issues and problems concerning women, for the most part, such training should
be given to women journalist who is based on deeper sensitivity and awareness related with
women aspects. two important element are basic to the development are: need for consciousness
raising sessions which encourage women journalist and second is the need for more information
among journalist about what is going on in their region and else where in the way of women and
development projects. They need to travel, discuss, to exchange ideas, to learn what has been
successful and what has failed. Moreover, correspondent needs to come together from time to
time, at least within their own regions, in order to break down feelings of isolation and to
promote a sense of cohesion and identity with a larger network. The citizens both man and
woman, who constitute media audience, must act as pressure groups and monitor media
performance in gender sensitive issues. Ensuring freedom for the media around the world is a
priority. Independent, free and pluralistic media are central to good governance in democracies
that are young and old. Free media can ensure transparency, accountability and the rule of law;
they promote participation in public and political discourse, and contribute to the fight against
poverty. An independent media sector draws its power from the community it serves and in
return empowers that community to be full a partner in the democratic process. Freedom of
Information and Freedom of Expression are the founding principles for open and informed
debate. New technology will continue to evolve and allow citizens to further shape their media
environments as well as access a plurality of sources. The combination of access to information
and citizen participation in media can only contribute to an increased sense of ownership and
empowerment.
49
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Purvis, ‘Hidden From History’ in the Polity Reader in Gender Studies, 2002.
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Polity, 1994.
51
LESSON 3
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND WOMEN
Introduction
The Indian economy has undergone a significant change and transformation in the 1990s.
This has happened in the form of what the Indian government calls “liberalization”. This process
is broadly seen as an opening up of the Indian market to foreign investment. The logic of this
rolling back of relative state control of the production process is largely based in the rhetoric that
surrounds what is called “globalization”. The debate is taking place in the media, academic and
political parties and the most frequently voiced argument is that India should not be ‘ left behind
in the rapidly shrinking global village’. The debate also occupies an important place in the study
of politics of the developing world, to-the-extent that liberalization, or the open up of the
developing economies to international investment, is seen as a key symptom of development
itself, while the viability of democratic industry in the presence of international competition,
particularly from the establishment in the developed world, is ignored. The argument is rejected
on the ground that such an approach would handicap the viability and growth of domestic
industries (Jahnavi Phalkey :1999:38).In the context of the liberalization policies of the
Indian government in the 1990s, that strategy change would become ever-more complex.
As the global reach of social movement increases through technological and
informational trade and market begin to impinge significantly on national economies, the
relationship between local struggles, social movements and the nation- state will be
mediated by forces of globalization. This would perhaps, be more visible a trend in
countires likes India, where liberalization and structural adjustment policies are quite new
and deeply contested. In the context of multiparty democratic political system, weak
infrastructures power of the state and the growing pressures on the political system
because of increasing social disparities and new social coalitions, the rate and pace of
globalization become unpredictable. This unpredictability could then become part of the
negotiations that take place between local struggles and state fractions ( Shirin M. Rai:
1999:18).In India, there are wide regional variations in the sex ratio of each state. A wide
range of social factors contribute to this situation and this sex ratio is an outcome of the
prevailing socio-economic condition of women and their position in society. Female infant
mortality, age specific female morbidity and mortality, educational access and achievement, work
participation, access to health services, poor nutrition and other development indicators
point to women's low status in society. Customs such as Sati and female infanticide were
common mal-practices for many centuries. Purdah system and practice of dowry are still widely
prevalent in the State. It is also widely believed that domestic and sexual violence against
women is quite high. Female literacy is among the lowest in the country. A larger number of
girl children than boys die in the ages of 0-4 due to disease and presumably neglect.
Women and girls of India are known to carry a greater burden of illiteracy, poor health,
oppression, social discrimination, poverty and powerlessness of the as compared to their
sisters in many other parts or me country. Persistence of the tradition of child marriage
and looking at a girl child as “Paraya Dhan” have robbed many girl children of their
childhood and plunged them into domestic responsibilities at a tender age. The security of
traditional and social systems provided to women moving out of their homes for
52
education and employement is being regarded as insufficient which needs to be strengthened.
In the absence of new social norms, laws and enforcement systems, women of Rajasthan are
passing through a critical transitional period. These are indeed challenging times. Despite poor
status and hard living conditions, women of this state are known for their courage, strength and
firm determination. Surviving in such a harsh environment where simple necessities of life like
water and firewood involve many hours of hard work is a major achievement in itself. Women of
Rajasthan are known the world over for their artistic sense, song, dance and traditional crafts. They
are also well known for their capacity to work hard in difficult work environments on
construction sites and roads. While on the one hand, women can be seen working hard side by
side with men in Delhi and other neighbouring states, on the other hand in some communities
where men folk have migrated for earning a living, women communities are left behind for
running their households on their own in very harsh circumstances. Rajasthan is the first state to
have launched in 1984 in 6 districts, the Women Development Programme for the development
of women. Then keeping in view the positive results of the evaluation of this programme, it was
extended to the whole of the state. This in itself is a unique programme. This programme aims
not only at providing services and facilities to women but also to improve the economic status
and economic independence in women.
Economic polices of India introduces, the Tenth Five Year Plan (2002-07) called for a
three pronged strategy of social empowerment, economic empowerment and providing gender
justice to create an enabling environment of positive, economic and social policies for women
and eliminating all forms of discrimination against them and thus advance gender equality goals.
The Government of India as initiated various schemes spread across a broader spectrum such as
women's need for shelter, security, safety, legal aid, justice, information, maternal health, food,
nutrition etc. as well as their need for economic sustenance through skill development, education,
and access to credit and marketing. In order to address the phenomenon of domestic violence,
which is widely prevalent but remains largely invisible in the public domain, the Protection from
Domestic Violence Act, 2006 was enacted by the Parliament. The Act envisages that the
Protection Officer would assist the victim of domestic violence to be secure from violence and
help her to access shelter homes, health care and legal advice. For a holistic empowerment of
women to happen, social, economic and political aspects impacting on women must converge
effectively. The multiple roles of women and the meager ability to access resource and available
assets are areas of concern. It is important to emphasize that women require adequate security
and protection to be self-reliant.
The development process affects women and men in different ways. The after effects of
colonialism, and the peripheral position of poor countries of the south and those with economies
in transition in today’s global zing world, exacerbate the effects of discrimination on women.
The penetration of capitalism, leading to the modernization and restructuring of subsistence and
centrally planned economies, often increases the gender-based disadvantages. Modernization of
agriculture has altered the division of labour between the sexes, increasing women’s dependent
status as well as their workload.
The role of men and women in different places show great variation. At the beginning of
the third millennium most of the world’s population is living more comfortably than it was a
century ago. Women as a group now have a greater voice in both their public and private lives.
The spread of education and literacy has opened up new opportunities for many people and the
time-space compression associated with globalization is making possible the increasingly rapid
53
and widespread distribution of information and scientific knowledge. Improvements in
communications, however, also make us aware that economic development is not always
unidirectional.
Women’s organizations, and various United Nations international women’s conferences
in Mexico City, Copenhagen, Nairobi and Beijing over the last three decades, have put gender
issues firmly on the development agenda. The experiences of different states and regions show
that economic prosperity helps gender equality but some gender gaps are resistant to change.
Rapid growth, as in the East Asian countries, has led to a narrowing of the gender differences in
wages and education but inequality in political representation remains. Sudden, economic
change, such as structural adjustment programmes or the post-cold war transition in Eastern
Europe, creates new gender differences in which women are generally the loser.
Over the half a century ago, in 1946, the United Nations set up the commission on the
status of women. It was to have two basic functions: to prepare recommendations and reports to
the economic and social council on promoting women’s rights in political, economic, civil, social
and educational fields; and to make recommendations on urgent problems requiring immediate
attention in the field of women’s rights (united nation 1996:13). The remit of the commission
remained essentially the same until 1987 when it was expanded to include advocacy for equality,
development and peace and monitoring of the implementation of measures for the advancement
of women at regional, sect oral, national and global levels.(united nations 1996). Today it is clear
that progress towards gender equality in most parts of the world is considerably less than that
which was hoped for. However, disparities between women in different countries are greater
than those between men and women in any one country.(Janet Henshall Momsen:2004).
Structural Adjustment
This article is a contribution to the ongoing debate on the possible positive and negative
impact of the newly –introduced New Economic Policies (NEP) and Structural Adjustment
Programme (SAP) on women workers. The article attempt to link the political and social
implication’s of these economic polices on women’s lives and work with the development of
strategies for the survival and empowerment, focusing on urban working women. The structural
adjustment will lead to feminization of labour and thus to greater employment opportunities for
women. But the feminization itself is a term, which hides more than its reveals, because several
contradictory possibilities are conflated in using the word. They show that the trends rather, are
towards the declining employment of women due to automation and introduction of technology
in a context of structural adjustment, and suggest organizational strategies, which will strengthen
women’s resources in confronting the greater economic pressures they will have to face.
Women’s groups have joined other progressive and voluntary organization to express
their fear of possibility of a severe negative impact especially on the lives of workingwomen.
Children and women of poorer families were the hardest hit by recession. Apart from
the effects on nutrition, workload, mortality, etc.., studies have shown how traditional industries
which employed large percentage of women were being closed after introduction of SAP.
Indian women form a vulnerable and exploited group of people. India has one of the
lowest sex ratio in the world of 1,000 males to 923 females. It is a further drop from the 1981
figure of 1,000 males: 934 females. Only 39.4 per cent of women are literate. Less women than
54
men work for a living for every three men only one woman uses health facilities. (Batlivala,
1984). There are depressing figures on the number of rapes, dowry, murders, sexual harassment
and assaults on women.
Given the existing structure of discrimination against women, the introduction SAP via
the NEP with its attendant problems of inflation, recessions, restructuring of industry, fall in real
wages, will intensify and worsen conditions particularly for poor women. There will also be fall
in working women’s standard of living, poor nutritional and health level, an increase in the
double burden of work and a brake to any improvement of their status in society.
This structural adjustment generally involves an increase in production for export
combined with demand-reducing policies, such as removal of subsidies on basic food stuffs,
price rises, wage cuts and job losses. It may be argued that the social costs of structural
adjustment would have been worse without the IMF intervention, but for a long time there was
little appreciation by international agencies of the gender bias in their Impact.
In response to structural adjustment, women have developed new survival strategies. This
behavior has been called ‘invisible adjustment’, implying that women make adjustment
policies socially possible by increasing their own economic activities, by working harder and
by self-abnegation.there was a marked increase in the time women spent on income-earning
work at the expense of social duties, household maintenance and their own leisure, especially
in the dry season.
The hegemony of neo-liberal structural adjustment shifts the burden of welfare from the
states to individual families and especially women. Wage cuts and the raising cost of living
forces more women are paid less than men. The impact of the economic crisis of the 1980s on
female economic activity rates was very mixed. It varied not only from country to country but
within countries, between economic sectors, between urban and rural areas and according to age
and educational levels. Increased production for export provided new jobs for women in laborsintensive manufacturing, data entry and word –processing. Some new jobs were also created for
women in agro business, but the expansion of agricultural exports benefited men than women.
The most widespread effect was a slowdown in the participation of women in the formal
workforce, which had been growing since 1960, and an expansion of the informal economy.
Family structure also responded, with an increase in the number of extended families in which
both household and wages could be shared (Momsen: 2004).
In the 1990s the collapse of the Soviet Union and the rapid global spread of capitalism
led to further economic crisis, especially in the former centrally planned economies.
Unemployment, previously unknown, became widespread and in most countries was worse for
women than men. Natural disasters, such as drought and floods, caused major development
setbacks and civil strife in East Timor, Sri Lanka, the Balkans and several African countries and
undermined much of the progress made during the 1970s.formal employment grew again in the
1990s, particularly in the service industries, although women’s jobs tend to enjoy less social
protection and employment rights than do men’s jobs. Women also increased their share as selfemployment workers and as workers in managerial and administrative positions in the 1990s.
Women have been particularly affected by the industrial restructuring brought about as a result
of the introduction of new less labour-intensive technology, and of decreased foreign direct
55
investment in assembly industry in most of the 40 developing countries operating export zones.
Many women join the informal economy or were forced to migrate.
Girls may be taken out of school to replace the mother and so lose their chance to be
trained for a better job in the future, while families will struggle to educate boys. Increased food
prices force poor families to reduce both the quantity and quality of their food intake and women
and children are usually most affected. Malnutrition combined with lack of adequate health care
is being reported from some of the former communist countries. When families can no longer
cope, children are abandoned to fend for themselves on the streets. Men migrate to seek work
elsewhere, with a result that the number of female-headed households increases. However, in the
last decade young women have begun to migrate independently in search of employment often in
domestic service or sex work.(Jenet Henshall Momsen:2004).
Development policies are now aimed at sustainable pro-poor growth. Progress towards
this is being assessed through success at achieving the targets of the Millennium Development
Goals (MDGs). The first of the millennium goal is to reduce by half the proportion of people
living in extreme poverty by 2015. Of the world’s six billion people, 1.2 billion live on less than
US$ 1 per day. Global poverty rates declined by 20 per cent during the 1990s and the number of
people living in extreme poverty almost halved, but most of this decline occurred in china and
India, while most other parts of the world are falling short of the poverty target.
Poverty is not just shortage of material assets but is marked by multiple deprivations.
Trouble and unequal gender relations accompany ill being and feelings of powerlessness and
insecurity. Increased economic hardship and growing male unemployment is pushing poor
women to work outside the home in greater numbers, but this does not automatically give them
greater status or security in the home. Women feel overburden by work and men feel humiliated
by being unable to maintain their status as the main breadwinner. These shifts in gender
identities are a source of deep anxiety for both women and men.
Female-headed households, in general, had a higher chance of being among the
‘chronically’, poor and a lower chance of being among the permanent non-poor, but if the
women household head had primary education she was less likely to be among the ‘chronic’
poor.
Women become more powerful in the face of such acute threats to the survival of the
family because of their traditional responsibility for reproduction. Both mothers and daughters
work longer hours and time becomes their scarcest resource. Women increase their productive
work by seeking alternative sources of income to compensate for declines in household income,
while also spending longer searching for and preparing cheaper types of food. Men feel
themselves marginalized and often-adult males respond by increasing their alcohol consumption
and their level of violence to women, while teenage sons turn to dependence on drugs. The
poorest families, often headed by women, usually bear a disproportionate share of the burden of
poverty and economic crises tend to exacerbate pre-existing gender inequalities. The declining
nutrition levels, the increased cost of health services as a result of adjustment policies, and an
increased dependence on commercial sex as a source of income made women more vulnerable to
the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Overall, the feminization of labour and the growth of the informal
economy reflect a economy a weakened position for men rather than greater economic
56
opportunities for women. Income earning by women does not necessarily lead to social
empowerment or greater gender equity (Narayan et al. 2000b).
Women’s Survival Strategies under the era of Structural Adjustment
Awareness of the need of the communities tends to be greater among women than men,
since it is normally women who have to cope with the problems of housing and access to
services. Consequently, women often take the lead in demanding improvements in urban
services. They may also work together to change social attitudes. Women’s groups in India have
also lobbied for legal restraints on the abortion of female foetuses. As pressure on women’s time
increases, their community management role may change.
Women’s survival strategies often depend on building up networks of women within the
community. Such networks may include extended family as well as colleagues form work and
may reach outside the immediate community. For example communal kitchens in Lima, Peru
such organization also free up time for individual women by relieving them of some domestic
chores and provide a locus for border community base action.
Another important example of Red threat movement in Guyana began in 1986 as a
group of craft workers, with leadership from middle-class women political activists, aimed at
improving employment opportunities and access to resources for poor. It developed into a
political force, uniting women across class and racial boundaries that were involved in
consciousness raising and community political action.
The new global economy is characterized by globalization and the increasing use of
computing and information technologies, but also by deregulation, income polarization and
feminization of employment, with new more flexible patterns and hour of work.
For some younger women, globalization has created new jobs in export-oriented
industries, such as garment making and electronics manufacturing, especially in such areas as the
united states/ Mexican border region and in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Malaysia. For the more
educated women there are new opportunities in call centers and data entry, especially where
English is spoken, as in many parts of the Caribbean, where almost 5,000 women were employed
in data entry in the late 1990s. Women with higher education have been able to benefit from the
global spread of financial institutions, especially in eastern Europe, where women are more
likely than men to be trained in economies and to speak several languages. They are also in
demand as computer programmers. These jobs have empowered young women by providing an
income and exposing them to new cultural concept and ways of living. Work in data processing,
although it may be better than other jobs available locally, may not lead to upgrading in the labor
market, and may be seen as a new kind of sweatshop(Momsen:2004).
Access to mobile telephones has allowed women to set up village phone center.
Bangladesh initiated the Grameen Bank, and in India, where over 250,000 jobs have been
created since 1997.such entrepreneurial activity provides income for the mainly women
operators and enables villages to keep in touch with migrant relatives and friends, but has only
weak linkages to the rural poor who largely remain outside the information loop.
57
The Swaminathan Foundation’s Village Knowledge Centers provide ICT facilities
within project village in southern India, including dedicated website with a variety of locally
relevant content. Computers are also now being used in many poor countries to find out global
markets for artisan items and products from small workshops. Today there is the need to create
women-friendly technology environments, which allow both men and women to be empowered
and allow women to combine ICT and domestic duties. Efforts by women world wide to place
gender firmly at the center of the world summit on the information society stress the importance
of enhancing the possibilities for women at all levels to use ICT tools for the transformation of
gender hierarchies in society, and to challenge stereotyped gender roles.
The spread of global communications technologies has enabled the highly influential
international women’s movement to pioneer a global advocacy campaign, including but also
going beyond the series of United Nations conferences in the 1990s. In this way, marginalized
groups have unprecedented opportunities to create pressure groups that may ultimately transform
national politics.(Jenet Henshall Momsen:2004).
India was one of the latecomers to join this race for liberalization. it was only in 1991 that
it formally declared its intention to put its economy through a process of structural adjustment
and brought for the comprehensive package of policy measures for that purpose. Jayati Ghosh,
for example has highlighted several of these negative impacts on women, as reproducers of the
household, as workers in an altered production system and as consumers in a globalized market.
She then goes on to emphasis that ‘many of these processes will operate to worsen the material
conditions of women workers in the immediate sense and affect their future ability to improve
conditions’ (Ghosh 1994:ws2-ws4).
There are several strands in the basic argument, which at one level seem to lend credence
to this position in the Indian context.
First, as market expands, the scale, technologies and the location of production tend to
shift from household-based production to the factory system. In the process, women who earlier
could combine productive activities with the household’s reproductive work for which they
continue to bear sole responsibility can no longer do so. Consequently they become marginalized
as workers in the modern economy. Secondly, since their reproductive work remains in the nonmonetized section it gets undervalued in comparison with market-oriented work. The traditional
skills and knowledge that women had used in those activities also get devalued in the society and
the economy. On the other hand, by promoting the image of women as non-working, caring
housewives whose main role on behalf of the household is supposed to be that of consumers,
capital can get the work of reproducing the labour power done without paying for its opportunity
cost.
New economy poses a major danger to the movement in so far as it has tended to bring
sharp divisions between educated urban women and the rest. For the sake of poor women who
have always been the central concern of Indian women’s movement, it is necessary to reassert
that markets by themselves are neither pro-nor- anti women.
58
Millennium Development Goals
As we enter into the new millennium the development and the empowerment of women
and the promotion of gender equality is one of the eight internationally agreed millennium
development goals (MDGs) designed to achieve.
Millennium Development Goals
Goal: to promote gender equality and empowerment women
Target: to eliminate gender disparities in primary and secondary education, preferably by 2005
and in all levels of education no later than 2015.
Indicators
Ratio of girls to boys in primary, secondary and tertiary education.
Ratio of literate females to males of 15-24 years of age.
Share of women in paid employment in the non-agricultural sector.
Proportion of seats held by women in national parliaments.
The alternative vision put forward, of development with women, demanded not just a
bigger piece of someone else’s pie, but a whole new dish, prepared, baked and distributed
equally. Women and men are differently by economic change and development and thus an
active public policy is needed to intervene in order to close gender gaps.
In the mission statement of Beijing fourth world conference on women, held in 1995, it
was said that ‘(a) transformed partnership based on equality between women and men is a
condition for people-centered sustainable development’ (United Nations 1996:652).
The focus on gender in development policies came first from the major national and
international aid agencies, and government in the south quickly learned that they needed to build
a gender aspect into their request for assistance. Thus, at the beginning it was the north that
largely imposed the agenda. As non- governmental organizations (NGOs) began to play an
increasingly important role in grassroots delivery of aid, their gender policies began to influence
local action.
The Millennium Declaration signed at the Untied Nations Millennium Summit in 2000
sets out the United Nations’ goals for the next decade. These goals come from the resolutions of
the various world conferences organized by the United Nations during the 1990s. Reaching these
goals will not be easy but they do set standards, which can be monitored. There are eight goals:
1. Reduce the Poverty Ratio by 2015.
2. Enroll all children in primary school by 2015.
3. Empower women by eliminating gender disparities in primary and secondary
education by 2005.
4. Reduce infant and child mortality rate by three- quarters between 1990 and 2015.
59
5. Provide access to all who need reproductive health services by 2015
6. Implement national strategies for sustainable development by 2005 so as to reverse
the loss of environmental resources by 2015.
7. Develop a global partnership for development.
As Boutros Boutros-Ghali said: ‘No true social transformation can occur until every
society learns to adopt new values, forging relationships between men and women based on
equality, equal responsibility and mutual respect’.
Although there is formal recognition of women’s rights and legal equality, the genderdisaggregated data that are now increasingly available have revealed that women continue to
face discrimination. Most governments have formally adopted the 1979 convention on the
elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (CEDAW) but the implementation of
the CEDAW principles is far from complete. It is also worth noting that the number of
reservations expressed by goverernments adopting the convention was the highest for any human
rights instrument negotiated under the auspices of the United Nations, indicating the obstacles
still faced by women.(oloka-onyango 2000).
The 1990s saw an unprecedented series of conferences, some directly concerned with
women and other on environment and social issues in which women’s voices played a major role
in decision-making. Yet at the national level, the decision making position of women
deteriorated. In 2001 women held 14 percent of all seats in parliaments, increases from 9 per cent
in 1987. But the proportion for the less developed countries was only 12 per cent, compared to
18 per cent in the more developed countries. In 2002 the proportion varied from 42.7 per cent in
Sweden to zero in several Middle Eastern countries, although women in Bahrain did get both to
vote and to stand as candidates for the first time. Many of the political inroads women have made
are due to gender quota designed to seat more women legilative bodies, form national
parliaments to village councils. A number of countries including Brazil, France, India, the
Philippines and Uganda, have established such quotas in the last decade.
In South Africa, Increasing the political representation of women is often considered to
be a way of improving the state’s success in meeting women’s needs and raising the efficiency of
government as women politicians are considered to be less corrupt and more altruistic than their
male counterparts. Thus, the United Nations and the World Bank, in their publications, tend to
see more equal gender representation in politics as contributing to development (Bardhan and
Klasen 1999).
However, women’s contribution will never be equally valued until women’s priorities are
included as objective of development. This challenge highlights the importance of another index,
the Gender Empowerment Index (GEM), which takes into account the political power of women
and the proportion of women in professional and technical jobs. (UNDP: 2002).
Sustainable Development
Sustainable development was first developed as a concept in 1987, with the publication
of the Brundtland report. The Brundtland Commission coined the most widely used definition
of sustainable development. Sustainable development does not just mean a cleaner environment;
60
it also requires a stable and healthy economy. Sustainability is a systemic concept, relating to the
community of economic, social, and environmental aspects of human society and all these aspect
directly and indirectly related to women because women play an important role in human
society. It is totally depends on woman how she will manage the environmental sustainability.
The impact of environmental degradation is often greater on women because of gender division
of labour within household which allocate work such as firewood and water collection to
women, precisely tasks which become more difficult with deforestation and falling water tables
(Ines Smyth: 1999:131).
Over one billion people, or 18 per cent of the world ‘s population, lack access to safe
drinking water and over 2.4 billion people are without basic sanitation. The target of reducing by
half 2015 the number of people without access to clear water and sanitation was adopted in the
final plan of action at the world summit on sustainable development, held at Johannesburg in
2002. According to the Untied Nations environment programme (UNEP), every year over two
million people, mainly children, die from diarrhea due to contaminated water and lack of
sanitation, and five million deaths are caused by water –borne diseases. Water shortages are
increasing these days. The United Nations believes that at the current rate of consumption two
out of three people will be living in water-stressed situations by 2025. There is plenty of water
available on the earth but it is not evenly distributed. Providing water for the family is usually
women’s task, with the help of children, and so improved access will reduce their burden of
work, freeing time for other occupations and more regular attendance at school, as well as
improving health. Death and disease has been reduced and in some cases gender roles have
become more interchangeable as women have empowered. The use of polluted sources of water
results in the spread of water –borne disease such as cholera, typhoid and amoebic dysentery, as
well as stomach upsets and diarrhea. Development interventions by supplying wells to villages
have reduced the spread of these diseases but have brought their own problems. Women are
often most immediately affected by these changes because of their household responsibility
involving water and their role as caregivers for the sick in the family.
Women’s Role in Reforestation
In 1989 Professor Wangari Maathai was awarded women-aid’s’ women of the world’
award. This was in recognition of her in setting up the Green Belt Movement (GBM) in Kenya
in 1997. Working with the national council of women she persuaded communities throughout
Kenya to plant more than 10 million trees. Some 35 other African countries have taken up the
scheme. Thousands of green belts have been planted and many hundreds of community tree
nurseries set up. Women have shown each other how to collect the seeds of nearby indigenous
trees, and how to plant and trend them. Slowly the devastating effects of soil erosion are being
reversed. The GBM is a grass-roots environmental movement with multipurpose trees; to reduce
deforestation by planting trees; to promote the cultivation of multipurpose trees; to create a
positive image of women; to make tree-planting an income-earning activity for women and help
the rural poor.
In addition to the green belt movement, local authorities, village’s chiefs, schools and
prisons have established seedling nurseries in Kenya. Women are motivated to grow trees not
only for fuel but also for fodder and fruit, for use as windbreaks, for fencing and for shade and
construction materials. In a study of women’s community forestry practice in part of central
Kenya, it was found that women has many reasons to participating in tree planting: they
recognized the benefited of trees to soil and water conservation; they show the utility of trees in
61
generating income and providing for household needs of fiber, fuel wood, shelter and medicine;
and they wanted to preserve indigenous species. Women have been encouraged by the public
recognition of their activities, by an increase in extension workers and services tailored
specifically to women’s needs and by the free supply of tree seedlings. A major role of the GBM
has been the provision of technical assistance at national and international levels to other
community groups.
The use of low quality fuel for cooking means spending more hours by the side of the
fire, usually in a poorly ventilated kitchen, where inhaling acrid smoke is hard to avoid. It has
been calculated that a day spent inhaling smoke from cooking fires is the equivalent of smoking
400cigarettes and can cause chronic respiratory problems, throat cancer and stillbirths. Women
who cooked with straw or wood when they were 30 years old were found to have an 80 per cent
greater chance than other women of having lung cancer in later years.
Sustainable Strategies
Women must adopt a range of strategies for sustainability of the resources:
Women move from cooking outdoors to indoor to minimize the loss of heat form
wind.
Most women are aware that improved stoves, which are enclosed and have an
opening on one side for insertion of wood and holes for the pots on top, are more
efficient and economical than the traditional three-stone open fire.
When fuel wood is abundant the fire is kept burning to provide protection from
mosquitoes and wild animals, but with scarcity fires are extinguished immediately
after cooking.
Aluminum cooking pots are energy efficient so they are gradually replacing
earthenware pots are seen as being highly priced, earth ware vessel keep food warm
for longer and many people say that the food cooked in the traditional pots tastes
better.
When there is no shortage of fuel wood, water is heated to bathe children, the old and
the sick. Drinking water is also boiled to purify it. With fuel scarcity cold water only
is use for such purposes. Drinking unboiled water is likely to lead to sickness,
especially in young children, pregnant women and the elderly, leading to greater
stress in the family. Washing clothes and dishes and bathing babies in cold water are
harder work for women.
At busy times, women cook more food than is required for a single meal. The
leftovers are used for a second meal. With plentiful wood the leftovers would be
warmed up, but when wood is scarce and expensive they are served cold, saving both
time and fuel.
Carrying heavier loads of wood longer distances is hardship for women.
The extra time needed to find wood and the lack of fuel for cooking forces families to
reduce the number of meals they consume each day in the acute cases.
62
Scarcity of fuel families to cut down on consumption of food items needing long
cooking times, such as pulses and yams, and to give up smoking some items for
longer preservation.
Wood ash from fires is traditionally used to fertilize dooryard gardens but the supply of
this decrease with declining use of fire(Nandita, Sujata, Amrita, Gandhi 2006).
Vulnerability in combination with the occurrence of a natural hazard produces disaster.
Poverty is one of the main aspects of vulnerability but varies with occupation and social
characteristics, such as gender, age, ethnicity and disability. The gender impact of natural
hazards, such as volcanic eruptions, earthquake, hurricanes, typhoons and floods, reflects the
position of women in different cultures. Women generally have less access to resources and less
representation at all levels of decision-making. Women may suffer more than men in most
disasters but may also have central roles in coping and recovery, providing that they are given
the opportunities. . Women may be forced to turn to high risk activities like prostitution in order
to feed their children following a disaster, while men alone in search of employment. Women on
their own are even more vulnerable and may find it especially difficult to get loans for rebuilding
and re-establishing a viable livelihood (Momsen 2003, 240).
Strengthening Survival Strategies
The strategy we develop will have to relate to the specific of our economic situation and
culture of struggle. They will have to constantly bridge the gap between the work place,
community, and neighborhood. These would be intermediate strategies, which can provide
support for women ion the present context, yet contain within them the possibility for
transforming exploitative relations and lay the basis for self-determination.
The strategies are: strategy for the creation of resources which include increasing own
production, increasing sale of labour, sales of assets, increasing production through
voluntary labour exchanges and cooperative work and transferring income to aid
poorer relatives; strategies for conserving and improving the use of existing
resources; and extended family and migration strategies
Women cooked the food on the daily basis shifts every four or five days, with each
household paying according to the number of meals required. The communal kitchens
thus became instrument of redistribution in favor of the poor. Thus, women’s
responsibility towards families and their children‘s health and future became a source
of energy and action that has permitted them to break with traditional; patterns.
Similarly, the mother clubs where mothers took turns to manage childcare centers
have also freed women for other work.
Running Balwadis is a common activity for most organization. However, they are
usually open only for a few hours for pre-school children. With n the same
infrastructure it is possible to extend Balwadi hours for the whole day for small
children of home-based workers.
Women’s groups can help local women to form consumer cooperatives for wholesale
purchase of essential commodity.
63
The integral link between the household, workplace and community affects women’s
work as well as their potential for organizing. Most women perform low skill, manual
jobs which give them a weak position in the labor market. Training women too
develop new skills and enhance existing ones have been recommended time and
again. New training center should be open.
Lack of credit facilities will affect women workers especially the self-employed.
Banks will have to be pressured to respond to the poor sections of society. At the
same time we have to assist women to gain access to family resources by insisting on
joint ownership of land and house, including their names in identity cards, photos
passes and ration cards. This could help in gaining access to formal credit sources.
(Menon Nivedita: 2006).
All these strategies require collective action at different levels. Pressurizing the state,
supporting workingwomen in their daily survival and developing organizational forms, which
can empower them within the household, in the market and in relation to the state. A number of
voluntary organization have stared programmes on health and provision of services like fodder,
banks, credit, etc given the deteriorating economic situation.(Nandita, Sujata, Amrita, Gandhi
2006).
Women Self-Help Groups
There is an urgent need to organize women into self-help groups because many rural
women in this area are landless labourers and are economically very poor; most of them are
illiterates/semi-literates. These women can be organized into self-help groups. The goal of this
program is to promote savings- and credit activities, and to promote employment of these women
into production units. This will lead to a strong and permanent improvement of their socioeconomic conditions in a number of ways: Initiation of savings and credit activities and
promotion of income generating programs in these self-help groups will bring more economic
development and independence to these women and their families. Because of the better welfare
of these families, more children will be able to attend school instead of being forced into
agricultural child labor. For the first time in their life, these disadvantaged rural women become
organized into groups. The formation of these self-help groups will facilitate discussion of many
issues pertaining to their socio-economic, educational and health status. Thus, the formation of
this group provides a forum to initiate many participatory activities (including training and
awareness camps). This process will also lead to increased confidence in these women, and will
help them to gain decision-making status in their society. This will encourage these women to
participate and contribute in general social and political matters in their respective villages,
including women's rights. Thus, the long-term accomplishments of this program will extend far
into the future.
Process Involve in the Self Help Group
First of all, the READ staff explains to these women the concept of self-help groups, by
personal interactions and group meetings. Selected representatives from other agencies are
usually invited to attend these group meetings to provide additional information. These women
groups are given an understanding of the concept of savings and credit activities, and they are
provided with the basic materials (account books, pens, etc.). For each group, a president,
treasurer and secretary are chosen, and these 3 women receive extra training in their duties and
responsibilities. Every 2 or 4 weeks, these groups meet to discuss their ongoing activities and to
64
collect or distribute the money of their savings and credit activities. At these meetings, a READ
staff member is then present to supervise and guide them, which is especially important because
many women are illiterate, and they need to be explained more than once how the activities are
being done. The READ staff also provides assistance to these groups to open a bank account to
keep their money. In addition, READ negotiates with banks, merchants etc., to start production
units in these women groups and find a market for their products.
Performance Analysis
In 1998, READ was the first organization in its area to introduce the concept of women
self-help groups, and 5 women self-help groups were formed. Since then, the program has been
very successful, and READ has presently organized more than 659 women self-help groups in a
more than 108 villages in Andimadam block, and Sendurai block. Each group has approximately
15-20 women.For the first 5 groups that READ has formed, READ was able to mobilize a
revolving fund from the DWCRA (Development of Women and Children in Rural Areas)
agency, for a total amount of 600 US dollars per group to expand the credit activities which they
had already formed from their own savings. Thanks to this program, a total of 57 women have
received credit to develop economic activities; the money is being used for a variety of purposes,
such as the purchase of bullocks, sheep, poultry, goats and sewing machines. The women repay
the money in monthly installments with interest, so that the money in the revolving fund can be
used continuously. In addition, thanks to the guidance of READ, one of these groups has recently
started their own income generation program, by starting a production unit for making goldcovered necklaces, which are being sold in the cities. Nilakantha Mahila Kosha is the name of
women self help group from Puran Panchayat of Balianta Block. It was created, with the help of
a local NGO, after the Super Cyclone, in 1999. This eighteen member group, besides
undertaking micro credit enterprise, shares all their problems and tries to resolve it collectively.
During the critical floods from 2001 the group faced one more challenge. It fortunately could be
solved with techniques and information they acquired in the trainings promoted by the Disaster
Campaign and Preparedness Programme. It was last year, when one of the villagers got drunk.
He did not take proper care and went near the river to see the floodwater. Suddenly, he swayed
and fell into the river and began to drown. The self-help group was informed in time and, with
the help of the local youths, could save him. As he required some medical support, also because
his wife was about to give birth, again Nilakantha Mahila Kosha came to his rescue. The selfhelp group gave from their savings a financial assistance to the family. The group, after this
experience, called a meeting with all the male members of the village to try to close all the liquor
shops of the village. Also, the local police and the Panchayat - the village level politician assisted them in this mission. In addition, the villagers came forward to prepare a contingency
plan for the natural disaster faced by them and this women self help group took the lead in doing
so. They organized male groups and started rehabilitation works of the community by repairing
roads, monitored relief distribution and management of village affairs.
Shramshakti, the report of the national commission on self employed women and women
in the informal sector, to an extent represented the voice of a substantial section of the women’s
movement and of women’s studies scholars, who were inducted into its various task forces.
Activists helped in organizing public hearings with women workers in the informal sector in both
urban and rural areas (government of India 1988). There were shades of divergence or difference
in emphasis in the approach to the problem of women in the informal sector. A large section of
women activists went along with government in its active promotion and special emphasis on the
65
role of women in the self-employed and home based sectors, while others differed with this
approach. The latter felt that this reinforced the process of marginalization and was a retreat on
government’s earlier commitment to bring women into the ‘productive’ sphere. The dilemma
was the genuine one. No one disputed that the limited opportunities for economic earnings
should be expanded and work conditions in this sector be improved. The women’s movement
should have fought harder for gender equality in the labour market force (Banerjee 1995).
Women’s organizations have mushroomed, sometimes combing issues at the workplace
and family environment, sometimes as sub-committee within existing trade environment,
sometimes as sub-committee within existing trade unions or joint fronts. Many groups at the
grassroots level have directly entered or sponsored income-generation activities, with SEVA
heading the list as the most well known combination of the two. Even though women’s
participation in trade union activity and involvement at the level of decision –making still
remains abysmally low, over the last two decades at least the problem has been highlighted and
the class and gender bias (Indu Agnihotri and Vina Mazumdar 2005).
Another important self help group known as SEWA has a membership of nearly 700,000
members all of whom are women in the informal economy in all rural and urban sectors of work,
and we see many changes in their lives, some positive some negative, which are connected with
larger changes in the economy and society. In a way SEWA is a microcosm of the informal
economy in India, and dealing with the changes in the lives of the SEWA members gives a
direction on how it can be done at an economy-wide and policy level. SEWA tried to
systematically explore the links between changes in the women’s lives at a micro-level and the
larger macro policies and trends. SEWA has tried to actively deal with these changes by
strengthening the members to take advantage of openings in the economy available to them, and
resisting changes which are harmful. At the same time SEWA have tried to influence policy at
the macro-level in favour of the workers and producers in the informal economy. In order to deal
with these consequences SEWA is working on four key strategies-organizing of women into
membership based like trade unions, associations; capacity building which includes both
technical as well managerial skills;capital formation in their own names either individually or
preferably collectively in their groups and organizations; social security including access to
health care, child care, insurance, housing and old age benefits. At the same time SEWA is
actively undertaking research to continually trace the effects on its members, and is actively
influencing policy in their favour.
Financial Self Help Group
Long-held traditions of self-help gave impetus to small community-based co-operative
societies that have evolved, with the help of the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development
(AKFED), into small co-operative banks, which then merged to form the Development Cooperative Bank, and eventually metamorphosed during the 1990s into the Development Credit
Bank (DCB). From its origins in small institutions addressing the needs of underserved
communities, especially in the co-operative sector, DCB has emerged as a fully fledged
commercial bank providing advanced corporate finance services at one end of the spectrum
while continuing to service the needs of co-operative society borrowers. Development Credit
Bank Ltd. (DCB) is amongst the fastest growing private sector scheduled commercial Banks in
the country today with a history of operating in the financial services arena for over 70 years
More recently the Bank has seen a rapid expansion in its retail operation and DCB currently has
66
a network of 67 branches (and extension counters) and 101 Automated Teller Machines (ATMs)
in eight states and two union territories. DCB now has a deposit base of Rs. 4,474 Crores
(approximately US$ 972 Million) as on March 2004 and the advances were over Rs 2,439 Crores
(approximately US$ 540 Million). DCB, striving to be recognized as among the country’s most
preferred and profitable retail banks, provides a comprehensive suite of world class products for
specific market segments in chosen geographies and has initiated a ‘liability and select asset
product’ led strategy, through a mix of both owned and outsourced products and multi-channel
capability. The products are innovative, designed to understand customer requirements and offer
customized service.
The Statistical Indices To Measure Employment And Work, Occupational Pattern, Rural
And Urban Sector, Unorganized And Organized Sectors
Economic activity is defined as any activity resulting in the production of goods and
services that add value to the national product. The data sources that provide information on
workers and employment related issues are mainly the Census of India and the National Sample
Survey (NSS). (NSS data refers to the 1993-94 (50th round) and 1999-2000 (55th round) survey).
The Directorate General of Employment and Training (DGET) under the Ministry of Labour
provides annual information on the numbers of persons employed in the organized sector.
Another source of data used here is the time use survey based estimates provided by the Central
Statistical Organization (CSO). This is a pilot survey covering six states to capture India’s socioeconomic, demographic, geographic and cultural diversities. This survey covers more than
18,000 households selected through a proper sampling procedure in the states of Haryana,
Madhya Pradesh Gujarat Orissa, Tamilnadu and Meghalaya, for the period 1998-1999. Time use
statistics provide crucial information on the time spent by men and women in different tasks.
While men are involved largely in the activities recognized as income contributing, the share of
women’s participation is more significant in non-market unpaid activities.
Labour Force Participation Rate
The labour force participation rate (LFPR) is defined as the number of persons in the
labour force per 1000 persons. An estimated 54 percent of males in both rural and urban areas
were in the labour force, while women’s participation in the labour force varies across ruralurban areas. In 1999-2000, the female labour force participation rate (FLFPR) was 30 for rural
areas and much lower at 15 for urban locations. There was a decline in FLFPR from 33 in rural
areas and 16.5 in urban areas in 1993-94 (see table WT1). As per the NSS report (2001), for
females, the rates declined for almost all age groups during the period 1993-94 and 19992000.(Rustagi Preet 2003).
67
68
For the year 1999-2000, most states recorded a decline in participation levels. The low
FLEPPR for rural areas have been reported form Delhi (3.6), Tripura (7.6) and Chandigarh
69
(12.8). In urban areas, after Jammu and Kashmir (6.8), the low FLEPRs were from Tripura (8.1),
Bihar (8.2) and Uttar Pradesh (9.7).
The states where FLEPR has been high in rural areas are Andhra Pradesh (48) Himachal
Pradesh (47), Nagaland (45), Mizoram (44), Maharashtra (44), Tamilnadu (44), and Meghalaya
(42). Generally in Urban areas, relatively more women were in the labour force in the southern
and northeastern states. In 1999-2000, the high FLEPR states in urban locations were recorded in
Mizoram (27,) Kerala (25) and Tamilnadu (25) (see Table WT1). The security of labour force
figures reveals that by and large, higher proportions of women were economically active in the
rice producing and the hilly region states. These are also the states where demand for female
labour is generally higher. This is borne out by the workforce participation data analyzed in the
following subsection. (Rustagi Preet 2003)
Female Work Participation Rate (FWPR)
The Census of India provides detailed information on workers, that is, all those persons
who are involved in economic activities. Workers are further subdivided into main and marginal
workers. The status of main worker is given to those who undertake economically productive
work for a major portion of the year, that is, for more than 183 days. Due to women’s work being
concentrated within the domestic, non-market spheres, their work remains unrecognized. Even
where their work is recognized, women are often marginal workers. The total workers category
that includes both main and marginal workers is used to calculate the female work participation
rate (FWPR).
The female work participation rate refers to the total workers as a proportion of the
female population. The difference between the male and female work participation rate is
calculated for assessing the gender gap in work participation across states/UTs.(Rustagi Preet,
2003)
70
71
Over the last decade, the female work participation rate (that is, the proportion of female
workers (main + marginal) among female population above six years) for India, has registered an
72
increase from 19 in 1991 to 30 in 2001. Across all the states, the FWPR ranges from 8.4 in the
UT Lakshdweep to 56.8 in Mizoram (see table WT2). Work participation is high among females
in the tribal states and the hilly regions such as most of the northeastern states, Himachal Pradesh
and Chattisgarh. These are also the states where disparities across gender in terms of work
participation are lower. The female workforce participation rates according to the NSS figures
over the last two rounds, 50th (1993-94) and 55th (1999-2000), reveal a decline in women’s
participation in labour market activities. The all India female workforce participation in rural
areas has reduced from 33 in 1993-94 to 30 in 1999-2000 (see table WT3). The states where
female workforce participation rates have registered in increase in rural areas over the five year
period are Nagaland, Mizoram, Sikkim, Punjab and Gujarat). In urban areas, the all India figures
for female workforce participation rates are approximately 14 in 1999-2000. This has declined
from 15.5 in 1993-94. Low female workforce participation rates have been recorded from
Jammu and Kashmir, Bihar and Tripura in 1999-2000. Mizoram, Tamilnadu and Manipur are the
states where higher levels of women’s labour market participation have been registered.
Eighty—eight percent of all women workers are in rural areas. Agricultural activities,
whether on their own farms or as hired labourers on the fields of others, are the main occupations
of women workers. Apart from land based occupation, other activities that employ women are
related to animal husbandry, natural resource management and so on. Most of these primary
sector activities offer subsistence employment and are either low paid or unpaid activities.
Among the secondary sector employment avenues (i.e., manufacturing), women are
predominantly involved in informal home based activities. This work in most cases offers little
or no social security, low wages and poor working conditions. The changing organization of
production through the increasing resort to contractualization of work is paving the way for
various exploitative relations, while circumventing even the few legislative measures that
currently exist for workers’ protection. There are other sectors like construction, trading and
services which provide employment for women both in rural and urban areas. Women workers in
the construction industry, for instance, constitute the bulk of the unskilled workforce. Most of the
women in the trading and retailing activities are unpaid family workers or self employed
entrepreneurs. Much of the literature on women’s work emphasizes that even the women’s who
are self employed, are very often, underemployed. This is a residual employment avenue, since
demand for their labour is not forthcoming from other sectors. In the services sector, the majority
of women workers are domestic service providers. Women are at the lower echelons of
employment in formal and informal sector activities. There seems to be a ‘glass ceiling’ to
women’s upward mobility in job hierarchies. It is still difficult to find women holding positions
of power and authority. (Rustagi Preet, 2003)
73
74
75
Organized Sector Employment
This is the sector for which information on workers is available with some degree of
accuracy as opposed to the large numbers of women workers in the unaccounted uroganized
sector. The organized sector offers secure and relatively well-paid jobs. Women’s share in
organized sector employment is only 17 percent. Most women even within the organized sector
are located in the lower rungs of the hierarchy. Very few are managers, bosses or decision
makers. In recent times, with the policy of retrenchments, the numbers of women in the
organized sector have been declining.
Table Wt4: Employment in organized sector as on 31st March, 1999-States
Rank
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
State/Union
Territories
Bihar
A&N Islands
Uttar Pradesh
West Bengal
Jammu & Kashmir
Daman & Diu
Orissa
Madhya Pradesh
Gujarat
Haryana
Rajasthan
Delhi
Maharashtra
Himachal Pradesh
Punjab
Pondicherry
Nagaland
All India
Andhra Pradesh
Chandigarh
Tripura
Goa
Manipur
Meghalaya
Mizoram
Tamil Nadu
Karnataka
Assam
Kerala
1999
% of women
Total
employment to
employed
total
(lakhs)
employment
16.1
6.7
0.4
9
25.9
9.2
23.4
10.3
2.1
10.8
0.1
11.1
8.2
11.6
16.2
11.7
17.7
12.6
6.6
13.3
12.8
13.4
8.5
14.1
38.1
14.7
3
14.9
8.5
15.4
0.5
15.9
0.8
16.6
281.1
17.2
20.6
19.4
0.9
19.5
1.1
20.1
1.1
20.2
0.8
22.2
0.8
23.6
0.4
26.5
25.5
29.1
18.5
29.5
10.5
29.8
12.1
38.6
1998
% of women
Total
employment to
employed
total
(lakhs)
employment
15.8
6.9
0.4
9.2
26
9.2
23
9.3
2.2
10.7
0.1
16.4
8.1
11.2
16.7
11.4
17.6
12.5
6.6
13.3
11.8
14.6
8.5
14.2
38.3
14.6
3
14.8
2
15
9.2
17.3
0.8
16.2
281.9
17.2
20.7
19.6
0.9
19.2
1.1
22.6
1.1
20.2
0.8
22
0.8
22.5
0.4
26
25.5
28.7
17.7
29.4
12.5
31
12.3
37.7
Source: Directorate General of Employment and Training, Ministry of Labour
76
Women’s share in the organized sector is generally low in most states, ranging from 7
percent in Bihar to 39 percent in Kerala for the year 1999 (see table WT4). Compared to the
previous year (1998), there is no change in the ranking order among states. The percentages of
women’s share in organized sector have declined in almost all states. Over 1998 to 1999, about,
80,000 women are out of organized sector jobs. States with high percentage of women to total
employment in organized sector kerala (38), Assam (31), Karnataka (29), Tamilnadu (29),
Mizoram (26). States with low percentage of women in organized sector employment-Bihar (7),
Uttar Pradesh (9), West Bengal (9), Jammu & Kashmir (11), Orissa (11)(Rustagi Preet, 2003).
Women’s Work and Wages
The changing patterns of work in rural India and the impact on women’s status are
important areas for study and intervention. In the era of neo-liberal economic policy, women as
workers have suffered. The days of employment available to women in rural areas, particularly
in agriculture, have fallen sharply.
A critical issue for women is the decreasing days of work available in agriculture and the
consequence growing demand for non-agricultural work to ensure a minimum income. Women
in particular are the worst affected because the opportunities for non- agricultural work for
women are extremely limited. Even as women work more for lower wages, the unpaid work
burden on women has greatly increased. Provision of water, sanitation, health care, schools for
children, crèches, etc, are essential for economic purposes, because the lack of these facilities
means that women have to spend hours of precious time on these tasks of the family care.
Liberalization has worsened the quality of life for the mass of women by privatizing these
services or neglecting them. Girl children are also caught in the vicious trap of increased work
burdens. They are the most invisible, silent shadow, thin, frail and forever working. Girl children
in rural India form a very large section of millions of child workers in the country. Estimates of
numbers of children workers range from 44 million to 100 million, but it is recognized that the
numbers are increasing. (Brinda Karat 2005:62)
Rural unemployment and the utter failure of the government to provide alternative work
has forced a much greater migration of men and women looking for work. On the one hand male
migration has greatly intensified leading to an increase in the female headed families. More
women are responsible for the welfare and the survival of their families than before. The
traditional states where male migration has been directed like Punjab, Haryana, the cotton
growing areas of Maharashtra or Gujarat, have themselves experienced a crises hitting wide
section of the peasantry. This has directed worsened the already precarious situation for male
migrants whose earning has gone down considerably. In approximately 50 villages covered by
AIDWA activists in UP and Bihar in a specific campaign on food during 2003 as well as 2004
female headed families reported that, remittances from migrant male workers in distant areas,
trying to find work where there is none, is the household of women and the aged left behind in
the villages without hope of the money order ever reaching. Women in such circumstances are
the worst hit, the poorest, the most vulnerable, and the most indebted. Yet there are no policies,
no affirmative action for this section of women. Very few of these women benefit from
government schemes including schemes like the self-help groups, DWCRA schemes etc.
77
For women the lack of work and increasing poverty has led to a big increase in short term
migration within the state. This could be rural to rural or rural to urban. Interstate migration of
women, and indeed whole families, is also on the increase. Women workers may migrate on their
own, or with the whole family. Policies to prevent migration require a total reversal of current
polices. First and the foremost a big increase in public expenditure in rural areas, in
infrastructure, and availability of sustained work at the level wage. (Karat Brinda:2005:68).
Weekly Time in Hours
Graph WG1 Time Spent by Women and Men in An Average
Week on Certain Activities
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
Male
Female
Cocking
Cleaning
Washing
Household &Y Mending
& Utensils
Clothes
Care of
Children
Activities
Source: CSO (2001)
Poor educational levels and formal training not only act as a constraint for women’s
participation but prevent them from seeking or aspiring for more secure and better paid
employment avenues of the formal type. Even the proportions of women on the active registers
of state employment exchanges are high only among the states where female literacy levels are
high. Moreover the involvement of women in domestic chores also acts as a constraint on their
ability to participate in remunerative jobs. If and only if male members of the households
cooperate more, can the economic participation of women increase, thereby leading to their
improved economic status, whose overall effects might be empowering. Hence, the attitudes
towards what constitutes women’s work and men’s work need to be changed.(Rustagi, Preet,
2003)
Globalization And Its Economic Impact On Women
Globalization has made a tremendous impact on the lives and activities of women
throughout the world over. In India today, globalization has had positive and negative effects on
women. Our constitution grants women legal citizenship but they get little respect and standing
this country. Women have equal rights with men. But the male dominant society does not accept
this and because of this Indians women especially the disadvantaged women suffer immensely.
Women are discriminated everywhere in the family, community and in the society in terms of
lower wages for equal job, less privilege in education and employment. In the developing
country context, globalization has intensified gender-inequality, although it has lowered genderinequality in some countries where it has led to an unprecedented employment opportunity for
78
women. The world is more globally integrated than it was in the middle of the twentieth century
but it is still far from fully globalized. Globalization processes ‘involve not merely the
geographical extension of economic activity across national boundaries but also- and more
importantly- the functional integration of such internationally dispersed activities. These
processes are unevenly distributed, complex and volatile.
Technology changes in the production process have allowed it to be fragmented into
separate parts, which do not have to be done in the same location. Standardization and increased
automation of production have led to a deskilling of work in manufacturing, opening up jobs for
less skilled workers. Change in transport and communications technologies have enabled a new
flexibility in the geographical location of the production. Much manufacturing has become
‘footloose’, moving from country to country in search of the cheapest labor.
It has been suggested that the relationship between development and female employment
follows a ‘U’- shaped curve, with economic activity of women being highest in both least
developed and post-industrial societies, while it is lowest in those countries at a middle level of
development as women move out of agriculture.
Although at opposite ends of the development spectrum. However, at intermediate points
cultural, political, and historical factors intervene to reduce the applicability of the model.
Socialist countries such as Cuba and china have high participation rates for women,
similar to the levels in North America and Western Europe. Africa has the greatest variation,
with low rates in Muslim North Africa and high rates in parts of Africa south of the Sahara. Latin
America and south Asia have less than half their female population officially employed., while
south east Asia has but elsewhere it is urban jobs which dominates.
In Latin America women are employed mostly in the service sector, especially in
domestic service, teaching and clerical occupation. In south East Asia, the growth of the world
market factories employing mostly young women has led to an increase in female activity rates.
For professional women this double burden has been reduced by the employment of immigrant
women as nannies and domestics.
Age also effects the gender division of labour. In most societies male control of women’s
use of space is greatest during their reproductive years, thus limiting their access to the labor
market.
In most parts of the developing world women reach their maximum level of economic
activity in their early twenties, while the maximum for men occurs a little later. In Southeast
Asia there is a marked dip in the level of female employment between the ages of 20 and 45,
which is the period during which women experience the most intensive childbirth and childrearing time demands. Other world regions do not demonstrate this so clearly. Its importance in
south –East Asia may be a function of the high level of employment of young, single women in
factories, from which jobs they are fired when they marry or become pregnant.
79
The expansion of educational opportunities for women in recent years is reflected in the
type of employment undertaken by women of different ages. Especially in Latin America and the
Caribbean, where there has been a marked increase in women’s access to education, younger
women have moved into white-collar, urban managerial and administrative jobs, which offer
regular employment, pension and status.
Their mother generally continue to work intermittently in unskilled work, such as
agricultural labour or trading .the greater financial independence of young women enables them
to be less dependent on men and also less likely to see having children predominantly in terms of
ensuring a future financial resources.
The restructuring of the global economy associated with the new international division of
labor has marked effects at global, national and local levels. Linked with the new spatial
distribution of production is a restructuring of social relation, including gender relation, as labor
markets recruit specific gender, age, ethnic and religious groups. These changes transform
household, communities and markets and the changes in gender relation reflect shifting gender
identities. Parent –child relationship change, as young women become the major earners in the
family, and working in factories for transnational companies while living in urban dormitories
with other young workers introduces rural women to new ideas.(Momsen:2004).
Women workers are concentrated in light industries producing consumer goods, ranging
form food processing, textile and garments to chemical, rubber, plastic and electronics. In Egypt,
Hong Kong, India, Kenya, the Philippines and South Korea over three-quarters of the female
industrial labour force is employed in these seven industries. However as manufacturing
processes become more complex, men are increasingly being employed in manufacturing
especially in supervisory positions. In Bangladesh the proportion of women workers in
manufacturing, in relation to male workers, fell from 328 per cent to 110 per cent between 1980
and 1990 but in most countries of Asia and the pacific the numerical dominance of women in
this sector continue to grow. The growth of large-scale commercial manufacturing has resulted in
older women’s traditional craft skills becoming devalued.
Women do employed to do simple, unskilled, labour- intensive tasks of assembly or
finishing, requiring minimum use of capital or productive tools. Working in the home allows
women to carry out their productive and reproductive chores in the same location. The
advantages of the outworking for employers are the flexibility it gives them to respond to
changes in demand and the reduction in labour costs.
Women also work as petty commodity producers in both urban and rural areas. Like out
working, self- employment offers women flexibility of time and space as it can be combined
with domestic chores. In a Sri Lanka village women of Tamil Nadu, Singhalese and moor
ethnicity and Hindu, Buddhist and Muslim religious affiliations meet on one women’s verandah
to make local cigarettes and paper bags together, thus proving cross-cultural social exchange and
sharing responsibility for child care while individually earning. (Ismail 1999a). Selfemployment builds on women’s traditional skills and has been expanding recently as aid
organizations offer assistance in the form of credit, training, design and marketing
(Momsen:2004).
80
Provision of Micro Credit has been seen as the way to help women to set up small
businesses and to be empowered. The Grameen Bank in Bangladesh led the way in 1976 in
providing small loans to poor women. At first this system was seen as a very positive
contribution to development, especially for poor rural women. Micro finance was promoted as a
self-help ‘human face’ complement to structural adjustment in the context of declining aid
budgets and reduction in government subsidies (Mayoux 2002). The World Bank has argued that
Grameen bank loans to women tend to lead to an increase in girls’ schooling and in per capita
consumption, a reduction in fertility and increases in women’s paid work and nonland assets
(World Bank 2001).
In central Sri Lanka micro credit has only a minimal impact on poverty; it does
empower women by enabling them to earn money that is not controlled by their husbands and to
go out alone to group meetings, forcing men to take over some domestic tasks (Aladuwaka
2002). It also encourages women to participate in community management and empowers them
to work with other women to reduce male alcoholism in the community. The successful
entrepreneurs in this community felt that they gained new respect from their husbands by earning
their own money.
In Africa and the Caribbean there is a long tradition of informal savings, credit and
insurance arrangements, such as Rotating Saving and Credit Associations (ROSCAs), and
women are used to working confidentiality and security to building up independent saving than
ROSCAs, and in Asia and Latin America the savings groups often provide socially accepted
places for women to meet.
Providing services in the informal sector involves many women. Work in this sector, as
traders, servants or a prostitute is often the only urban employment open to young, uneducated
women from rural areas. There are distinct regional patterns in the dominant types of
employment. Working in private household, maids are unlikely to be protected by employment
legislation, may be expected to work very long hours and may also be exposed to the sexual
advances of the male members of the household. If they become pregnant they will lose their job
and may have to turn to prostitution. Sometimes they will return to their natal rural villages to get
married or may stay in the cities and find better-paid jobs. Foreign maids will be forced to return
to their own countries or to work illegally (Momsen: 2004).
Improvement in global communication and transport and in infrastructure in poor
countries has encouraged a period of explosive grown in tourism, especially in developing
countries. Tourism is seen as a new export-led growth industry and many countries of the south
have very rapidly become dependent on tourism. Women also work in the formal tourism sector,
making up an average of 46 per cent of the world tourism workforce. Tourism provides mainly
low-paying jobs for women as maids and housekeepers or as receptionists in hotels, while the
more lucrative positions of managers and chefs are predominantly male. Women’s employment
in tourism is not just the result of the willingness of women to work in low-paying jobs, which
utilize their supposedly ‘natural’ housekeeping skills, but also of their ability to provide friendly
care and assistance to guests. Sexual objectification of women is found in many aspects of the
industry, with female hotel employees in particular being told how to dress and comport
81
themselves in much greater details than is true for male employees. Women in hospitality
industry may also be expected to flirt with guests in order to encourage additional consumption
at the bar, for example. Thus sexuality can constitute an element of gendered economic relation
(Momsen: 2004).
Globalization as a primarily economic phenomenon has its social, political, and
philosophical manifestations. With globalization, capital labour and ideas have been moving
round the globe with unprecedented speed, creating hope for a more homogenous world. There is
talk of waves of democratization and discussion of the universal ability of liberal thought to offer
guiding principles for social and political systems.The global emphasis on modernization of
agriculture often takes an ungendered perspective and remains unaware of the specificities of
technologies in terms of their impact on the lives of farming women. The effect of modernization
can be seen in terms of the expansion of female employment in large scale agri –business and
export- oriented farming, but also affects the resources given to deal with the need of women
working on small arid plots on the margins of the agriculture sector (Sintiki Tarfa:1999:215)
Conclusion
Gender issues lie at the heart of today’s global transformations. The global pursuit of
profit has opened up employment opportunities for many women around the world.
Globalization effects on men and women differentially, by increased disparities between rich and
the poor, increased work burdens, increased violence, and increased trafficking in women and
children. In these contradictory processes of development, gender relations become the symbolic
battleground for competing visions of the future. Although most women in India work and
contribute to the economy in one form or another, much of their work is not documented or
accounted for in official statistics. Women plow fields and harvest crops while working on
farms, women weave and make handicrafts while working in household industries, women sell
food and gather wood while working in the informal sector. Additionally, women are
traditionally responsible for the daily household chores (e.g., cooking, fetching water, and
looking after children). Since Indian culture hinders women's access to jobs in stores, factories
and the public sector, the informal sector is particularly important for women. There are
estimates that over 90 percent of workingwomen are involved in the informal sector. The
informal sector includes jobs such as domestic servant, small trader, artisan, or field laborer on a
family farm. Most of these jobs are unskilled and low paying and do not provide benefits to the
worker. More importantly, however, cultural practices vary from region to region. Though it is a
broad generalization, North India tends to be more patriarchal and feudal than South India.
Women in northern India have more restrictions placed on their behavior, thereby restricting
their access to work. Southern India tends to be more egalitarian, women have relatively more
freedom, and women have a more prominent presence in society. Cultural restrictions however
are changing, and women are freer to participate in the formal economy, though the shortage of
jobs throughout the country contributes to low female employment. But in the recent years,
conditions of working women in India have improved considerably. More and more women find
themselves in positions of respect and prestige, more and more workplaces are now populated
with women who work on equal terms as men. Working is no longer an adjustment, a mere
necessity; but a means to self worth and growth.
82
Women have been affected by globalization and its spin-offs. As much as some women
have come to enjoy the benefits of growth and foreign capital investment in their own countries,
more women have found no place to earn a living other than in the informal sector. Further more,
while some women have enjoyed improved living conditions, thanks to the concerted effort of
international and non-governmental agencies, many more have become victims of the
conservative reactions to globalization. The formal sector has not enabled women’s integration
in the job market or massive social mobility. Further more, whereas women in the informal
sector depend mainly on household production units, therefore, in the formal or the informal
sector, women whose gains depend on family connections, privileges or household economic
units remain barely touched by the process of public interest aggregation and articulation.(Noha
El-Mikawy:1999:77).Women have now not only found their place in work places but are also
party to governance. In recent years there have been explicit moves to increase women's political
participation. Women have been given representation in the Panchayati Raj system as a sign of
political empowerment. There are many elected women representatives at the village council
level. At the central and state levels too women are progressively making a difference. Today we
have women Chief Ministers in five large states of India. At the international level, third world
countries try to ressit globalization and try to strenghthen their own econmy for this for this, we
need to follow certain strategies-Strategies for resisting globalization•
The first step in strengthening international movements against imperialism is to
strengthen the movement in one’s own country.
•
Women should utilize the “opportunities” provided to them by liberalization and
globalization.
•
We must establish closer contacts with women organizations throughout the world that
are in struggle against the WTO-World bank-IMF dictated policies.
•
The need for globalizing resistance to globalization policies is important, and in the
present context is an important part of Indian women’s struggle for justice and
equality.(Karat Brinda:2005:31)
83
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Empowerment in Malla Kullar (eds), Writing the Women’s Movement: A Reader
Zubaan, delhi.
Banerjee, Nirmala (2005), “The Structural Adjustment Programme and Women’s Economic
Empowerment”, in Mala Khullar (eds.) Writing the Women’s Movement A reader
Zubaan, Delhi.
Bardhan, K. and S. klasen (1999) ‘UNDP’ A Gender-Related Indices: A Critical Review’
World Development 27: 985-46.
Freeman, Carla (2001) ‘Is local: Global as Feminie: Masculine? Rethinking the Gender of
Globalization’, Signs 26 (4): 1007-37.
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Afshar and Stephanie Barrientos, (ed.)(1998)“Women, Globalization and
Fragmentation in the Developing World”, Women Studies at York, Macmillan
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Jill Steams,(1998) “ Gender and International Relation :An Introduction”, Polity Press,
Cambridge.
Karat Brinda (2005), “Globalization and Survival Issues”pg.51-111 in Survival and
Emancipation; Notes from Indian women’s Stuggle: Three Essays, Collective.
Momsen, Janet Henshall, (2004), “Gender and Development “, Rutledge perspectives on
development, Rutledge, London.
Momsen, Janet H. (ed.)(2004), Gender, Migration and Domestic Service, London and New
York: Routlege.
Narayan, Deepa and Patti Petersch (eds) (2002) Voices of the Poor from Many Lands, New
York: Oxford University Press for the World Bank.
Nandita Shah, Sujata Gothosker, Nandita Gandhi and Amrita Chhachhi (2006), “Structural
Adjustment, Feminization of Labour Force and Organizational Strategies”, in
Nivedita Menon (ed.), “Themes in Politics: Gender and Politics in India, Oxford
University Press, New Delhi.
Preet Rustagi,(2003) “Women’s Work, Economic Participation and Contribution in Gender
Biases and Discrimination Against Women” (UMFEM).
Shiva, Vandana, Staying Alive; Women, Ecology and Development, London: Zed books. The
classic presentation of ecofeminsm. Shiva’s work led the way in considering
women’s connections to the environment in the south.
84
Oloka-Onyango, Joseph (2000) Human Rights and Sustainable Development in
Contemporary Africa: A New Dawn, or Retreating Horizons? Human
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Shiva, vandana Women and Environment.
United Nations; Millennium Development Goals.
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World Bank (2001) World Development Indicators, Washington, DC: World Bank.
85
LESSON 4
THE ISSUES OF WOMEN’S POLITICAL PARTICIPATION
AND REPRESENTATION IN INDIA
!"##$%
Introduction
Women represent more than half of the world’s population and just less than half of the
global electorate. Nevertheless, women constitute a marginal proportionate of representatives in
the world’s legislative bodies. India has of yet managed notably limited success in rectifying
these imbalances, with women currently holding only 8% of parliamentary seats. Although India
was one of the first democratic nations to grant women the vote, women are neither represented
in the legislative spaces nor contributing towards the formation of national laws. Over five
decades after the independence; numerous efforts have been made by the government and civil
society to ameliorate the condition of women in various sphere of life. The main purpose was to
raise their status in society, economy, polity and education, thereby according them equality, visvis their male counterparts. Despite many efforts, still a large segment of the women population
is deprived of its basic human rights, i.e., the right to participate in the politics. Deprivation from
this singular important reality of existence has kept women powerless for centuries and
millennia. After the immediate independence, our social, political and economic situation were
fragmented then ever before, but still many women from the educated class participated in the
constituent assembly for drafting the new constitution for India. Woman’s voices are too often
unheard in decision making around the world. They remain under-represented in democratic
institutions (only 15 percent of the world’s parliamentarians are women) and women’s
organization often have little opportunity to influence policy dialogue. In some countries women
are still unable to vote or stand for election.
Women make-up half the world’s population. No country can afford to ignore the skills,
talents and experiences of half its people. In addition institutions that exclude women’s
experiences and Perspective are likely to make decisions that do not take account of the reality of
women’s lives. Policies made in these circumstances are unlikely to meet women’s needs. There
is a growing recognition that democratic structures cannot claim to be truly representative of they
fail to reflect the population they are intended to serve. The goal of increasing women’s
representation in politics has been the subject of a number of international agreements and
treaties. Although women’s participation in democracy has been higher up the political agenda
over the past ten years the actual proportion of women politicians remains low. Despite general
acceptance of the need for a gender balance in decision making bodies at all levels, a gap
between de jure and de facto equality has persisted. By March 2003 the world wide average for
women’s representation was 15.1 percent. Only 11 countries (Sweden, Denmark, Germany,
Finland, and Norway, Iceland the Netherlands, South Africa, Costa Rica, Argentina and
86
Mozambique) have met the 30 percent benchmark figure agreed at numerous international
conferences over the last ten years1.
However, there are signs that things are changing. A report by the United Nations
Development Fund for women (UNIFEM) in May 2003 concluded that there had been
‘encouraging signs of improvement in women’s representation’, particularly compared to
relatively slow progress in the areas of education, literacy and employment. Improvements in
women’s representation do not happen by accident or as a result of a natural process of
improvement as the over all status of women improves. The UNIFEM Report concluded that the
differences between wealthy and poor countries in terms of women’s equality did not hold true
for women’s political participation. Where women’s representation is high this is often the result
of sustained campaigning by activities inside and outside political parties for many years. Where
these campaigns are successful they result in the use of positive action mechanism and other
strategies to increase women’s ability to participate2.
Women Political Participation in Indian Polity at National Level
The Constituent Assembly of India was formed in December 1946 and 14 women were
included as members. They were Ammu Swaminathan, Dakshayani Velayudhan and Durgabai
Deshmukh from Madras, Hansa Mehta from Bombay, Malti Chowdhury from Orissa, Sucheta
Kripalani, Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, Purnima Banerjee, Kamala Chaudhuri and Begum Aizaz
Rasul from Uttar Pradesh, Sarojini Naidu from Bihar, begum Jahanara Shah Nawaz from Punjab
and Lila Roy and Begum Ikramullah from Bengal (Kiran Devendra:1985:41). Indian women had
been asking for the franchise and the constitution of India gave it to them willingly. This brought
women on an equal footing with men. The adult franchise granted in article was the least the
constitution makers could do to remove sex discrimination. The contribution of Sucheta
Kripalani in the struggle for freedom is also worthy of note. She courted imprisonment for taking
part in freedom struggle. She was elected as a member of Constituent Assembly in 1946. She
was general secretary of Indian National Congress from 1958 to 1960, and Chief Minister of
Uttar Pradesh from 1963 to 1967. Sucheta Kripalani was in the words of Shrimati Indira Gandhi,
“a person of rare courage and character who brought credit to Indian womanhood.” Women all
over the world have remained out of the political realm for quite a long time. For centuries, they
were not welcomed at the helm of political affairs. Women's quest for full citizenship and
participation in politics began during the eighteenth century Enlightenment. Changes began to
appear gradually in recent decades particularly when women became assertive of their rights.
They realized the need for redefining their traditional roles which prevented them from entering
the arenas where men ruled the roost.
Although women, to a great extent, succeeded in
gaining acceptance and recognition, the scenario has not yet changed dramatically. Chowdhary et
al who have studied the political affairs of women in 43 countries found that in no country did
women have political status, access or influence equal to that of men. Though women constitute
nearly half of the global population, their participation in political affairs has not been
significant.
________________________________________
1
Stephenson, Mary Ann, “Gender and Democracy: What Works?” Strategies to increase women’s representation”,
British Council, Manchester, U.K. 2004.
2
United Nations Development Fund for women (UNIFEM), Press release,1st May 2003
87
When compared with the other parts of the world, India’s scenario in this regard is no
exception. Women’s Political participation has been very low despite their remarkable
contribution in the socio-political struggles. In 1919, Sarojini Naidu headed a deputation of the
women’s India Association, which met the British Viceroy to demand the right to vote. The
Indian National Congress supported woman suffrage. In 1950, soon after Indian independence,
women were granted the right to vote but their representation in Lok Sabha, and other elected
bodies has not been sufficient3. Women contesting elections still constitute only a trivial
percentage of the total number of contestant, e.g., in Lok Sabha, the representation of women
varied between 3.4 percent (in the eighth Lok Sabha) and 8.1 percent (in the eighty Lok Sabha).
In the first Lok Sabha, there were only 22 women members who formed only 4.41 percent of the
total 499 members. The sixth sabha admitted the lowest number of women parliamentarians with
19 out of the total 44 members in a house of 544, not even 10 percent of the total strength, things
were not different in Rajya Sabha. But still, the situation was somewhat better. In the Rajya
Sabha, the representation of women was between 5.8 to 11.8 percent. The Percent of women in
Rajya Sabha fluctuated around ten cent for at least five times during 1952-934. Ever since the
National Perspective plan for women in 2001 was published, many non-governmental
organization and others have been demanding increasing participation of women in politics, by
way of representation in the national and state assemblies and other decision making bodies at
the highest level. As in the fields of voting, candidature and representation in the Parliament and
the state assemblies, women have not found adequate or proportional representation.
In the Past decade, it has been increasingly realized that the Participation of women is far
from adequate, either by way of voter out or candidature. There have been fluctuation, though
there is general trend of lore women coming out to Vote. This increase in the turnout of women
voters, particularly of the lower classes and castes from rural areas, can be attributed to a high
degree of mobilization rather than to one’s own political consciousness. This mobilization of
women voters did not of course mean much of an increase in their participation in the decisionmaking process either at local, state or national level. Many studies on women in politics,
however, had pointed out to the lack of their political empowerment and the limitations and
challenges before them, disabling them from playing a decisive role in the political affairs of the
country. There are numerous domestic and public factors that hinder women’s chances in
electoral battles of democracy5. For instance reluctance of political Parties and their leaders to
give tickets to women aspirants, social norms and patterns, gender biases, familial restrictions,
economics resources raising and funding capacities, political support from the party managers,
cadre, tendencies of character assassination, subtle sexist propaganda and above all the voter’s
attitude towards women candidates etc.
The Percentage of elected women Lok Sabha members has never exceeded 10. The low
participation of women by way of number of them nominated and elected had a dampening
_____________________________________________
3
Ranjana Kumari, “Introducing”, In Fredrich Ebert Stiftung, Women in Politics: Forms and Processes (New Delhi:
Har Anand Publications, 1993), P. 5
4
Susheela Kaushik, “Women and Political Participation”, in Fredrich Ebert Stiftung, Women in Politics: Forms
and Processes. New Delhi, Har Anand Publications, 1993.
5
Sushila Kaushik, “Political Empowerment of women and Recent Elections”, S.K., Chaube and Sushila Kaushik
(ed), Indian Democracy at the turn of Century, New Delhi: Kanishka Publishers X distributors, 1999. p. 245.
88
effect on the movement for political empowerment of women. It showed that the political
system, even while conceding the role of women in local self government, was not ready to give
them an access at the national level. Lack of political will and absence of commitment for
women issues could not bring required determination. The Bill proposed reservation of 1/3 of
constituencies for women, on the lines of that for SCs/STs, with a provision to rotate from with
every election. But the mechanism was not free of flaws. As this would have meant that nearly
half of the constituencies would have been reserved for one group or other. Rotation would have
meant that at least two- thirds of the sitting MLAs and MPs would not go back to there
constituency for re-election. This would have robbed our system of whatever accountability it
has now6. The election commission proposed yet another alternative, which was initially
endorsed by National Perspective plan approved by Rajiv Gandhi and also by some social
scientists and activities. This proposal involves a compulsory quota for women in party
nominations. It meant that the political parties would be required to field at least a certain
percentage of women candidates, but would be free to decide where to field them. Objections
against his proposal has been that it would not guarantee 33 percent women running elections, as
parties may give relatively weaker seats within each state and district to women, resulting in their
subsequent defeat. A few observers considered this option as a better way of realizing the
objectives7.
The Report of the committee on the Status of Women Entitled Towards Equality (1974),
concluded that women’s impact on politics has been marginal, even through in sheer number
they are large. As a remedial measure, the committee proposed that each political party set a
quota for women candidates. The proposed 84th constitution Amendment Bill reserving 33
percent in Legislative Assemblies and in the Parliament, Unfortunately this bill is struggling to
be passed. While many opposed the Bill openly when it was introduced scores, of other members
across all parties displayed an ambivalent behavior, voting against the Bill while supporting it
publicly.
Although the number of Indian women in parliament has increased from 59 in 1998 to 70
in 2001, their share continues to be very low, representing only 8.5 percent of the total members
in the Parliament in 2001. These trends points out clearly to the need for affirmative action
besides addressing these issues in an expeditious way so that women’s concerns gain political
prominence and a fairly representative number of women are in a position not only at the
grassroots level, but also at the state and national levels.
___________________________________
6
Tyagi Ruchi, “Indian Politics in comparative Perspective”, Mayur Paper backs Delhi, 2007, p. 27.34.
7
Yagendra Yadav, “Quota options”, The Hindu, May 9,2003.
89
Table –I: The total numbers of
period 1952-1999
YEAR
TOTAL
NUMBER
CONTESTED
women contestants for the Lok Sabha seat during the
1952
1957
1962
1967
1971
1977
1980
1984
1989
1991
1996
1998
1999
51
70
68
66
86
70
142
159
189
325
491
274
247
499
500
503
523
521
544
544
544
517
544
543
543
543
TOTAL
WOMEN
CONTESTED
NUMBER OF %OF
THE
WOMEN
TOTAL
MEMBERS
SEATS
WOMEN
22
4.4
27
5.4
34
6.7
31
5.9
22
4.2
19
3.4
28
7.9
44
8.1
27
5.3
39
7.16
39
7.18
43
7.9
48
8.9
The findings of a recent study by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (1997) brings out this
dimension vividly. The study shows that the percentage of women in world parliaments has
dropped over the years. Their representation is quite disproportionate to their population.
Strangely enough, ten parliaments in the world do not have even a single woman
parliamentarian. According to the study, while there are 33,981 men parliamentarians in the
world, the number of women is only 4,512 (13.28%). Further, only 7.7 per cent of the
parliamentary group leaders are women, and only nine per cent of party spokespersons belong to
the fairer sex. India's record in this regard is no exception. Although women constitute about half
of the total electorate, their representation in Lok Sabha has not been adequate. Women
contesting elections still constitute only a meagre percentage of one or two of the total number of
contestants. For instance, in Lok Sabha, the representation of women varied between 3.4 per cent
(in the sixth Lok Sabha) and 8.1 per cent (in the eighth Lok Sabha). In the first Lok Sabha, there
were only 22 women members who formed only 4.41 per cent of the total 499 members. The
Sixth Lok Sabha admitted the lowest number of women parliamentarians with 19 out of the total
544 (3.49%). The highest numbers of women members were found in the eighth Lok Sabha with
44 members in a house of 544. This did not form even ten per cent of the total strength. The
present Lok Sabha has a women representation of only 7.4 per cent. Things were not different in
Rajya Sabha either. In the Rajya Sabha, the representation of women was somewhere between
5.8 and 11.8 per cent. Compared to Lok Sabha the representation of women was slightly better in
Rajya Sabha. The percentage of women in Rajya Sabha hovered around ten per cent, at least five
times during 1952-93.
90
Political Participation and Representation of Women in Indian Politics
Politics is directly related to governance and management of any society. Political power
is necessary to formulate policies, laws and order for a state. Indian constitution provides
provision for equal political participation of men and women in the process of formulation of
government. But it is certainly not true in the case of women especially in a democratic country
like India.
The state and its organizational entities impart equal role to women in decision making
and policy formulation but some social and historical factors tends to create obstacles. In a
democratic country like India both men and women are equally and legally eligible for political
offices, in spite of the fact those women constitute half of the Indian population, the
representatives of the women in state and central legislatures are very few. This void prevents the
ideas & aspirations of half of the society to be expressed for the development of women of the
whole nation.
The evolution of Indian democracy through fourteen general elections so far has reflected
a low representation of women in parliament, state legislatures, political parties & other decision
making bodies. The reasons behind are historical, social and cultural factors that have always
restricted woman to utilize her capabilities and nurture her talent for the growth and development
in almost every sphere of life. The preference for imparting education is given to men and
women are considered as secondary for earning bread for the family, as a result there are fewer
women in paid work force than men.
Women are paid less for the presumption that they work less. They are discriminated in
land and property rights. They used to face violence inside & outside their families throughout
their lives. These factors create negative social and legal environments for women and thus she
tends to lose confidence and ability to efficiently work in public sphere. Whenever women are
being discussed upon, statistics demonstrates very clear facts about condition of women in a
particular region. For example in India , the declining sex ratio in India very well depict the low
gender equity status as India ranks 113 in GDI (Gender Related Development Index).
The data also infer the increasing violence and crimes against women and their
marginalized status in employment, education and health sectors. While literary rate for women
is only 53.7, as compared to 73.3 for men. Among SC/ST only 24% SC and 18% ST females can
read and write.
By 1930, women had gained the right to vote. Women’s participation in the national
movement for the freedom of the country benefited them to gain some political and civil rights.
Although they were not directly involved in the creation of new state and its and civil rights in
independent India. Constitution guaranteed right to vote to elect the government to each woman
of free India but representation of women in political parties, parliament and other decision
making bodies remained low even after independence (Susheela Kaushik:1993 & Veena:1993).
The Power of decision making was approximately few and policy making was only
limited to giving affirmation to the bill being to it due to tremendous political pressures and
91
majority association with it. There was always a void between the formal idea of women’s
political participation and their meaningful use of power. The women who have been
successfully politician are mostly from the families of great Political leaders or though male
political patronage. In spite of that, very few women contest elections. Almost all parties hesitate
to field women candidates. Women candidates are considered to b weak for promoting the
interest of party at local, regional and national levels.
Women are considered incapable of convincing the laborers, workers, traders,
government employees and general public that their interest and aspiration will be taken care off
and duly implemented during their tenure period. This is the reason that in spite of their ability in
administration and the art of political articulation they could not reach higher level in politics.
Few women reach to the position of cabinet ministers and they are generally assigned portfolios
in the social service sectors of health, education, social welfare, child development etc.
Due to rise of various women movements in India during late 1980s, political parties
started realizing the importance of women representation in their election manifestoes and the
potential votes they carry behind them. However, these weighted fact did not convert into more
seats for women in political bodies along with it, women issues were always despised within the
agenda of the party and never translated to programmes, polices, and legislation of the
government as a whole. Women are most far from the decision making position of most political
parties. The women party leaders are meant to deal with women issues like dowry, rape, child &
family and social taboos for procuring women votes for the party. They are used as instruments
to gather support for all women of the society.
However, most women in India belong from rural areas, they are extremely backward
and illiterate and quite immature to formulate decision for choosing government. They make
their choice with support of male members of their families like husband or sons.
Various parties have made endless efforts to induct women at various levels of party
organization. The CPI (communist party of India –Marxist) has inducted in its district
committees & state level bodies. The BJP has been known to have highest percentage of women
in parliament board and the election committee. The congress party led by a woman had only
10% of women among the candidates.
Some women leaders have important place in Indian politics. Today Jayalalitha as a
leader of AIADMK, Mamta Bannerjee as a leader of Trinamul congress and Mayawati as a
leader of Bahujan Samaj party are instances in point. These are the leaders who can influence the
decision of their own party as well as the course of national politics. The role of Indra Gandhi
and Sonia Gandhi within the congress party is well admired. Both of them well prove the fact
that women in power do not confine themselves to women issues only.
The major role of women should be strengthened in local self government or panchayati
raj system .The experience of the women in such local and remote regions is analytically
measured in terms of social taboos, social legitimized, caste barrier and gender bias that they
face during decision making and implementation of the laws at regional levels. Still women
participation in building self government at the local level has increased due to certain factors.
The village women have inculcated unanimous opinion in this regard, approximately about 40%
92
of women to get into political bodies come from marginalized sections and committees.
Although women from such weaker section of society are promoted to promote interest of the
communities but this positive change in the society provide new kind of women experiment and
intensive political participation at the grass root level.
Table –II Women Representation in Lok Sabha
Lok
Sabha
year
Total
Members
Members
Percentage of Female Members
(no.)
(no.)
to total
seats
(no.)
Males
Females
I
1952 499
477
22
4.41
II
1957 500
473
27
5.40
III
1962 503
469
34
6.76
IV
1967 523
492
31
5.93
V
1971 521
499
22
4.22
VI
1977 544
525
19
3.49
VII
1980 544
516
28
5.15
VIII
1984 544
500
44
8.09
IX
1989 517
460
27
5.22
X
1991 544
505
39
7.17
XI
1996 543
504
39
7.18
XII
1998 543
500
43
7.92
XIII
1999 543
494
49
9.02
XIV
2004 543
499
44
8.1
Source:’Lok Sabha Members’, Lok Sabha Secretariat, New Delhi.
According to table –II women representation in Lok Sabha statistics indicates that
number of female participation in 1952 was 4.41%, year by year that percentage increased to 8.1
% by 2004. The lowest participation rate of women in Lok Sabha was in the year 1977 in 6th
Lok Sabha i.e. only 3.49%. The highest participation rate of women in Lok Sabha was in the
year 1999 in 13th Lok Sabha i.e. 9.02%.
Table –III Women’s Representation in Rajya Sabha
Rajya
sabha
year
Total
(no.)
I
II
III
IV
V
VI
VII
VIII
1952
1957
1962
1967
1971
1977
1980
1984
219
237
238
240
243
244
244
244
Seats Members
(no.)
Males
203
219
220
220
226
219
220
216
Members
(no.)
Females
16
18
18
20
17
25
24
28
93
Percentage
of
members to total
7.31
7.59
7.56
8.33
7.00
10.25
9.84
11.48
Female
IX
1989 245
221
24
9.80
X
1991 245
207
38
15.51
XI
1996 223
204
19
8.52
XII
1998 245
230
15
6.12
XIII
1999 245
226
19
7.76
XIV
2005 243
218
25
10.29
XIV
2006 242
218
24
9.92
Source: ‘List of Members of Rajya Sabha’, Rajya Sabha Secretariat, New Delhi.
According to table –III women representation in Rajya Sabha statistics indicates that
number of female participation in 1952 was 7.31%, year by year that percentage increased to
10.29 % by the year 2005.The lowest participation rate of women in Rajya Sabha was in the year
1998 in 12th Rajya Sabha i.e. only 6.12%.The highest participation rate of women in Rajya Sabha
was in the year 1984 in 8th Rajya Sabha i.e. 11.48%.
If we compare both the situation in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha we can easily able to find
out the participation level of women in Indian parliament was very minimal or dismal since the
ages. It is the women’s responsibility to increase the participation up to the standard level. At
least 50 % of women participation is the need of an hour in Indian democracy.
Panchayati Raj And The Political Participation Of Women
73RD Amendment Act of 1992
This act has added part IX to the constitution of India. it is entitled as the panchayts, and
consists of provisions from articles 243 to 243 O. In addition, this act has also added eleventh
schedule to the constitution. The act provides the reservation of seats for the SC, ST, and women
in all the three levels. Further the state legislature shall provide for the reservation of the seats
for the offices of chairpersons in the panchayati at the village or any other level for the SCs and
STs. Further not less than one –third of the seats of the reserved for the total number of offices of
chair persons in the panchayats at each level shall be reserved for women.
74th Amendment Act of 1992
This act has added part IX-A of the constitution of India. It is entitled as the
municipalities and consists of provisions from article 243 P-TO-243ZG. In addition, the act also
added twelfth schedule to the constitution. It contains 18 functional items of municipalities and
deals with this article 243W. The act provides for the Reservation of seats for the schedule
castes and the schedule tribes in every municipality in proportion of their population to the total
population in the municipal area. Further, it provides reservation of not less than one-third of the
total number of seats for women (including the number of seats for women belonging to SCs and
STs). The state legislature may provide for the manner of reservation of offices of chairpersons
in the municipalities for the SCs, the STs and the women. It may also make any provision for the
reservation of seats in any municipality or offices of chairpersons in municipalities in favor of
backward classes.
94
Panchayati Raj and Political Participation of Women in India
At present article 330 of the constitution provides for the reservation of seats for schedule
caste and schedule tribes in the house. Of the people; article 332 makes a similar in the state
assemblies, while article 243 D does so at the panchayati raj level. This was fixed at 22.5 per
cent of the total seats. Following the 73th amendment, providing for reservation for women at
the panchayat level, clause 2 was added in this article, resrving one third seats for SC and ST
women within SC and ST quota, and clause 3 resaved one third seats for women, including the
number of seats reserved for Women , under SC and ST quota. In the other words ,We can say,
in a local body of100 seats, 23 were reserved for SCs and STs, of which 7 or 8 would be adjusted
to include the 7 SC/ST women.
The 33% seat reserved for women would also be adjusted to include the 7 SC/ST women
seats, so that the general category of women reserved seats would come down from 33 to 26.
The new institutional arrangement in terms of 73rd and 74th constitutional amendments
providing uniform structure throughout the country is a historic step to liberate the women from
the clutches of the big government and the total state system , yet it is not the product of popular
demand but the arrangement thrust upon the people. Hence, it will take sometime to secure the
acceptance for the new system.
The most striking feature in regarding to 73rd and 74th amendment is one third reservation
of elected offices for women and for SCs and STs in proportion to their population.
Representations of women and Dalit will certainly bring qualitative change in the functioning of
panchayat. In initial stages, some cases of functioning by proxy may be reported, but once
women taste, power they would assert their independence as it evident in case of west Bengal,
kerala, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and to certain extent Himachal Pradesh. The provision of
women reservation for women will be only “naam ke waste”(just for name sake) and the women
will be panchayats as proxies to their male counterparts. As a result of reservation, a large
number of women belonging to SCs and STs has got an opportunity to participate in the decision
making process.
The recent Constitutional amendments (73rd and 74th Constitutional Amendments)
however have brought about significant changes in the situation. With the advent of these Acts,
today India has more than 500 district panchayats, around 5,100 block/taluka panchayats and
about 2,25,000 village panchayats, 90 municipal corporations, 1,500 municipal councils, and
1,800 nagar panchayats. All these bodies would jointly elect three million representatives and a
considerable number of them would be women. The trend owes impetus primarily to the
provisions made in the Act that one-third of the seats (33.33 per cent) in the local bodies such as
panchayats, nagarasabhas, municipalities and corporations shall be reserved for women. This
one-third reservation means the possibility of one million women in the panchayats and
municipalities of India. It is estimated that there are already 7,16,234 women in panchayats in all
the States excluding Manipur, Bihar, and Jammu and Kashmir and several States went ahead and
elected even more than one-third women members required under the Acts.
In Kerala, a State known for its socio economic, demographic and developmental
features, a good proportion of women willingly exercise their franchise in elections. The State, in
fact, has the highest percentage of women voting. The proportion of votes cast by women in the
95
elections held in Kerala was around 50 per cent. This enthusiasm is however, absent when it
comes to political participation. It is evident from the low proportion of women in the State
Legislative Assembly and women representatives of Kerala in the Lok Sabha, Rajya Sabha and
local bodies. In 1957, for instance, the number of women in the State Assembly was only six out
of the total 121 members. In 1991, the number was eight in the house of 141. In the present
Assembly, there are 13 women legislators, there is only a single woman among the twenty
Members of Parliament (MP) elected in the recent 1998 Lok Sabha election. Kerala has a total of
2,001 women panchayat members. In the municipalities and corporations of Kerala, the elected
women form 34.58 per cent ie., hardly 1.25 per cent excess of the mandatory 33.33 per cent.
However, to find adequate number of women to contest the elections was a difficult task for
almost all the major political parties. This is clear from the total number of men and women
candidates in the fray.
The figures indicate that women candidates in the fray (Gram Panchayat, Block
Panchayat, District Panchayat, Municipalities and Municipal Corporations combined) were
proportionately low. There were only 17,869 women against 40,220 men to contest the elections
which is, hardly 31 per cent of the total number of the contestants.
The irony is that majority of them are housewives without having any interest in politics
and public life being unlettered. Most of the women have no clear idea of their role as a member
(functionary) of panchayat. Women panches and sarpanches , belonging to SC and ST , the
leadership role is rather a curse and much worse than their upper caste counterparts for the
apparent reason that the former is subjected to ostracism on caste grounds. The gram sabha is
considered to act as a larger forum for the participation of all section of rural community. But
rarely it is a matter of greater concern that women rarely.Participate in the Gram Sabhas to
hesitation, traditional ideology and idealization of self-effacement. The gram sabhas cannot be
considered more effective in the absence of active participation of women.
An assessment of the experience of women in panchayats does not show a mixed record
with the prevalence of proxy politics quite dominant in some areas. But the overwhelming
experience has been of the courage and tenacity of the women to effectively discharge their duty
in the face of great odds. The law for reservation in panchayati raj and local bodies by enabling
the entry of an estimated one million women into electoral politics at the local level has hit hard
at prevailing social norms of a woman’s place. There are deeply ingrained patriarchal mindsets at
different levels of party hierarchies and a considerable effort and struggle by women’s
organization and women within political parties, made a commitment to support a constitutional
provision for one third reservations for women (karat, Brinda:2005).
The government’s effort to encourage participation of the weaker section and the
downtrodden such as SC/ST and women is indeed commendable .yet, it must be remembered
that such change cannot be brought about overnight. This segment of society which has been
subjected to exploitation for ages cannot break free of all the shackles of illiteracy, poverty and
traditional at once.
According to the eighth five year plan, out of all the rural families in India, about 30
percent are matriarchal. Despite this, most women are uneducated, have little or no property and
96
live in a traditional-bound society. In such a case, the politically powerful can make them contest
elections for their own political gains. Hence, this provision would be really fruitful only if
women (SC/ST) were given proper training in the working of political – administrative
institutions. Elected leaders of local government institutions should be trained about their role
and responsibilities. Women, SC and ST leaders should be imparted special training so that they
acquire necessary knowledge, understanding, skills, and confidence for decision-making,
implementation and evaluation.
Since the passage of the 73rd and 74th amendments to the Constitution, a large number
of NGOs have been involved in post-election training for women PRI representatives. In
Karnataka, in the districts where Mahila Samakhya has been working, the Sanghas (collectives
of poor, ‘lower’ caste, rural women) which are the key to all of the MS empowerment work act
as such a support network. Sangha members are able to challenge traditional barriers because of
the support that they sangha gives them, both to contest elections and also after they have been
elected. Membership of the sangha not only provides support to women representatives, it also
puts pressure on them to be more accountable to their constituents. (Kapadia, Karin: 2002:297)
Mahila Samakhya
A Programme for Women’s Empowerment
The Mahila Samakhya programme, currently running in eight states of the country, is a
programme of the Department of Education, Ministry of Human Resources Development, and
Government of India. The MS programme was started as a consequence of the National Policy
on Education formulated in 1986 after two years of intense debate and discussion. It was born
out of the realization that despite the many developmental initiatives since independence, gender
inequalities persisted in all spheres of development. Women remained exploited and oppressed.
Poor rural women, regardless of caste and community, geography and state-wise development
initiatives, remained the most powerless and marginalized group of all. The main objective of
Mahila Samakhya is to reverse the processes responsible for the subordination of women, by
empowering them with self esteem, and the knowledge with which to determine their own
destinies. The unique feature of the MS programme is the emphasis given to changing these
perceptions it is this rejection of victimhood which enables women to challenge patriarchal
power equations in the family, community and society.
The MS Programme Structure
The MS team consists of a cadre of highly motivated and innovatively trained women
activists, known as Sahayoginis, each of whom works in approximately ten villages. Their
motivational efforts enable groups of poor women to emerge as a sangha. In the early years of
the programme, four or five sangha women were trained as Sahayakis (leaders) to sustain and
further develop their sangha. Since 1999, more and more sangha women are sharing sangha work
by forming issue-based committees of two or three sangha members. Each committee, as noted,
handles a key area of concern such as education, health or legal literacy. The Sahayoginis are
supported by the District Implementation Unit which has a district programme co-ordinator and
four resource persons who form the programme team. They are assisted by administrative and
financial functionaries. A State Programme Office with a state programme director and several
resource persons and consultants co-ordinates the activities of the various District
Implementation Units. Team members are selected both for their skills as well as their
97
commitment to women’s issues. The project document specifically mentions that project
functionaries should be ‘free of caste/community prejudices’. Thus MS team members belong to
several caste and class backgrounds but this is not allowed to come in the way of working
together. The nature of MS work makes for a close-knit team that shares a common vision and
perspective. There is ongoing capacity building of the MS team, through action and reflection
exercises, trainings, documentation workshops, reviews, analyses and the planning of field
activities. The flexibility of the programme allows it to respond in innovative ways to problems
in the field as well as to situations within the organization. A special feature of the Mahila
Samakhya Programme is that it is an autonomous registered society, which functions more like
an NGO than a government department. The participation of representatives from other
education initiatives of the state government provides a support structure for the Mahila
Samakhya programme. In addition, MS works closely with NGOs concerned with women’s
issues and draws on their rich expertise (Kapadia, Karin: 2002:300). The basic strategy of the
MS programme is the building of village level sanghas or collectives. These sanghas provide
women with time and space for themselves. Women gather together at sangha meetings and
engage in a process of collective reflection about their lives, in analyses of their problems, and in
action. Sooner rather than later they begin to feel the possibility of changing their lives. The MS
programme focuses on the poorest of poor women in the selected project areas. In most of the
MS areas, the poorest of the poor are the scheduled caste (SC) and scheduled tribe (ST) women.
(Kapadia, Karin: 2002:301).
Organizational Structure of Mahila Samkhya
MHAILA SANGHAS
(Approximately one per village)
SAHAYOGINIS
(One per 10 sanghas)
DISTRICT IMPLEMENTATION UNIT
(DISTRICT PROGRAMME COORDINATOR)
Resource persons, junior resource persons
Administrative and finance functionaries
STATE PROGRAMME OFFICE
(STATE PROGRAMME DIRECTOR)
Resource persons, junior resource persons
Administrative and finance functionaries
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
(CHAIRPERSON-EDUCATION SECRETARY, KARNATAKA)
Representatives from women’s organization, government departments, eminent educationists,
activists, professionals from MS districts, and representatives of national resource group of
Mahila Samakhya
GENERAL COUNCIL
(PRESIDENT-EDUCATION MINISTER)
98
The 73rd Amendment to the Constitution was, then, to an extent, a response to this
pressure from ‘below’. Alongside this, there has been a running strategy of the postcolonial,
democratic policy in India, which has been to (a) secure social change and (b) manage
protest/pressure through affirmative action for castes and tribes. The government made a historic
legislative intervention by constitutionally instituting panhayats. All state governments had to
organize direct elections, legislate and implement state acts and devolve a list of twenty-nine
subjects to the panchayats. Above all, they had to provide for affirmative action through
reservation of seats for members and chairpersons at all three tiers. These quotas were for (a)
women, (b) the Backward Classes and (c) the Scheduled Castes and (d) Scheduled Tribes.
Affirmative action for the Scheduled Castes and Tribes was not new. Seats were reserved for
them in the legislative institutions of the country but this was the first time that there were also
quotas for chairpersons of panchayati raj institutions.
These amendments became the impetus and, to an extent, the model for the recent
Constitutional 81st Amendment Bill that sought to give women quotas in Parliament. It was
ostensibly rejected due to disagreement on the question of ‘quotas within the quota’ for the
representation of women from the Backward Classes and minorities. But the Amendment, in
fact, had garnered opposition from most political parties. The states of the Indian federation
were required constitutionally to pass their own panchayat legislation (Acts). Despite this, many
avoided holding elections within the prescribed period and therefore did not transfer the powers
deriving from the list of twenty-nine subjects or equip panchayats with financial resources. State
action with respect to the devolution of powers and resources has been woefully inadequate.
Thus, although decentralized structures have been set up, this has not translated into local
autonomy. The performance of different states has, on the whole been poor. While some, like
Kerala, have a somewhat better record, others, like Bihar, have virtually nothing to offer. States
like Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Karnataka fall somewhere between these two. The 73rd
Amendment is perceived by most states as the centre’s baby, non-consensually thrust on them,
and part of a covert, centralizing (rather than localizing) agenda. Interestingly, state elites who
have been vociferous critics of centralizing trends within the structure and practice of the Indian
federation are equally disinclined to accept the devolution of powers to the panchayats. The
crucial question is: to what extent is the state committed to women’s development? The Indian
state has made several efforts in this regard and has attempted to collaborate with civil groups, as
in its Women in Development (WID) and Gender and Development (GAD) initiatives. WID
emerged in the 1980s as an outcome of the UN Decade for Women (1976-85).
By this time, the marginalization of women by development processes had become
evident. Policy efforts now began to concentrate on the need to integrate women into
development rather than treat them as objects of development. The shift from Women in
Development to Gender and Development (WID to GAD) in the 1990s came about as a result of
a concerted effort to mainstream gender in state arenas. In India, two major programmes had
been conceived in the 1980s as part of Women in Development initiatives, namely Mahila
Samakhya (MS) and the Women’s Development Programme (WDP). Both were grounded in
an ideology that assumed the possibility of partnership with the state; the assumption was that
99
even though the state was a patriarchal structure, it also had benevolent components that could
help to further the cause of women’s development.
While Mahila Samakhya was set up in many states, the Women’s Development
Programme was launched exclusively in the state of Rajasthan. It was founded on a triadic
structure involving the state, NGOs and academics/universities. More specifically, these were the
Department of Women and Child Development (DWCD) of Rajasthan, the state’s
Information Development and Resources Agency (IDARA) and the Institute of Development
Studies, Jaipur (IDS). (Kapadia Katrin 2002:398).
The Women’s Development Porgramme was oriented towards achieving a shift in
women’s consciousness rather than towards the formation of self help groups that would foster
economic self-reliance. The latter was the model that the Self Employed Women’s Association
(SEWA) and the Development of Women and Children in Rural Areas (DWCRA) programme
represented. The WIG initiative was launched through women’s quotas in panchayat institutions.
In contrast to GAD where the focus was on the state and policy makers, WIG once again returns
to society and focuses on the need to provide a space in the state apparatus for the untapped
energy of its female members. (Mayaram in Kapadia, Karin 2002:399).
A series of questions assume relevance with respect to ‘engendering’ panchayat
democracy. How is affirmative action in the institutions of local governance working on the
ground in rural India? What is the impact of the 73rd Constitutional Amendment on rural women,
especially those who belong to the poor, backward, low and Dalit castes? What is the meaning,
given social, structural and other constraints, of women’s political presence? What is the
response of the rural power structure to the presence of women? How is the institutional fabric,
including ruling groups and bureaucracies, caste associations, formal civil society and the new
social and women’s movements, responding to women’s presence? What is the nature of the
nascent ‘feminization’ of the rural public sphere? By ‘feminization’ I mean not only the visibility
of women in politics and their presence in institutions of representative democracy, but also their
active participation in decision-making forums. What is the likely impact of a major presence of
women in politics? What are the transformative signals, if any? What impedes the performance
of women representatives in the panchayats, the institutions of rural governance? And finally,
what can be done for women to fulfil their potential, to obtain a real feminization of the polity?
(Mayaram in Kapadia, Karin: 2002:403).
Problems Faced by Woman Panchayat Representatives
The evidence detailed below belongs to Rajasthan but the conclusions are more general
and can apply to other states as well. Many women representatives have been physically
targeted. Misri Devi, a Mina tribal woman Sarpanch (chairperson) of gram panchayat Thikariya
in Dausa district, was prevented from unfurling the national flag on Republic Day in 1998. A
gang of four persons led by the former sarpanch attacked her. Shanti Devi, a Dalit sarpanch in
Tonk district’s gram panchayat Polyara was continually harassed for the entire term of four and a
half years that she held office. Her clothes were ripped off her by the former Rajput sarpanch of
her panchayat and later an attempt was made on her life when his son pursued her in the fields on
a tractor. Bodily assault is one way of obstructing women’s work; another is hampering them in
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discharging official duties and not allowing gram panchayats with women chairpersons to
complete their work. The attempt to create hindrances is one of the most frequently used forms
of obstruction. Jashoda Raigar of gram panchayat Baheted, Sawai Madhopur, is one of the new
Dalit women chairpersons who have faced constant harassment after her election. Stones were
flung at her and abuse hurled at her and her husband. They were even assaulted.
These stories reflect what is a common reality all over the country, where upper and
dominant caste male leaders, who have held power for some time, prevent newly-elected women
from working. Their initial expectation was, of course, that women would merely ratify their
commands, while they would continue to wield real power, so they did not worry too much about
them. The use of the disqualification/removal provision is another mode of opposition to women.
Most state panchayat acts have instituted the provision of no-confidence motions (NCMs). For
many women, however, the story is one of political exit. Take the case of Mausami Devi, the
Dalit pradhan of Khandar, Sawai Madhopur district. The local BJP faction removed her despite
the fact that she had joined their party. Mausami was unable to manage panchayat politics, she
lacked literacy and political understanding, had no family connections and little political support,
and had a poor self-image. Also she belonged to a poor, marginal, Dalit caste of washerpersons.
Unlike Badhu Devi, Mausami was unable to fight back.
The two Dalit chairpersons who managed to survive were able to do so because they
were backed by a major Dalit Caste. Further, there are attempts to create various obstacles for
women. Holding panchayat meetings late at night is a strategy of gendered exclusion as women
are often unable to attend. The pressures of corruption have generated considerable anxiety for
women representatives. They find themselves under great pressure from their families in this
respect. The question is: what can be done to prevent this backlash or at least to mitigate its
impact? The first need is that of recognition. The backlash needs to be recognized as an assault
on equal opportunity and equal dignity. The second need is for a thorough review of institutions,
looking at their rules, norms and practices from a gendered perspective.
The lower level bureaucracy that deals with panchayat institutions is almost completely
male-both in its composition and in its culture. There is a need for women’s quotas here, as well
as for an exposure to feminist ideas. The state institutions responsible for PR elections also leave
much to be desired with respect to their collection and publication of sex- disaggregated data
regarding panchayat representatives. We were unable to find statistics on the number (castewise) of women elected – even the election department did not have this. Similarly the
Department of Panchayati Raj and Rural Development has insufficient statistics on the number
of women disqualified/removed under the two-child norm through a no-confidence motion.
There is an urgent need to correct this lack of sex/caste disaggregated data. The state and
international agencies place a premium on ‘training’ women, but the entire apparatus of
‘training’ needs to be rethought. An alternative model of training would assume that there is no
barrier between trainers and trainees and that the elected women themselves can work as peer
groups or as trainers for other women. Elected women have also expressed a need for knowledge
of their rights.
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There is a further need for regular dialogue to resolve problems between panchayat
representatives and other elected representatives and members of the local bureaucracy. There
are two models available for such dialogue. The first is a public hearing, as was held in Ajmer.
The second is a dialogue organized by a third party. This has been developed at the Institute of
Development Studies in Jaipur, over the past two decades. The first model is efficacious in terms
of protest but tends to be confrontational. The second bring together state officials, members of
civil society organizations, panchayati raj institutions and academics in a single forum.
The need for an association of women panchayat representatives is urgent and is beign
increasingly articulated by them. The structure of such an association might be federated and
decentralized, with scope for chairpersons, and members’ associations at the village, block,
district and division levels. An apex elected body could head a pyramidal structure. This could
constitute a major pressure group with respect to the actual devolution of power by the state.
Conclusion
Women have been confined to kitchen, agricultural fields since ages. For empowering the
women, we need to think about a workable solution through panchayat system which actually
needs conviction, dedication and determination to face all kind of obstacles and hindrances
present in the society. participation in the village panchayat do not actually need a elected
representatives, because if some body directly wants to participate in gram sabha individual older
than 18 years, he or she can automatically participate in formulation of local self government .In
some villages, in order to get participation in gram sabha women constitute Mahila Samaj
where they discuses various issues among themselves and try to find out reasonable solutions.
Women social empowerment includes the socio-cultural development which is closely related
with the political empowerment, a large number of participation, education, decision making
roles, health, family, in short all sphere of life and genuine social empowerment are very much
required in our society.
There is the immediate or urgent need to educate the girls since from childhood.
They tend to be more educated, school opportunity, ability to stand up and argue, that
will greatly strengthen the women. Young girls will get better education of her able to handle the
responsibility of 60 years men. We actually do not want reservation, but we need more and more
participation, awareness, progress, development among women themselves. Some important date
from the state of Himachal, Uttarakhand reflects the economic reality of the men. Their men go
out of the home town in search of work while in their absence women has to manage all the work
and look after the burden at home all alone. She needs to grow the crops, collect credits from
banks, teach the children, fetch the water, cook the food etc. she need to fulfills all the work
which is very essential and necessary in our life. This commendable work done by women is
quite remarkable.
Women constitute 50% of the women population, but in India the participation of
women is very minimal or dismal. The social sector women are unable to identify themselves as
a work force in regional, state and national level. In fact the participation of women in political
process is the pre-requisite for the political society. Patriarchal society and male domination are
the main reason behind low or minimum participation of women. Human development report
talks about the change in the context of women life and increased capacity for leading a fulfilling
102
human life. It gets reflected in external qualities such as health, mobility, education and
awareness, status in the family participation in decision making at level of material security.
Approach to empowerment has under gone change from women welfare to women development
process. Women should participate in functional, political and social processes of the state.
Selected indicators for measuring the impact of different level of participation includes
economic independence, access to right to resources, economic opportunities, involving
household decision making, political awareness and issues of public interest, voting, decision
making, participation, relative participation, voice in public decision making, capability to
influence the mind of people in the crowd, freedom to participate, ability to speak out ,
strengthen the association of women leaders and representatives at global, national ,regional and
local level and on the whole to develop mechanism to facilitate the development of women in all
sphere of life. Today we actually need a women revolution which will able to move women
beyond a single minded emphasis on women’s employment to giving centrality to women’s
ownership and control of land, means of production and politics.
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REFERENCES
rd
B.Nirmala, ‘The 73 Constitutional Amendment and the Experience of Women in the New PRIs:
A Critical Evaluation, ‘Unpublished paper presented to the conference on women and
Panchayati Raj Institutions, New Delhi
Gandhi, Nandita Shah, ‘The Issue at Stake: Theory and Practice in the Contemporary Women’s
Movement’ in India, New Delhi, Kali for Women, 1992.
In Contemporary Rajasthan’ in Kumari Jayawardene and Malathi de Alwis (eds.), ‘Embodied
Violence: Communalizing Women’s Sexuality in South Asia,’ New Delhi, Kali for Women, 1996.
Karat , Brinda, ‘On Political Participation’ in Survival and Emancipation: Notes from Indian
Women’s Struggle’ Three Essays Collective , 2005.
Mahila Samakhya Karnataka Annual Reports 1994-95; 1996-97; 1997-98; 1998-99; 1999-2000.
Mayaram, Shail , ‘Restructuring the Gram Sabha and Reclaiming Popular Sovereignty’,
Unpublished Paper presented at a consultation on ‘Functioning of Gram Sabhas and Gram
Panchayats after the 73rd constitutional amendments: problems and prospects’, Institute of Social
Sciences, New Delhi, India International Centre, 1997.
Mayaram, Shail with Pritam Pal, ‘The Politics of Women’s Reservation: Women Panchayat
Representatives in Rajasthan: Performance, Problems, and Potential’, IDS working paper, 1997.
Project document of Mahila Samakhya, Department of Education, Ministry of Human Resource
Development, Government of India, 1999.
Ranjana Kumari, “Introducing”, In Fredrich Ebert Stiftung, Women in Politics: Forms and
Processes (New Delhi: Har Anand Publiccations, 1993).
Sharma kumud , ‘Dimension of Women’s Participation in Panchayati Raj’ in Malla Khullar
(ed.), ‘Writing the Women’s Movement : A Reader, Zubaan, Delhi, 2004.
Stephenson, Mary Ann, “Gender and Democracy: What Works?” Strategies to increase
women’s representation”, British Council, Manchester, U.K. 2004.
Sushila Kaushik, “Political Empowerment of women and Recent Elections”, S.K., Chaube and
Sushila Kaushik (ed), Indian Democracy at the turn of Century, New Delhi: Kanishka Publishers
X distributors, 1999. p. 245.
Tyagi Ruchi, “Indian Politics in comparative Perspective”, Mayur Paper backs Delhi, 2007, p.
27.34
UMA Resource Center for Women and Panchaytai Raj , ‘Women in Panchayati Raj: The Case
Study of Rajasthan’, in strengthening the participation of women in local governance, vol.1,
Bangalore , institute of social studies trust, 1995.
United Nations Development Fund for women (UNIFEM), Press release,1st May 2003.
Yagendra Yadav, “Quota options”, The Hindu, May9, 2003.
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LESSON 5
LAWS, INSTITUTIONS AND WOMEN'S RIGHTS IN INDIA
Constitutional And Legal Provisions For Women
Introduction
Though the Constitution of India guarantees equality of all citizens' before the law still
women carry the burden of centuries of subordination thereby making it difficult for them to
realized their constitutional rights. Recognizing the real status of women, the Constitution
also provides for positive discrimination in favour of women. The Government of India
reaffirms its commitment to work for the realization of constitutional guarantee of equality, social justice and
non-discrimination on the basis of sex, caste, community, language and religion. This policy
takes the letter this spirit of the Constitution of India as the starting point. In the global
development scenario, India has almost become synonymous with low status of women,
patriarchal society, feudal customs and values, social polarization along caste lines, high
illiteracy and extreme poverty. To some extent this picture of India may be the contribution
of mass media and films. Yet the bitter truth is that girls and women are considered an
unwanted burden in Indian society. There is no doubt that we are in the midst of a great
revolution in the history of women. The evidence is everywhere; the voice of women is
increasingly heard in Parliament, courts and in the streets. While women in the West had to
fight for over a century to get some of their basic rights, like the right to vote, the Constitution
of India gave women equal rights with men from the beginning. Unfortunately, women in this
country are mostly unaware of their rights because of illiteracy and the oppressive tradition.
Names like Kalpana Chawla: The Indian born, who fought her way up into NASA and was the
first women in space, and Indira Gandhi: The Iron Woman of India was the Prime Minister of
the Nation, Beauty Queens like Aishwarya Rai and Susmita Sen, and Mother Teresa are not
representative of the condition of Indian women.
Constitutional Rights of Women in India
Fundamental rights
Article 14 says that the government shall not deny to any person equality before law
or the equal protection of the laws. The Constitution of India guarantees equality of sexes and
in fact grants special favours to women. The principle of equal protection does not mean that
every law must have a universal application for all persons, who are not by nature, circumstance
or attainments (knowledge, virtue or money) in the same position as others. Varying needs of
different classes of persons require separate treatment and a law enacted with this object in view
is not considered being violative of equal protection. The constitution however, does not stand
for absolute equality. The state may classify persons for the purpose of legislation. But the
classification should be on the reasonable basis. Hence, equal protection has reference to the
person who has same nature, attainment, qualification or circumstances.
Article 15 declares that government shall not discriminate against any citizen on the
ground of sex. Article 15 Prohibition of discrimination on the grounds of religion, race, caste,
sex or place of birth describes: The state shall not discriminate against any citizen on ground
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only of religion, to race, caste, sex, and place of birth or any of them. No citizen shall , on the
ground only of religion, race, caste, sex, place of birth or any of them, be subject to any
disability, liability, restriction or condition with regard to: Access to shops, public restaurants,
hotels, and place of public entertainment; or the use of wells , tanks , bathing ghats and places of
public resort maintained wholly or partly out of state or dedicated to use of the general public
Article 15 (3) makes a special provision enabling the State to make affirmative discriminations in
favour of women. Moreover, the government can pass special laws in favour of women. Under
93rd Constitutional Amendment Act, this clause conferred on the state the power to make any
special provision by law for the advancement of any socially and educationally backward class
or for the schedule caste or the scheduled tribes in so far as such special provisions relate to their
admission to educational institution including private educational institutions, whether aided or
unaided by the state, other than the minority educational institutions.
Article 16 guarantees that no citizen shall be discriminated against in matters of
public employment on the grounds of sex religion, caste, creed, sex, descent, place of birth,
residence. There shall be equality of opportunity for all citizens in matters relating to
employment or appointment to any office under the state. No citizen shall, on the grounds only
of religion, caste, creed, sex, descent, place of birth, residence, or any of them, be ineligible for,
or discriminated against in respect of, any employment or office under the state. Nothing in this
article shall present parliament from making any law prescribing, in regard to a class or classes
of employment or appointment to an office under the government of, or any local, or other
authority with Article 16 guarantees that no citizen shall be discriminated against in matters of
public employment on the grounds of sex. There shall be equality of opportunity for all citizens
in matters relating to employment or appointment to any office under the state. No citizen shall,
on the grounds only of religion, caste, creed, sex, descent, place of birth, residence, or any of
them, be ineligible for, or discriminated against in respect of, any employment or office under
the state. Nothing in this article shall present parliament from making any law prescribing, in
regard to a class or classes of employment or appointment to an office under the government of ,
or any local, or other authority within a state or an union territory, any requirement as to reside
within that state or union territory prior to such employment or appointment. In this article
nothing shall prevent the state from making any provision of reservation in matter of promotion
to any class or classes of posts in the service under the state in favour of schedule caste and
schedule tribe which, in the opinion of the state, are not adequately represented in the services
under the state.
In Article 21, constitution is giving protection of life and Personal liberty of the
individual. Constitution guarantees that no person shall be deprived of his life or personal
liberty. “Except according to procedure established by law”. Through 86th amendment act,
2002, the right to education was provided for the Indian citizen. For the purpose a new article in
part –III was inserted and two articles in part IV were amended. The newly inserted article 21A
declared that “the state shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of
six to fourteen years in such manner as the state may by law, determine. Article 21, if read
literally, is a colorless and would be satisfied, the moment it is establish by the state that there is
a law which provides a procedure which has been followed by the impugned action. But the
expression ‘procedure establish by law’ in article has been judicially construed as meaning a
procedure which is reasonable, fair and just.
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Article 22. Protection against arrest and detention in certain cases: No person who is
asserted shall be detained in custody without being informed as soon as may be, of the grounds
for such arrest nor shall he be detained the right to consult, and to be defended by a legal
practitioner of his choice. Every person who is arrested and detained in custody shall be
produced before the nearest magistrate within a period of twenty four hours of such arrest
excluding the time necessary for the journey from the place or arrest to the court of the
magistrate and no such person shall be detained in custody beyond the said period without the
authority of a magistrate. These fundamental Rights are particularly important from the
perspective of human rights of women. As the fundamental rights are justifiable, an aggrieved
person can seek redressal through writ petitions. These fundamental rights are particularly
important form the perspective of human rights of women. As the fundamental rights are just
able, an aggrieved person can seek rederessal through writ petition.
Rights Against Exploitation
Article 23 prohibition of traffic in human beings and forced labour: Traffic in human
beings and beggar and other similar forms of forced labour are prohibited and any contravention
of this provision shall be an offence punishable in accordance with law. Article 23 prohibition of
traffic in human beings and forced labour: Traffic in human beings and beggar and other similar
forms of forced labour are prohibited and any contravention of this provision shall be an offence
punishable in accordance with law. Nothing in this article shall prevent the state from imposing
compulsory service for any public purposes, and in imposing such services the state shall not
make any discrimination on the grounds only of religion, race, caste, creed or any of them.
Article 24 prohibition of employment of children in factories, etc. –no below the age
of fourteen years shall be employed to work in any factory or mine or engaged in any other
hazardous employment. Exploitation under article 23 and 24 means utilization of a person for
one’s own ends. It is opposed to the basic concept of our constitution, as well as to the dignity of
the individual which our constitution, guarantees in its preamble. It not only violates the
preamble of our constitution, but is also opposed to the directive principles of state policy
contained under article 39, for the object of promoting economic equality.
Cultural And Educational Rights
Article 29: protection of interests of minorities: Any section of the citizens residing in
the territory of India or any part thereof having a distinct language, script or culture of its own
shall have the right to conserve the same No citizen shall be denied admission into any
educational institution maintained by the state or receiving aid out of state on ground only of
religion, race, caste, language or any of them.
Article 30 right of minority to establish and administer educational institutions: All
minorities, whether based on religion or languages, shall have the right to establish and
administer educational institutions of their choices. The state shall not, in granting aid to
educational institutional institutions, discriminate against any educational institution on the
ground that it is under the management of a minority, whether based on religion or language. All
these are fundamental rights. Therefore, a woman can go to the court if one is subjected to any
discrimination. When we talk about constitutional rights of women in India, we mainly pertain to
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those areas where discrimination is done against women and special laws formulated to fight
those bigotries. The most important issues stand as those pertaining to marriage, children,
abortion, crimes against women, and inheritance.
Under the Directive Principle of the State Policy (DPSP) Article 39-A. Equal justice
and free legal Aid: The State shall secure that the operation of the legal system promotes justice,
on a bases of equal opportunity, and shall in particular provide free legal aid by suitable
legislation or schemes or in any other way, to ensure that opportunities for securing justice are
not denied to any citizen by reason economic or other disabilities.
Article 42 directs the State to make provision for ensuring just and humane
conditions of work and maternity relief. Above all, the Constitution imposes a fundamental
duty on every citizen through Articles 15 (A) (e) to renounce the practices derogatory to the
dignity of women.
Laws Related with Women Marriage
Before modern Hindu laws were passed, child marriages were the norms, inter-caste
marriages were banned, the girl became a part of the husband's family, and polygamy was
common. In the 19th century, the British rulers passed several laws to protect customs and
traditions while abolishing detestable practices like Sati. Some such revolutionary laws were
Hindu Widows Remarriage Act 1865 and the Brahmo Samaj Marriage Act 1872, the forerunner
of the present Special Marriage Act. In the beginning, the Act sets four essential conditions for a
valid Hindu marriage. They are: There are some grounds available to the wife only, both in
Hindu and civil marriages. One such ground available exclusively to the wife is her husband's
commission of rape, sodomy or bestiality. Under the Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act
1956, a Hindu wife is entitled to be maintained by her husband. Section 125 of the Criminal
Procedure Code also deals with maintenance of wife and children. If there is a decree of
maintenance against the husband and the couple have been living apart for over one year, it
would be a ground for the wife to seek dissolution of marriage. Here again the Muslim Personal
Law has a different set of conditions for the annulment of an Islamic marriage.
1.
Monogamy
2.
Sound mind
3.
Marriageable age
4.
The parties should not be too closely related
Polygamy was permitted among Hindus before the Act was passed in 1955. However,
after the act was passed, any man marrying again while his wife is living will be punished with
fine and imprisonment up to seven years. Formerly, child marriages were common. The Child
Marriage Act of 1929 was not very effective as such marriages were continued to be performed.
Now, however, the bridegroom must be 21 years old and the bride 18 years. However, there is a
separate Muslim Code of Conduct, which allows polygamy of up to four wives as per Islamic
laws.
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A marriage may be invalid without the boy or the girl realizing it at the time of the
wedding. A civil marriage would be void if four essential conditions are not complied with.
These conditions are listed in the Special Marriage Act (Section 4), as enumerated below:
•
If it is bigamy
•
If either party was suffering from mental disorder
•
If the boy has not completed 21 years and the girl 18 years
•
The boy and the girl are too closely related, or in legal language, are "within
degrees of prohibited relationship" unless custom governing at least one party
permits the marriage between them. Prohibited relationships are listed in he
Special Marriage Act.
A fifth reason for invalidating a marriage is impotence of either party. There are some
grounds available to the wife only, both in Hindu and civil marriages. One such ground available
exclusively to the wife is her husband's commission of rape, sodomy or bestiality. Under the
Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act 1956, a Hindu wife is entitled to be maintained by her
husband. Section 125 of the Criminal Procedure Code also deals with maintenance of wife and
children. If there is a decree of maintenance against the husband and the couple have been living
apart for over one year, it would be a ground for the wife to seek dissolution of marriage. Here
again the Muslim Personal Law has a different set of conditions for the annulment of an Islamic.
Uniform Civil Code
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”
- Martin Luther King
This uniform civil code means a uniform personal law on such matters as marriage,
divorcé, maintenance, adoption, guardianship and succession, regardless of one’s religion- as it
exist in most countries and indeed even in Goa, a legacy of Portuguese rule. The principles of
equality, justice and non-discrimination are far more important than unequal, unjust and
discriminatory personal laws associated with particular religions. The term civil code is used to
cover the entire body of laws governing rights relating to property and otherwise in personal
matters like divorce, maintenance, adoption and inheritance. As things stand, there are different
laws governing aspects for different communities in India. Thus, the laws governing inheritance
or divorce among Hindus would be different from those pertaining to Muslims or christens so no.
The demand for a uniform civil code essentially means unifying all these “personal laws” to have
one set of secular dealing with these aspects that will apply to all citizens of India irrespective of
the community they belong to. Though the exact contours of such a uniform code have not spelt
out, it should presumably incorporate the most modern and progressive aspects of all existing
personal laws while discarding those, which are retrograde. Article 44, which is one of the
‘directive principles’ laid down in the constitution, says: “the state shall endeavors to secure for
the citizens a uniform civil code throughout the territory of India”. As article 37 of the
constitution itself makes clear, the directive principles “shall not be enforceable by any court”.
Nevertheless, they are “fundamental in the governance of the country”. We also had a number of
civil laws, which were uniform, like the contract act, the transfer of property act, the civil
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procedure code, etc. so this uniform civil code really referred to family laws, sometimes called
personal laws. Though the constitution does not say that directive principles are not enforceable
by any court, it also makes it clear that the directive principles are “fundamental in the
governance of the country and it shall be the duty of the state to apply these principles in making
laws.
Article 44 pertains to all citizens of India. The constitution confers citizenship not on the
basis of caste, creed, sex or religion, but on the basis of birth, domicile, choice, etc. thus, it is the
right of all citizens and women in particular, to be treated equally and without being
discriminated against; and the endeavors of the state to achieve this must be perpetual and
paramount. Even if the government hesitates for fear of losing votes, and the religious leaders
rant for fear of losing control, the women’s movement and civil society should not be
complacent. They must bring equality for the all-Indian women, including those whose voice is
feeble because of their being behind the purdah for years. We cannot leave it only to the minority
community to raise the issues, for then we might wait forever; as it does not suit most men to
give up their hold on women and the advantage, which is already theirs. As women’s
organizations and others have repeatedly pointed out, personal laws governing different
communities in India have a feature- they are all gender-biased. The Hindu minority had been
totally unaffected by the dramatic changes of Hindu law in India as for example mandatory
monogamy; permitting divorce, and the right of women to adopt, as also inheritance rights in
their father’s property, etc. the substantial benefits gained by Hindu women in India had passed
them by, and they were still carrying on as before the codification and amendments of 1955 and
1956 and thereafter. Similarly the Muslim minority in India had been passed over without any
movement towards gender-just laws, while some benefits had accrued in Bangladesh and
Pakistan to women by virtue of Muslim personal law amendments brought about in those two
countries. Since changing laws for minorities is a sensitive matter, at this seminar we called upon
“concerned persons, social action groups, political parties, legislators, and the government of
these countries to campaigns for and introduce reforms in the family laws in order to make them
just and guarantee equal rights to women and children.” A declaration setting out ‘the minimum
requirements’ was released. It dealt with marriage, separation and divorce’ it also dealt with
guardianship, custody adoption and other rights of the child; further it made provisions regarding
economic rights of women within marriage, maintenance inheritance laws.These are not Hindu
or Muslim or Christian or Parsi demands or laws- these are a cry for gender-just laws; for giving
women their human rights and their mandated constitutional rights. If we can’t give them all the
rights in one go, let us progress little by little, but let us not be stagnant. Let us move towards
gender-just laws and a uniform civil code. A true modern, secular, non-discriminatory and
progressive code would, therefore, mean changes in all personal laws. The concept of the “Hindu
undivided family”, at least insofar as it pertains to succession, would also obviously have to
undergo a change. This also explains why historically changes in personal law have been resisted
not just by one community, but also by the ruling orthodoxy in all of them. Since it involves a
change in laws, prerequisite is sufficient support for the move within parliament. The reason this
has been difficult to achieve has been because most parties have held the view that the reform of
laws pertaining to the personal domain is better done by pressure for such change from within
communities rather than as an imposition from above. Further, for historical reasons, the demand
for a uniform civil code has acquired communal overtones, which have overshadowed the innate
merits of the proposal. Equal right for women in matters of marriage, separation, custody of
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children, inheritance and property is today understood as the rationale for a uniform civil code.
This is the premise on which both women belonging to the Hindu and Muslim communities
respectively prepared a treatise on several aspects of the code. They hold the view that the true
religious prescriptions are consistent with gender justice. The UCC is conceived as part of
secularization of personal laws without shedding religious identities.It is necessary for any one to
canvass a uniform civil code as it is constitutionally mandated. However, the unique sociopolitical situation in India has made the exercise near impossible in the absence of a demand
form the communities themselves- something that seems unlikely to happen as of now. In the
process, women of all communities are the worst suffers and it is who need the UCC most. Does
India need the uniform civil code? Of course it does- even Italy has one, as do the rest of the
developed world. Nowhere is a scenario like in India, of various personal laws jostling together,
allowed. But it needs to come on the heels of a political consensus, which is what the BJP, as a
responsible party in power, needs to evolve. We can’t speak for all communities unless they are
ready. But when will all communities be ready? Was the Hindu community ready when the
Shastric Hindu laws were drastically changed in 1955-56? And how do we help the communities
to be ready? The answer appears to lie in the editorial of ‘The Hindu’ of December 7, 2004,
which concludes, “a readiness to reform can be created by dialogue and debate addressing the
laws that discriminate against women grossly and are indefensible”.
It is important to bring all personal laws within the constitutional principle of equality.
The Parsi, Christian and Hindu laws have been slowly moving in that direction; but we need
the Muslim personal laws to move likewise. After all, so many changes have been brought about
in other countries where Muslims predominates. Why then should the Indian Muslim women be
so disadvantaged? Especially when they have an equal right to vote and participate in the
formation of government at both the state and the central level. Depriving them of equality in
personal laws seems rather strange. The line between personal law and criminal law is often
blurred. Section 125 cr. P. c. is a provision to prevent vagrancy and thus give all Indian wives
some maintenance. Yet this became such a huge issue in the Shah Bano case. When tribal marry,
it is their personal law. But when the panchayat shuns them, then it is referred to as the law of the
panchayat. But if the panchayat executes them, then clearly it is a case of murder and clearly a
matter to be dealt under the criminal law. But are not blackening their faces, putting garlands of
shoes around their neck and ostracizing them a violation of human rights and thus a crime? The
tribal suffer untold indignities and even death, and leaders like Mahendra Singh Tikait proclaim
loudly that anyone breaking caste rules must expect to be punished. Muslim women suffer
indignities as a result of the horrendous practice of triple talaq. Though the all India Muslim
personal law board admits it is a social evil, the board president said just recently that the triple
talaq irrevocable as it comes from divine inspiration; that is, the shariatn .We must depoliticize
the uniform civil code. For at the heart of the desire for a uniform civil code is the determination
to do away with discrimination, and empower women and give them their dignity and selfesteem. A uniform civil code will help break down those customary practices derogatory and
harmful to women and give individual identity as independent citizen of India. Religion is about
faith- a relationship between an individual and his god; where law is about specific rights of an
individual as against other individuals or society at large. One is the religious plane, which is
entirely personal, and the other is the social plane, which deals with a person’s status and selfesteem as a citizen of the country. Take for instance the divorce act, which applies, to Christians,
irrespective of whether they are Protestants or catholic can get a divorce under the provisions of
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this act if he or she wants It criminal law treats all offenders with an equal hand- regardless of
their caste, creed, sex and religion, so should the civil law including the family law. Women’s
lives are normally bound with the family and their status therein. Laws that are just within the
family or like untouchability in other section of society, cannot stand within the framework of
the constitution, and they must slowly but surely be changed.It is some time said: why do we
need a uniform civil code when we have the special marriage act, 1954, which Pandit Jawaharlal
Nehru had called the forerunner of the uniform civil code. But the first special marriage act was
enacted not in 1954 but in 1872.it required the parties marrying under it to renounce their
religions. It is only when the special marriage act was re-enacted their 1954 that it permitted
inter-religious marriages without the couple having no renounce their religion.Parties marrying
under this act were governed by the Indian succession act, 1926 for the purposes of inheritance.
Subsequently in 1976, Hindu couples marrying under the special marriage act of 1954 were
taken out of its ambit, and could inherit under the Hindu succession act, 1956. This was a
retrograde step, because for a Hindu wife her inheritance depleted due to the coparceneary
system.In India women’s problems, regardless of caste community, gender or religion, are
similar. Women are suppressed and deny their dignity. A multiplicity of family laws divides
them and is confusing; and they are often not aware of what is their right, if any in a given
situation. They would be strengthening if they were together and under one set of rules. The
larger group of uneducated women often cannot differentiate between custom, culture, religion
and criminal law. A uniform civil code will not take away the right to perform religious
ceremonies and rituals; but would any woman object to a code that gives her equal property
rights, protection from polygamy and arbitrary divorce, and the right to adopt and right to
inheritance even if her father or husband converts to another religion. One of the advantages of a
uniform civil code will be a proper notice period and registration of then marriage. The
ceremonies will become optional. But parties can have ceremonies of their choice as rituals, i.e.,
Hindu- Saptapadi; Muslim -Nikah; Christian- church blessing, etc. but the proof of the marriage
will be the registration and compliance with what is required of notice, etc, as set out in the
uniform civil code. Monogamy will be mandatory and the laws of divorce will be the same for
men and women and this will leads to cohesion and non-fragmentation of society. Men and
women must be entitled to equal property rights, which can be enforced by law. These will real
empowerment of women. If this is not done it is woman and children who are the losers. For men
have managed to manipulate what laws are made by virtue of their position in society and or /
religion to ensure their supremacy. And even right- thinking men do not often voice their dissent
as they indirect beneficiaries of this manipulation. But article 44 wants just family laws for all. It
is not a question of national integration only but a reminder that all Indian women need this
protection of a uniform civil code, and an improvement and acceptance of their rights. It is
urgent because it is a matter of social reform and gender-just laws, and a draft uniform civil code
should be prepared. It should be circulated widely and debated vociferously and comments asked
for. The best should be taken from different laws and the strong anti-woman biases removed. We
must depoliticize article 44, and lets us complete the unfinished agenda of the founding fathers.
Every time a suggestion is made for a uniform civil code or gender-just laws, the religious
leaders or persons with vested interest should not rabble-rouse and frighten the ordinary Indian
Muslim women into silence, immobilizing them with fear that what is being suggested is the
death knell of Islam. Nor should they threaten the government with the spilling of rivers of
blood. Reinhold Niebuhr has said: “man’s capacity for justice makers’ democracy possible, but
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man’s inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.” Let us things in a democratic manner
and give justice to women (Leila Seth).
Violence Against Women: Several Issues (Dowry, Property, Marriage, Divorce Etc.)
Women and Property Law (Hindus Succession Act, 1956)
The Act applies to Hindus, Buddhists, Skihs and Jains. Before the Act came into force a
Hindu woman did not have absolute control over her property. She had only limited estate. Once
she died it went back to the reversioners and not to her heirs.
The Hindu succession Act came into force on June 17, 1956, with a view of conferring
absolute ownership on Hindu female in the property, which was in her possession [(S. 14 (1)]
The section was upheld by the Supreme Court in Harak Singh V. Kailash Singh. The ‘Limited
estate’ of Hindu females was enlarged and the reversionary rights have been abolished to a great
extent. As of now, a Hindu woman has full rights over any property that she has earned or that
has been gifted or willed or her, provided she has attained the age of majority. She is free to
dispose her property, gift, will as she thinks proper.
The Hindu female did not enjoy proprietary status in a male-dominated Hindu joint
family. The Hindu joint family did not allow her to hold property and further she was denied the
right of succession in the coparcenary property of the Hindu Joint family. She could not hold the
property independently. Nor she ever enjoyed it as a full owner. She was given a limited estate,
which on her death reverted to her reversioners. The limited estate did not confer on her full
fledged right to ownership. Sec 14 (1) of the Hindu Succession Act provided her a proprietary.
The female were allowed to stand on the same podium and to be recognized an equal footing.
The section gives her the following rights: (a) the right to possession; the right to its
management, the right to its exclusive enjoyment; right to disposal by an intervivos or will at
pleasure: and on the death of the owner the property should devolve by succession on the
owner’s own heirs.
Coparcenary Property
According to Hindu law, where the property belongs to a Hindu caparcenery, the share of
the coparcener, on his death, goes by survivorship to other coparceners. These coparcenaers
include son; son’s son, son’s son’s son son’s. This is called survivorship and is different from
succession. A Hindu woman is denied the right of succession in the coparcenary property of the
Hindu joint family. The coparcenars consist of father and his sons. The daughter is excluded.
Suppose the father dies leaving behind a son and daughter the share of the coparcenary property
will be divided into two parts. One part belonging to the father and the other part going to the
son. The daughter is excluded from the property. From the share of the father, the son and the
daughter share equally. Consequently the son will take ¾ share while the daughter will take ¼
share.
The Indian Succession Act
The Christian widow’s share in the property of her husband
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(a) If the husband has left any lineal descendants (child, children or remote issues) the
widow’s share is 1/3 and the remaining 2/3 goes to the lineal descendants. The latter
share among themselves equally without distinction.
(b) (b) if the husband has left no lineal descendants, but has left kindred (father, mother,
brother, sister, uncle, etc) then the widow’s share is ½ and the remaining goes to the
kindred. But a minimum is guaranteed to the widow in certain cases.
(c) (c) If there are no lineal descendants or kindred all the property goes to the widow (see
Section 33 and 33A of Indian Succession Act).
Widow’s minimum guarantee in her husband’s assets
When a person has left a widow but no lineal decedent the following rules apply:
(a) The widow is entitled to the first 5000 rupees.
(b) If the estate does not exceed Rs. 5000, the widow gets all the property otherwise, she
gets the first 5000 rupees, and in the residue she gets her share according to ordinary
rule.
(c) For her minimum Rs. 5000 she has a charge on the whole property, and is entitled to
interest at 4 percent per annum until payment.
(d) The benefit is available only if the deceased dies intestate in respect of all his property
(both moveable and immovable)
Right of daughter
(1) She inherits equally with any other brothers and sisters to her father’s estate, or her
mother’s.
(2) She is entitled to shelter, maintenance before marriage, but not after from her parents.
(3). She has full rights over her personal property, upon attaining majority. Until the, her
natural guardian is her father.
Right of mother
(1) She is entitled to maintenance from her husband, but his failure to provide the same may
also be ground for divorce.
(2) Upon death of her husband, she is entitled to one third share of his property, the rest being
divided among the children equally:
(3) She must inherit a minimum of Rs. 5000 from her husband’s estate, supposing the estate is
more than the amount. In case it not she may inherit the whole. She is not entitled to
maintenance from her children. In case any of her children dies without spouse or living
children, she may inherit ¼ of the assets.
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Inheritance by Muslim Women
Daughters
In heritance, the daughter’s share is equal to one half of the son’s in keeping with the
concept that a woman is worth half a man. She has, however, and has always had full control
over this property. It is her right to manage, control and to dispose of, it as she wishes in life or
death. Through she may received gifts from those whom she would inherit from, there should be
no doubt that the gift is a means of circumventing the inheritance laws of one third of a man’s
share, since, under Muslim law, the shares of inheritance are very strict.
Daughters have rights of residence in parents’ houses, as well as right to maintenance
until they are married. In case of divorce, charge for maintenance reverts to her parental family
after the iddat period. In case she has children capable of supporting her, the charge falls upon
them.
Wives
In Islamic law a woman’s identity, though inferior in status to man her right is not
extinguished when she marries. Thus the retains control over her goods and properties. She has a
right to the same maintenance he gives to this other wives, if any and may take action against
him in case he discriminates against her.
She has a right to ‘mehr’ according to the terms of the contract agreed to at the time of
marriage. She will inherit form him to the extent of one-eight if there are children or one-fourth
if there are none. If there is more than one wife. The share may diminish to one-sixteenth. In
circumstances where there are no shares in the estate as prescribed by law the wife may inherit a
greater amount by will. A Muslim may dispose of one-third of his property though not to share in
the inheritance.
Mother
In case of divorce or widowhood, she is entitled to maintenance from her children. Her
property is to be divided according to the rules of Muslim law. She is entitled to inherit one-sixth
of her deceased child’s estate.
Islamic law as applied in India, treated women quite reasonable, as far as the right to hold
property was concerned. Their position appeared to be quite comfortable in Muslim law and the
proprietary status of the Muslim female was comparatively far better than the Hindu female. The
Hindu female’s dependence on men led her to a degrading position, where as Muslim females
received the right in property as of right and thus were free from the yoke of male dominance in
matter of property. Muslim males dominance could be seen in other matters, but as far property
rights were concerned, she enjoyed independence in its enjoyment and disposal8.
8
Hindu Succession Act, 1956.
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Dowry
Dowry normally means gifts given during the marriage to the son-in-law or his parents in
cash or kind. From the point of view of women’s status, however, dowry has to be looked at as
constituting.
(a) What is given to the bride, and often settled before and announced openly or directly; the
gift though given to the bride may not be regarded as exclusively her property;
(b) What is given to the bridegroom before and at marriage; and
(c) What is presented to the in-laws of the girl.
The settlement often includes the enormous expenses incurred on travel and
entertainment of the bridegroom’s party. The gift-giving ritual continues throughout early
married life, during festivals and celebrations.
Indirectly it is assumed that it is a way of providing a girl with a share of the family
property. The Hindu laws on property and ownership do not, in their present form, grant women
their due share of family income and property. The Hindu Succession Act gives women the right
to a share of the family property. But tradition dies hard, and in most cases the property of the
family is given to sons. Daughters usually do not contend this, and hence inadvertently
strengthen the argument that the dowry system alone ensures them fair share of her father’s
property, which will help them tide over any crisis. The latter also explains the important
attached to gold and jewellery and other constituents of dowry. For, unlike land and other
immovable property, they are both easily transportable and readily converted to cash. Demand
for dowry is justified on many grounds. Firstly, since they have to pay dowry for their daughters,
why not take it for their sons? Secondly, fathers of educated boys want to get back the money
spent for their sons’ education. Dowry today is being demanded and paid without any relation to
the bride’s father’s income and wealth. Dowry is being demanded by all levels of people, be they
high, middle or low, items of dowry may differ ranging from flats, cars, electrical, furniture,
clothes, cash and jewellery. The problem of protecting young married women against harassment
on account of dowry has been engaging the attention of social workers and women’s
organization for quite sometimes.(Kahol Yudhistar, 2003)
Women’s being the enemy of a woman in cases of bride burning is an interesting feature
of this crime. It has been usually found that attitude of a woman as a mother is different from that
as a mother-in-law. As a mother she gives all what she has to the daughter but as the in-law she
attempts to extract the maximum possible dowry and can go the extent of causing death of the
bride, if the demands are not met to her satisfaction. In other words, in bride burning cases, crime
is normally abetted and even committed by the women themselves. It is ironical that in many
cases where one woman is killed for dowry another woman with a more handsome dowry is
prepared to “console” the bereaved husband.( Hindu succession Act; 1956).
Dowry Prohibition Act 1961
The first attempt by the Government of India to recognized dowry as a social evil and to
curb its practice is the Dowry Prohibition Act of 1961. The Act was modified with the Dowry
Prohibition (Amendment) Act of 1984 and 1986. Women’s organizations have played a key role
in this process of change. The 1961 Act defines dowry and makes the practice of both giving and
taking dowry, a punishable offence. Any agreement on dowry is void. If it is given at all, it will
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be the women’s property. With increased awareness of dowry deaths and consequent public
condemnation, women’s organization made a through analysis of the implication of 1961 Dowry
Act and criticized it for being theoretical and lacking in clarity.
The Dowry Prohibition (Amendment) Act, 1984
•
The Dowry Prohibition (Amendment) Act, 1984 makes the offence cognizable by
enlarging the meaning of the term “Dowry”. The main features of the
Amendment Act are as follows:-
•
Any property given or agreed to be given in connection with a marriage to the
bride or bridegroom or any other person is considered as dowry. It is not
necessary to show that the same has been given as consideration for the marriage.
It also provides for the preparation of list of presents which are given at the time
of marriage to the bride or bridegroom in accordance with the rules made under
this Act.
•
Any person giving or taking dowry or abetting the giving or taking of dowry is
also punishable with imprisonment which is not less than six months, but which
may extend to two years and with a fine which can extend to Rs. 10,000 or the
amount of the value of the dowry whichever is higher.
•
Neither the bride nor the persons giving presents to her at the time of marriage is
liable for punishment if the presents have been given to her without any demand
on that behalf and the presents are entered in the list maintained in accordance
with the rules.
•
Demands of dowry continue in spite of this significant new amendment of the
Dowry Prohibition Act 1961, failing which the bridegroom or his parents take to
violence against the bride and sometimes such violence results in her death.
Further there is a need for legal registration of gifts to be made compulsory, so
that women may not be cheated of her dowry. The 1984 Amendment however
makes it a cognizable offence and empowers recognized welfare institutions or
organization to take cognizance of the offence.
The Dowry Prohibition (Amendment) Bill 1986 was introduced in the Rajya Sabha. It
attempts to tighten the provisions of the Act and includes dowry deaths in the list of offence in
the Indian Penal Code. The Bill provides that if a woman dies within seven years of her marriage
due to causes other than natural, her property would be transferred to her children and if she has
no children to her parents The burden of proving that no dowry demand was made will be on
those who took or abetted in the taking of the dowry, the aggrieved person will be subjected to
prosecution. This amendment bill has made the offence non-bailable and raised the minimum
punishment to five year and fine upto Rs. 15,000. Provisions for appointment of dowry
prohibition officers and their advisory board with two women members had been made.
According to this new amendment in the Indian Penal Code whoever, being husband or related to
the husband of a woman, subjects such woman a cruelty shall be punishable with imprisonment
which may extent to three years and shall also be liable to fine. The cruelty for the purpose of
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this provision means any willful conduct which is of such a nature as is likely to drive the
woman to commit suicide or cause grave injury and danger to life, or health (whether mental or
physical) of the woman. The cruelty also includes harassment of the woman where such
harassment is with a view to coercing her or any person related to her to meet unlawful demands
for any property or valuable security or on account of failure by her or any person related to her
to meet such demand. Under this amendment the police have been empowered to investigate the
report cases of unnatural or suspicious deaths of women. Further, they have been empowered to
investigate in the following cases: when
(i)
The case involves suicide by a woman within seven years of her marriage, or
(ii)
The case relates to the death of women within seven year of her marriage in any
circumstances raising a reasonable suspicion that some other person committed an
offence in relation to such woman; or
(iii)
There is any doubt regarding the cause of death.
A new Section 198A has been inserted in the Cr. P.C. 1973, providing that “No court
shall take cognizance of an offence punishable under Section 498-A of the I.P.C. except upon a
police report of facts which constitute such offence or upon a complaint made by the person
aggrieved by the offence or by her father, mother, brother, sister or by her father’s or mother’s
brother or sister or with the leave of the court, by any other person related to her blood, marriage
or adoption. The Section takes into account the various circumstances under which a court can
take cognizance of an offence registered under Section-498-A of the IPC. A new Section 113-A
has been added in the Indian Evidence Act, 1972, to the following effect, in relation to the
burden of proof. “When the question is whether the Commission of suicide by a woman had
been abetted by her husband or any relative of her husband and it is shown that the had
committed suicide within a period of seven years from the date of her marriage and that her
husband or such relatives of her husband had subjected her to cruelty, the court may presume,
having regard to all the other circumstances of the case, that such suicide has been abetted by her
husband or by such relatives of her husband”.
This section empowers the court to assume that the suicide has been abetted by the
husband or a relative of the husband, unless otherwise established. Under this provision, the
burden of proof is shifted from the prosecution to the accused. Thus, there is a total departure
from fundamental rules of evidence. The guilt of the accused is assumed if the death of the
woman is caused within seven years of marriage and if cruelty against such woman at the hands
of the accused is established. However, the accused is at liberty to prove his innocence. He will
be entitled to any benefit of doubt, provided under the law of Evidence. In spite of this
amendment, dowry deaths in the country have not undergone any decline.
“The names vary. The circumstances differ. The amounts in question are vastly
dissimilar. But the victims of dowry death all share one thing in common-an untimely,
unnatural, grisly end.”(Kohal Yudhistar, 2003)
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Circulation of Torture and Violence
•
Shorn of superficial differences, each story reads the same: the demand for goods
and/or money by the boys’ side, the inability or the unwillingness, of the girls’
parents to pay up: the lack of support structure available to the girl and therefore,
her incapability to walk out of the marriage; the mental, and often physical torture
that follows.
•
The barbaric bestial act turned on by the flick of a match stick on kerosene
drenched victims marks the end to a helpless being. The demand for dowry and
the victimization is carefully planned and plotted by the culprits so as to leave
minimum evidence of the crime which they term as accident. The culprits allow
some time to pass to give the impression that the couple had good relations.
•
Demands for dowry are conveyed to the bride’s father and others in a variety of
direct and indirect ways. When demands were made after marriage, it is perceived
either as an exercise of the rightful prerogative of the groom and his family, or to
express discontent at what was given at the time of marriage or in social
comparison with neighbours, at later date, the dowry was perceived as inadequate.
•
The list of dowry demands are numerous and diverse and stretch beyond
imagination ranging from cash for starting business to TV, tape recorder, motor
cycle, refrigerator, car, even wrist watch, cycle or few tolas of gold. There are
even demands for buffalo or a fan or a job for the groom or transfer of name of
husband in fixed deposit.
•
Demands of a grand wedding, share in property of bride’s father are also few
other demand which may precipitate into serious consequences. No correlation
exists between the level of the education of the bride and her murder on dowry
issue is a matter of great surprise. Parent’s belief that proper education of their
daughter will diminish the margin of dowry is proving wrong.
•
The more a girl an educated, the greater is the demand of dowry. A sixth year
Chemistry student of Bihar University was burnt to death by her-in-laws and
husband for a car. Her parents are said to have given Rs. 4 lakh a few days before
she was married. Her father said that a week back his son-in-law had sent a letter
threatening him with dire consequences if he was not given a car. In the
meanwhile due to constant pressure her father sent two ceiling fans, one cooking
range, one table fan and four electric irons. Even working women are not spared
for dowry.
•
Victimization starts immediately after the marriage in most of the cases. But
sometimes victimization starts even after several years of marriage. In Gaya town
even after eight years of marriage, a mother of two children narrated a woeful tale
before the police after regaining consciousness that her husband and mother-inlaw with the help of other members of the family inflicted hot iron injuries from
her waist to chest till she became unconscious as father of the victim had
expressed his inability to comply with the demand of her husband and this led to
inhuman treatment with her.
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Though dowry has been widely prevalent among Muslims in Bihar “dowry deaths were
relatively unknown. It is only in recent times that such incidents have been coming to light. A
glance at media reports over the years make it amply evident that no longer are Hindu women
alone victim of dowry-related violence, it is taking place among Muslims as well although data
available on the topic is inadequate. It is beyond doubt that the incidents of dowry deaths among
Muslims is much lower in absolute number, yet their occurrence can no longer be described as a
“stray incident” or “an isolated case”. Wife battering and torture have always been indulged in
by men in a male dominated society. Even Muslims come from the same kind of society and so
the problem exists among them too and they are no exception to the nature of men all over. But
burning of women has been rare occurrence in comparison to Hindus reason being that Muslims
have recourse to divorce, a provision in Islam much misused by Indian Muslim men. There are
also cases of Muslim brides who are constantly harassed physically or mentally for failure to
bring sufficient dowry. Domestic violence related to dowry takes a particular form of reporting.
A dowry victim would be one who is harassed, beaten up, mentally tortured by her-in-laws or her
husband for failure to bring in the demanded dowry or more dowry; or would be one who has
been harassed or deserted; or one who has been burnt to death; or who has committed suicide
due to excessive harassment.
Though the dowry death is generally perceived to be the murder of a woman on the
dowry issue but before the act of killing, several forms of harassment and humiliation take place
against the victim. An innocent bride of Hazaribagh was kept confined in a room without food
for days together before being murdered.
It has been gathered from the newspapers that five different methods were alleged to have
been adopted in killing the victims. Sometimes the victims are first strangulated and then hanged
from the roof to make it look like suicide. We shall not attempt to define what exactly is meant
by harassment and cruelty, since they are largely subjective terms. At best, some of their physical
manifestation on death or injury to body are cognizable. What is more important is that it must
be recognized.
The most common form of harassment of a woman in her in-laws family unfolds in the
forms of taunts, abuses, threats, which generally escalate to battering, even abettement to suicide
or murder in some cases. However, what remains hidden from us are experiences of woman
battered by their husband- for various reasons including inadequacy of dowry. This is viewed by
the police as a simple case of domestic assault and by the society as “normal interaction among
intimate couples”. Women will be women, always striving to keep the family fabric intact.
Blinded by the patriarchal notions about the privacy of family matters and because of their
assumed weakness, woman seldom choose to get out of these relationships or even complain
about it. Putting up with violence becomes the order of the day for an indefinite period until it
becomes unbearable when they have to take hard decision and escape torture by suicide or
walking out. Keeping relationship together, despite violence, is also important for practical
reasons such as financial support and shelter. Setting out is almost as bad as staying in the
relationship. The threat of male violence outside the home is an acutely intimidating reality of
women who endure violence within their won homes. Living among constant threats of killing
and desertion become a daily ordeal for them, they have to take it or leave it, in most cases the
keep taking it.
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The mother-in-law, sister-in-law nexus along with an unsympathetic husband make life a
living hell for them. Indian conjugal relationships are typically much less closer than those
between mother and son: frequently the mother-in-law instigates the harassment against the
young bride using her son as her agent. The actual or supposed inadequacy of dowry becomes an
excuse for the mother-in-law.
On the slightest pretext the bride is sent back to her parental home-usually to refurbish
her “ inadequate dowry”. To make matters worse and continued harassment, the quality and
quantity or whatever she gets from her parents are made the excuse.
On the other extreme the girl is discouraged from frequently visiting her parents. Her
isolation from her earlier natal source of support being complete, her natal family is kept in the
dark under the impression that all is going well not having an inkling of idea what their daughter
is going through. That torture and harassment could reach such limits can be seen in cases where
clothes for daily wear were given to the woman by mother-in-law each day; where for a pair of
slippers and handkerchiefs she was not given money but was asked to get these from her parents;
where every time, she went to her parents, she was not given the rickshaw fare, but was asked to
make her parents pay it where the battering has permanently disfigured her finger, where a newly
married bride tried to commit suicide because of the hopeless situation she was in and had a
miscarriage; where she was not allowed to sleep with her husband or communicate with him for
one whole year after marriage; where a woman was tied with a rope, beaten, after which she was
burnt, where a woman was burnt within a week after her marriage, and where a girl had been
accused of being insane and cast out. These are few of the many instances of harassment the
women may have to undergo each day of their lives. The question that confronts us now is why
do so many girls come back even after they have undergone such torture beyond endurance? The
first reason being the wish of the girl herself who really sees no respectable position outside her
husband’s house. Women often feel inadequate to cope with self-sufficiency and consequently
the lack of self-confidence often acts as a trap to keep a woman within a violent home. Putting
up with physical abuse is the very reason that there is no decline in domestic violence against
women. A daughter’s change of status and her transfer from one family to another have a strong
cultural sanction. It is said that at marriage the girl dies and is reborn as a new person. The
formal advice given to her is that as long as she is alive she is not to leave the house she is
entering. The parents themselves ignore the case of the daughter who is being harassed and
wishes to come back. Their constant advice to her is to “adjust” to maltreatment, the common
saying being, “It is nothing unusual or so unbearable- so many women are coping with it”. In
most cases of wife murder, suicide, maltreatment, the women feels so burdened by the
expenditure undertaken by her parents that she feels duty bound to present a brave picture of
“silent courage”. In our culture divorce or widowhood for a woman is worse than death.
However, this is in many cases not true for the women of lower castes, as there is greater
autonomy to women among them. It is gathered from newspapers that there are many
circumstances in which, ill treatment of young wives, often driving them to commit suicide and
many times they have been murdered, take place which are not linked with the dowry death in
any way. To a great extent the matrimonial relations in general and the report between the
parents and in-laws, in particular have deteriorated under the stress of suspicion. The girls as
victims to oppression are equally questionable as to why do they submit to oppression? Why do
they not realize that a divorce is better than a marriage where money is the all and end-all of all
relations? Why do they not walk out of their marriages and try to stand on their own legs? Why
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do they not realize that by committing suicide, they are creating problems for their children and
an emotional trauma for their younger sisters and parents. Marriage is not the ultimate end in life
but happiness certainly is. She must decide whether she would continue to live in a state of
growing tension, or whether she would prefer to secure release from that tension once and for all.
Mutual respect for each other and a degree of tolerance of opposing viewpoints will, in a great
measure, contribute to harmonious solution. Men have to be taught to respect women and not
treat her as an object of exploitation. Further on, only if women respect themselves can
command respect from others9. (Kohal Yudhistar, 2003)
Domestic Violence
Poem is dedicated to the victims of Domestic Violence and those people's who are
devoting countless hours to ameliorate the problem.
Not wanting to leave, yet not safe to stay
Shadows
On her Sad, Vacant face
Bruises
Hid by a Coat of Skin colored denial
Not wanting to leave
Where could she go?
Not safe to stay
Did she do something wrong?
Not wanting to leave
He's the only one who loves me
Not safe to stay
Obviously it's her fault
She's so upset
Not wanting to leave
It's not like any one would listen anyways
Not wanting to leave
Who would believe a small passive voice
Over the charming good boy
(The facade hiding the ugly monster introduced after our brief euphoria of magic)
Not safe to stay
This time not just for her; but for
The life within her womb
Not wanting to leave
But he loves her
What to do?
She only knows two things,
She doesn't want to leave,
But it's not safe to stay
Laura Buzawa (Eve S. Buzawa and Carl G. Buzawa: 2003)
9
Kahol Yudhistar, “The Dowry Menance”, in “Violence Against women”, Reference press, New Delhi, 2003.
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Not wanting to leave, yet not safe to stay
This domestic violence prevention Act – 2005 gives the protection and right of women to
stay or take shelter in her husband home, but.
•
Do you think she is safe there emotionally?
•
Will this Law be able to give protection to the women in her husband's house or
the situation will be the same as earlier?
•
Do you think that she will secure or safe after getting enforcing her right from the
court?
•
Who will filled the gap between the relationship?
We can only make her safe and mentally sound by making her self independent economically.
Only enabling mechanism would change the system.
We must bring changes within the society and the societal socio-cultural norms and stereotype
mind setup should be break first; letter on we can think of giving protection to the women.
Thinking process of individual should be change and the structure of morality should be same for
male as well as female; then only we can ensure women in our society.
At this stage we need a mental revolution, to change the social mindset of the society and we
need to go miles and miles.........
“It is the human right of woman, to enjoy equality with man, the uninhibited and free opportunity
to be herself and to unfold her full faculties, eliminating from the social milieu all sex milieu all
sex prejudices, sex bans, sex servitude.”
“Don’t kill me by degrees or rape or in flames or suffocate me in the underworld. Let me be free
to live, as of right, with dignity and womanhood’s personality. This is my plaintive plea to be
free from foetus to my last breath- such is the litany of women to the state. Law, if it speaks the
truth, must heed this cry for sex justice, real in life, not only in printed pages. For law is what law
does”.
Introduction of Violence in India
Women in India through the ages have been victimized humiliated, tortured and exploited
as along as history can tell. There have been incidents of murder, rape, abduction and torture
from time immemorial. In spite of such a dark past, violence against has not been given much
attention, more so, no attempt was made on the issue of why such a socially relevant them has
been left neglected and ignored. Victimization of women in India starts from the time of their
birth. Boys are preferred to girls. In most of the cases the birth of a girl child does not make
happy even the parents of the child, not to speak about other members of the family. On the
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contrary, the birth of a son is enthusiastically celebrated with blessings showered on the couple
by all the members of the family, friends and neighbours alike. If a woman accidentally gives
birth to two or three daughters, she is made to hang her head in shame. She is subjected to abuses
and all sort of ill –treatment specially by in-Laws. Many women have committed suicide being
fed up with torture by mother-in-laws and husbands for being unable to give birth to a son for the
family. There are innumerable instances where the parents leave the female babies at the doorsteps of some orphanage or hospital or in parks and say good bye to the child for ever. There are
a variety of social, economic, legal and psychological forms of victimization against women. We
live in a society in which men are in holding majority of institutions.
Economically, women are discriminated against in the job market. Sex role stereotyping
has victimized and “imprisoned” a number of women, often women have been victimized by the
institution of marriage, in which, although they are no longer identified as property, they are still
repressed by implied and covert socio-cultural practices. In some cases in the courses of a marital
relationship, women have been exploited physically, emotionally, and sexually by their
husbands. Mental as well as Physical “injury” has been inflicted on women by the health
profession.
People have always been deeply disturbed about violence against women, but they have
never quite understood what makes the sense of pain conveyed by the term violence more
painful than any other pain, the sense of fear more awesome and the terror more terrifying than
any other. Women suffer and are made to suffer in many ways: In behavioural terms, violence
against women ranges form simple suppression to abuse, aggressions, exploitations and severe
oppression. We know it as female infanticide, the abortion of the female foetus, the neglect and
under nourishment of the girl child, denial of education to girls, rape, pre-puberty marriage, wife
beating, the harassment a bride leading to her suicide or murder.
Definition of Violence
Violence in general is a coercive mechanism to impose one’s will over another in order to
prove or feel a sense of power. It can be perpetuated by those in power against the powerless, or
by the powerless in retaliation against coercion by others, to deny their powerlessness. Collins
dictionary defines violence as:- Behaviour which is meant to hurt or kill people; A great deal of
energy used in doing something usually because you are very angry; Words, Actions or others
forms of expression which are critical or destructive.
The Oxford Dictionary defines violence as: The quality of being violent; Violent
conduct or treatment, out rage, injury; The unlawful exercise of physical force.
The Thesaurus adds a few additional dimensions to the concept offered by two
dictionaries. It indicates that the noun violence cannotes vehemence, impetuosity, vigorousness
excess destructiveness, vandalism, turbulence, turmoil roughness, severity, brute force, brutality,
savagery mercilessness, exacerbation, explosion. The adjective ‘violent’ is explained among
other terms by the terms aggressive, charging disorderly turbulent stormy, anarchistic, nihilistic,
intemperate, immoderate. Violence subjects women not only to servitude and subordination but
also keeps them in a state of despair and dehumanization in dignity and intimidation,
terrorization and humiliation. Violence is an act of aggression usually in interpersonal interaction
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or relations. It may also be aggression of an individual woman against herself, such as suicide,
self-multilation, negligence of ailments, sex determination tests, food denial and so no. Basically
the violence brings into question to concept of boundary maintenance (Nedelsky 1990) and a
sense of self as well as perception of another’s autonomy and identity. It implies that when the
body-and indeed the self- is vulnerable to violation, individuals have a very different notion of
“What is one’s body and what is done to one’s body” (Lit ke 1992: 174). Indian Scholars in
women’s studies have emphasized the dynamics of power and powerlessness involved in a
violent act. It is a coercive mechanism “to assert one’s will over another to prove or to feel to
sense of power”. (Lit ke 1992). Violence against women may take the form of extreme physical
of sexual abuse or it may take forms that are emotionally, psychologically and mentally
torturing. Violence may be perpetuated by family members in the forms of battering creating
complete dependence on the male head of the family for personal needs, mobility restrictions,
threat of use of physical violence, or lack of sufficient nutrition to women or marital rape (forced
sex with, wife, against her wishes). Women also face violence in public spaces, which ranges
form lurid comments, molestation, rape. At the workplace, women may face sexual harassment
inwanted demands for sexual favours in return for work related opportunities from employers or
those in positions of authority or gender discrimination in matters of promotions, salary structure
etc. Sexual harassment contains elements of coercion, threat and/or unwanted attention in a nonreciprocal relationship. Physical sexual and psychological violence that occurs in the family
including battering, sexual abuse of female children in the household, dowry-related violence
marital rape; female genital mutation and other traditional practices harmful to women; nonspousal violence; and violence related to exploitation physical, sexual and psychological
violence that occurs within the general community, including rape; sexual abuse, sexual
harassment and intimidation at work in educational institutions and elsewhere; trafficking in
woman, and forced prostitution. Physical, sexual and Psychological violence Perpetrated or
condoned by the state (The World Bank, 1994).
Classification of Crime under Law
A.
Crimes Identified under the Indians Penal Code IPC
1.
Rape (Section 376 IPC)
2.
Kidnapping and abduction (Section 363 and 373)
3.
Dowry Homicides (Section 302 and 304B).
4.
Torture-Physical and mental (Section 498-A).
5.
Molestation (Section 354).
6.
Eve-teasing or sexual harassment. (Section 509).
7.
Importation of girls (Section 366-B).
8.
Murder (Other than dowry homicides (Section 302).
B.
Crimes Identified under the Special Laws (SL)
1.
Immoral Trafficking (1956 Act)
2.
Demanding Dowry (1961 Act)
3.
Commission of Sati (1987 Act)
4.
Indecent representation of women (1986 Act)
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Marriage Relationship
Women who are married at a younger age are at the higher risk of physical violence.
Presence or absence of children in the family is likely to affect the quantity of relationship
between husband and wife. The highest Percentages of physical violence was found in those
household which had no child it may be attributed to their younger age as well as wives inability
to have children because children are valued in the Indian society and those women who are
unable to bear a child are ridiculed. In the Patriarchal society like India greater importance is
given to the male child. The female is not only considered a liability because of associated dowry
problems but mothers who give birth to female children only do not get much respect in the
family as compared with those who give birth to male children. Presence of a large number of
members in the family not only creates the problem of adjustment but they who act as instigators
for wife abuse.
The younger the age at marriage of the woman, the greater is the possibility of their being
battered. The younger the age of wife, the greater are the chances of her being victim of physical
violence. The absence of child is likely to result is wife battering. Remarriage after divorce or
separation is easily available to man than a woman. Such a discriminatory practice perpetuates
subjective dependency in the wives. The very foundation of happy family lies in cordial husband
wife relationship. It affects all the children, the home and the family. A cordial relationship
makes the children feel more secure in their home and relate to every thing more effectively,
where as an uncordial relationship makes them dull and inefficient. The sufferings of the wife are
not to be forgotten. Thus, marital conflict only reads to familial disorganization and has negative
consequences on the children’s upbringing. Because of the gender relationships down the ages,
women are used as instruments of reproduction with no independent status outside family, thus
maintaining systemic inequality over time. Different studies around the world shown that wifebeating is the most popular form of violence. Husband use violence against wives to reinforce
their dominant position women being women, they tolerate the torture silently keeping it all
within themselves sometimes to keep the family fabric intact.
Why husband beats his wife or why there is a abusal of house wives : certain reasons:
Violent Homes of Origin, Income and Domestic Violence, Employment Status, Alcohol use and
abuse, Power-imbalanced Relationship.
The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act 2005
ACT 43 OF 2005
The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Bill 2005 having been passed by the
Lok Sabha on 24th August, 2005 and by the Rajya Sabha on 29th August, 2005 received the
assent of the President of India on 13th September, 2005 and came on statute book as The
Protection Of Women From Domestic Violence Act, 2005 (43 Of 2005)
Domestic Violence Act 2005: Historical Background
An average Indian woman is bound by all the social constraints that men are not bound
by. She is brought up with the values to live a chaste, righteous and moral life. She is the ijjat of
the family and this ijjat is often related to her remaining virgin before getting married. With such
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upbringing it is not easy for a woman to disclose that she is a victim of rape. There is no
guarantee that her family will support and she will be accepted in society with dignity. At the
backdrop of such a situation, the parliament has now empowered Indian women with a law to
protect themselves from violence of any kind occurring within the family. Therefore, there are
reasons to cheer the enactment of the Protection of women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005.
This path breaking legislation seeks to protect women from all forms of domestic violence and to
check their harassment and exploitation by family members or relatives. Women will now be
able to take legal action against abusive husbands and other relatives who harass them.
Definition
"Violence would include, apart from brutalization of the individual or group through
physical injury, threats of coercion, subtle acts of disciplining aimed at pressurizing the
individual or group to act in a manner conducive to the wishes of the dominant group as well as
exploitation, discrimination, upholding of an unequal social and economic structure and the
creation of an atmosphere of terror, a situation of threat and reprisal."
Domestic Violence against women is an age-old phenomenon. Women were always
considered weak, vulnerable and in position to be exploited, violence has long been accepted as
something that happens to women. Family which was perceived as an arena of love, affection,
gentleness and centre of solidarity and warmth has now become a centre of exploitation, assault
and violence ranging from slapping, hitting, homicidal assault by one member of the family on
the other to husbands and in-laws harassment for dowry or any other reason.
"Domestic violence refers to any act of violence against women by the husbands or inlaws. Physical violence is defined as any act intended to harm or injure or inflict pain on the
women. Sexual violence can also be termed as physical violence. It refers to any act of nonconsensual sexual activity. It can range from unwanted sexual attention to rape. Mental
violence is any behavior or lack of it by the husband and in-laws intended to undermine the
woman’s self-confidence or lead to a lowered or negative self-esteem [Dave and Solanki
2001:40]."
In all societies, where patriarchal family structure prevails, the patriarch from other men
protects women, but they become victims of men in their own families.
"Domestic Violence is a violence between intimates living to gather or who have
previously cohabited".
But the most important aspect of this kind is that fact that it happens behind the closed
doors and is most often denied by the very women who has been the victim of violence.
"According to Encyclopedia of crime and justice, is a broad sense, "Violence is a general
term referring to all types of behavior either threatened or actual, that result in the damage or
destruction of property or the injury or death of an individual".
Domestic Violence knows no age, socio-economic, religious, social, gender or
educational barriers. It is a myth that only the poor or uneducated are victims of domestic
violence the women right from the moment of stepping into the husband's home tries to forget
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her own identity and adjust every thing according to the needs of the new place and the people
living in it. In spite of it, she is under a constant watch and is often criticized for anything eg. For
not bringing enough money for her parents, for not being trained properly. Hence for women,
"the Union of souls" turning into a nightmare is a truly horrifying and shattering experience.
Women in India through the ages have been victimized humiliated, tortured and exploited
as long as history can tell. There have been incidents of murder, rape , abduction and torture
from time immemorial. In spite of such a dark past, violence agenist has not been given much
attention , more so, no attempt was made on the issue of why such a socicaly relevant. (Misra
Preeti, 2006)
Background
Domestic violence is undoubtedly a human rights issue and serious deterrent to
development. The Vienna Accord 1994 and the Beijing Declaration and the platform for Action
(1995) have acknowledged this. The United Nations Committee on Convention on Elimination
of all forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) in its general recommendation in 1989
has recommended that states should act to protect women against violence of any kind especially
that occurring within the family. Presently, where her husband or relatives subject a woman to
cruelty, it is an offence under section 498A of the Indian Penal Code. The Civil law does not,
however, address this phenomenon in its entirety. Therefore, it was necessary to enact a law,
keeping in view the rights guaranteed under articles 14, 15 and 21 of the Constitution. This was
necessitated to provide for a remedy law, which is intended to protect the woman from being
victim of domestic violence and to prevent the occurrence of domestic violence in society. The
lawyers collective in 1994 first drafted the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Bill
and it was introduced to women’s organization and other stakeholders for its refinement and
acceptability. The process involved included study, dialogue and networking to put pressure on
the government for introduction of the Bill. In June 2005, congress introduced the Violence
Against Women Act (VAWA) of 2005, bipartisan legislation to reauthorize the VAWA
legislation originally passed in 1994. Since VAWA first became law in 1994, more than 660
state laws protecting victims of domestic violence and sexual assault have been passed, and
VAWA 2005 has an even more comprehensive approach to the problem of violence. The
legislation is called a re-authorization because it provides new authority for an existing law.
VAWA extends services and legal protection for women in housing and employment and
revamps the legal system to make it more accessible and beneficial for the victims. Additionally,
the law establishes crisis services for victims of rape and sexual assault.
The Protection Of Women From Domestic Violence Act 2005
Definition of domestic violence according to the Act -2005
The conduct of respondent shall constitute domestic violence in case it –
(a)
Harms or injure or endangers the health, safety, life, limb or well-being, whether
mental or physical, of the aggrieved person or tends to do so and includes causing
physical abuse, sexual abuse, verbal and emotional abuse and economic abuse; or
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(b)
Harasses, harms, injures or endangers the aggrieved person with a view to coerce
her or any other person related to her to meet any unlawful demand for any
dowry or other property or valuable security; or
(c)
Has the effect of threatening the aggrieved person or any person related to her by
any conduct mentioned in clause (a) or clause (b); or
(d)
Otherwise injures or causes harm; whether physical or mental, to the aggrieved
person.
According to the Domestic Violence Prevention Act 2005
•
‘Physical abuse’ means any act or conduct which is of such a nature as to cause
bodily pain, harm or danger to life, limb, or health or impair the health or
development of the aggrieved person and includes assault, criminal intimidation
and criminal force;
•
‘Sexual abuse’ includes any conduct of a sexual nature that abuses, humiliates,
degrades or otherwise violates the dignity of woman.
•
‘Verbal and emotional abuse’ includes –
•
Insults ridicule humiliation name calling and insults or ridicule specially with
regards to not having a child or a male child; and
•
Repeated threats to cause physical pain to any person in whom the aggrieved
person is interested
•
‘Economic abuse’ includes deprivation of all or any economic or financial
resources to which the aggrieved person is entitled under any law or custom
whether payable under an order of a court or otherwise or which the aggrieved
person requires out of necessity including, but not limited to, household necessity
for the aggrieved person and her children, if any, stridhan, property, jointly or
separately owned by the aggrieved person, payment of rental to the shared
household and maintenance;
•
Disposal of household effect, any alienation of assets whether movable or
immovable, valuables, shares, securities, bonds and the like or other property in
which the aggrieved person has an interest or is entitled to use by virtue of the
domestic relationship or which may be reasonably required by the aggrieved
person or her children or her stridhan or any other property jointly or sedately
held by the aggrieved person; and
•
Prohibition or restriction to continued access to resources or facilitates which the
aggrieved person is entitled to use or enjoy by virtue of the domestic relationship
includes access to the shared household.
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The Main Rights of Women as recognised by this Law
This law is so liberal and forward-looking that it recognizes a woman’s right to reside in
the shared household with her husband or a partner even when a dispute is on. Thus, it legislates
against husbands who throw their wives out of the house when there is a dispute. Such an action
by a husband will now be deemed illegal, not merely unethical. Even if she is a victim of
domestic violence, she retains right to live in ‘shared homes’ that is, a home or homes she shares
with the abusive partner. Section 17 of the law, which gives all married women or female
partners in a domestic relationship the right to reside in a home that is known in legal terms as
the shared household, applies whether or not she has any right, title or beneficial interest in the
same. The law provides that if an abused woman requires, she has to be provided alternate
accommodation and in such situations, the accommodation and her maintenance has to be paid
for by her husband or partner. The law, significantly, recognizes the need of the abused woman
for emergency relief, which will have to be provided by the husband. A woman cannot be
stopped from making a complaint/application alleging domestic violence. She has the right to
the services and assistance of the Protection Officer and Service Providers, arranged under the
provisions of the law. A woman who is the victim of domestic violence will have the right to the
services of the police, shelter homes and medical establishments. She also has the right to
simultaneously file her own complaint under Section 498A of the Indian Penal Code. Sections
18-23 provide a large number of avenues for an abused woman to get relief. She can get, through
the courts, Protection Orders, Residence Orders, Monetary Relief, and Custody Order for her
children, Compensation Order and Interim/Ex parte Orders. If a husband violates any of the
above rights of the aggrieved woman, it will be deemed a punishable offence. Charges under
Section 498A can be framed by the magistrate, in addition to the charges under this Act. Thus, an
accursed person will be liable to have charges framed under both the old law and the new one.
Further, the offences are cognizable and non-bail able. Punishment for violation of the rights
enumerated above could extend to the one-year’s imprisonment and/or a maximum fine of Rs.
20,000.
New Mechanisms have been recommended to implement the laws
Section 8 of the law provides for setting up and function of Protection Officers. These
officers, to be appointed by state governments, will be under the jurisdiction and control of the
court, and will be responsible to the court for monitoring the cases of domestic abuse. The PO
will assist the court in making a Domestic Incident Report or an application for a protection
order on behalf of the aggrieved woman and/or child. POs will ensure that aggrieved people are
provided legal aid, medical services, safe shelter and other required assistance. POs will ensure
that necessary information on service providers is provided to the aggrieved woman, and that
orders for monetary relief are complied with. Importantly, PO can be penalized for
failing/refusing to discharge his duty, with the proviso that prior sanction of the state government
is required. Service Providers are a vital tool in the implementation of this act. Service
Providers, as defined by law, are private organizations recognized under the Companies Act/
Societies Registration Act. They will have to register with the state government as a service
provider to record the Domestic Incident Report and to get the aggrieved person medically
examined.
The Service Providers will among other things ensure that the aggrieved person is
provided accommodation in a shelter home, if she requires so. A Service Provider is protected
for all actions done in good faith, in the exercise of the powers under this Act, towards the
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prevention of commission of domestic violence. They are, thus, protected by law and cannot be
sued for the proper exercise of their functions. The new law, thus, recognizes the role of
voluntary organizations in addressing the issue of domestic violence. NGOs working for
women’s rights can now register as Service Providers under the Act.
Chapter III Section 11: Duties of Government: This section stipulates the duties of the
central government and state government. These duties are to give wide publicity to the
provisions of the Act, to give sensitizations and awareness training on the issues addressed by the
Act to Government officers including police officers and members of judicial service, to ensure
effective coordination between Ministries and Departments dealing with Laws, Home affairs,
Law and Order, Health and Human resources in the services provided by them on the issues of
domestic violence and to put in place protocols for the Ministries and courts concerned with the
delivery of services to women under the provision of the Act. Chapter IV: Section 14:
Counseling: This section empowers the Magistrate to directly at any stage of the proceedings,
the respondent or the aggrieved person either singly or jointly to undergo counseling with any
member of a service provider. The member of service provider providing the counseling shall
possess such qualification and experience as may be laid down by the central government, by
rules. Chapter V: Section 31: Penalty for breach of Protection order by respondent: This
section provides that a breach of protection order or an interim protection order by the
respondent shall be an offence under the Act punishable with imprisonment of either description
which may extend to one year or with fine which may extent to twenty thousand rupees or with
both. Magistrate, while framing charges regarding breach of order, may also frame charges
under Section 498A or any other provision of the Indian Penal Code or the Dowry Prohibition
Act 1961, in case that fact disclose the commission of any offence under those provisions.
Now that the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005, has come into
effect, woman bruised and battered physically and emotionally by their husbands and in-laws
will have a protective shield of their command. Their number may run into lakhs, if not crores.
According to the National Crime Record Bureau, 2005, 40 percent of Indian women are victims
of domestic violence. A crime is committed against a woman in India every three minutes. The
men who act so boorishly now face imprisonment up to one year or a fine of Rs. 20,000 or both.
So far, a women could only use Section 498A of the IPC to file a complaint against an abusive
spouse. But the law was not comprehensive enough to enforce her right to stay on in her
matrimonial home or to demand a maintenance if thrown out or seek protection from the abusive
partner. That sense of helplessness is now set to change under the new Act. Another notable
feature of the Act is that under it, an ‘aggrieved person’ is not only the wife, but any woman who
is, or has been, in a domestic relationship with the respondent and who alleges to have been
subjected to any act of domestic violence by the respondent. “Domestic relationship” has been
further defined as “a relationship between the two persons who live or have, at any point of time,
lived together in a shared household, when they are related by consanguinity, marriage or
through a relationship in the nature of marriage, adoption or are family members living together
as a joint family.”
The intention of lawmakers here apparently is to ensure that the guilty
husband is not able to escape from responsibility by merely denying that the complainant is his
wife. It also aims to help women lured into a live-in relationship with a promise of marriage.
The intent is laudable, but it is essential to be very particular as to what the nature and duration
of a so-called live-in relationship is. When relationships sour, all too often, they have an
unfortunate effect of bringing out the worst in both parties. The harshness of the Act too can
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become a handy tool in the hands of a crafty woman hell-bent on black mailing a male friend.
The act also secures for woman the right to housing by providing for residence orders, which can
be passed by a magistrate. The act envisages the appointment of protection officers whose duties
includes informing the aggrieved woman of her rights and possible relief's, providing her a
shelter home and ensuring provision of legal aid. It empowers the magistrate to pass protection
orders preventing the respondent from aiding or committing an act of Domestic Violence and
from entering the aggrieved work place. Interestingly, the Act provides for monetary relief
granted to the woman to be consistent with her standard of living.(Jaising Indira, 2005).
Domestic violence under the Act includes actual abuse or the threat of abuse whether
physical, sexual, verbal, emotional or economic. This also includes harassment by way of
unlawful dowry demands to the woman or her relatives. The act will go a long way to provide
relief to woman from domestic violence and to get their due.
The Ministry of Women and Child Development (WCD) has simultaneously issued
another notification laying down the rules framed for implementation of the act, which will
provide for among other things, appointment of protection officers, service providers and
counsellors. Besides physical violence of beating, slapping, hitting, kicking and pushing, the Act
also covers sexual violence like forced intercourse, forcing a wife or mate to look at pornography
or any other material and child sexual abuse. It also includes verbal and emotional violence such
as name-calling and insults, preventing one’s wife from taking up a job or forcing her to leave a
job is also under the purview of the act. One of the most important feature of the Act is the
woman’s right to secure housing, means it provides a right to reside in the matrimonial and
shared household, whether or not she has any title in the household. The other relief envisaged is
that the power of the court to pass protection orders that prevent the abuser from aiding or
committing an act of domestic violence or any other specific act, entering a workplace or any
other place frequented by the abused, attempting to communicate with the abused and isolating
any assets used by both the parties.
Domestic violence among NRI: The commonest problem is marrying a woman in India
and then taking her to another country, normally the US and then sending her back with no visa
to get back. It is major problem, which the government is looking into. Inter-governmental
agreements are being worked out. Such men should be kicked out of the US and sent back home
to face the consequences.
Important Cases registered under DVPA 2005
Till now hundreds of cases have been registered under the Domestic Violence Prevention
Act 2005(DVPA) throughout the India. Here we are discussing the initial cases which have the
greater important significance from the implementation point of view.
Santosh Case – An important case: with full implementation
Being stuck in a bad marriage meant much more than emotional trauma for Santosh, 26year-old mother of two. It meant being regularly beaten up by her husband, being abused by inlaws when she delivered a girl child and constant dowry demands even after the birth of a son.
She became the first woman in Rajasthan and among the first in North India – to file a case
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under the recently notified protection of women from Domestic Violence Act 2005. She has
sought a protection order, an alternative residence or house rent and maintenance from her
husband. The junior division judicial Magistrate’s court acted swiftly issuing notice to Santosh’s
in-laws and making the area SHO responsible for her protection.
The case is illustrative. It shows how the new law being described as ‘historic’ by
women’s groups can provide timely intervention and relief to women caught in such situations.
This law provides civil relief. Earlier, it was an uphill task to get such relief under criminal law.
Each case was open to interpretation of the judge. Now, relief is written in law. Significantly,
the law encompasses all communities and religious groups, many of whom had little legal
protection for women.
Other Cases
Benedict Mary case
India’s first case booked under the Domestic Violence Prevention Act 2005 in Tiruelveli
related to the Joseph assaulting her wife a school teacher Benedict Mary, still awaits disposal,
due to the non appointment of protection officers or service providers by the State Government.
Kavi Priya case
In Chennai, even as welfare minister P. Angalane (37) claimed that he had filed a divorce
suite, his wife Kavipriya’s allegations that he tortured her and had secretly married another
woman. Pondicherry unit of CPM demanded Angalane’s arrest and said the congress leader
should be sacked.
Shraddha Pingale (19)
The Pune rural police has registered Maharashta’s first case under the newly enacted
Domestic Violence Prevention Act 2005, after a newly married woman lodged a harassment
complaint with the Ghodegaon police station. She stating that her husband and in-laws harassed
her mentally and physically while accusing her of having a pre marital affair.
Problems of Implementation
A progressive law for women’s right or a compendium of good intentions which will still
have to face a wall of social prejudice? The law against domestic violence, which came into
force recently has raised hopes that endemic violence against women would get legal redress but
also question over how effectively it would be implemented. Predictably, the Protection of
Women against Domestic Violence Act 2005 has received mixed response. There are some who
feel that the act will finally recognise a problem which is faced, in some form or the others, by
70% of Indian women, while others feel that bringing in a legislation is only half the job done;
because law was radical and tackled an ugly side of society that was often brushed under the
carpet. This law recognize new concepts like mental assault and torture, sexual violence within
marriage and the legitimacy of live-in relationship. The success of this legislation will depend on
combating the problems of illiteracy and ignorance amongst women as well as deep-rooted
stigmas in reporting domestic violence. Terming implementation of the new legislation as a
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‘challenging issue’. There are some unanswered questions. The government has not made any
budgetary allocation to appoint protection officers. People with the right training needed to be
appointed as protection officers.
Besides bureaucratic hurdles, criticism that the law has
attracted is that it could be used to settle scores and booking false cases. The possibility of a
bitter faking out between couples leading to complaints being filed cannot be ruled out. There
could be misused to settle scores out of vengeance. Anti-dowry legislation has also attracted
similar criticism.
Social pressures may still lead to under-reporting and suppression of
domestic violence cases. No additional resources provided for setting up of shelters or homes
and appointment of protection officers. Slow bureaucratic and police process, it has taken a year
for the act to be enforced.
Domestic Violence Act a major gain for women
Domestic Violence Act empowers women to overcome patriarchal and feudal oppression
and live with dignity is certainly welcome. DVA represents a landmark in the achievement of
gender equality for Indian women in two fundamental ways.
Firstly, it rubbishes the myth that the Indian family is a safe heaven for all its members.
This fact is evidenced by the broad range of harms covered under the new law, including abuse
of the elderly, child sexual abuse and violence against divorced or widowed women. Empirical
evidence of the widespread existence of these brutalities in the home has been available for years
and finally found expression in law.
Second, the law delinks domestic violence from the confinements of dowry harassment
and dowry murders. Until now, victims of domestic violence were invariably forced to link the
violence to a demand for dowry in order to access legal remedies under the Indian Penal Code.
The only other option was divorce on grounds of cruelty. DVA provides Civil Law relief for
domestic violence which is recognized as occurring for all sorts of reasons, across every class,
religion and caste, in rural areas and urban centres.
The laws has some fairly revolutionary features. For the first time, marital rape is legally
recognized as a form of domestic violence. While criminal law has still not been amended to
enable a woman to file a rape case against her husband or domestic sexual partner, she is now
given access to new civil remedies, including securing a protection order or injunction against
her abuser.
DVA recognizes child sexual abuse as an offence and hence for the first time offers some
space in law for the recognition of a child’s right to be free from violence in the home.
Domestic Violence is not confined to wives but includes mothers, daughters, sisters,
widows, divorced women living in the home as well as those who are in an informal relationship
with the accused, including the bigamous relationship.
Presumably, the Act would also cover a man who abuses or beats up a sex worker with
whom he has had a long standing relationship, such as a pimp, or an ongoing sexual relationship
though the scope of this provision would need to be tested in the courts.
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Complaints of domestic violence can be filed by neighbours, social workers or relatives
on behalf of the victim and the Magistrate is given a broad array of powers, including issuing
protection or injunction orders, providing monetary relief or payment maintenance.
DVA covers acts that are violative of a woman’s dignity or any other unwelcome conduct
of a sexual violence, is considered bad, indecent and something in which ‘good people’ do not
indulge or talk about the courts may find themselves determining dignity or sexuality along
highly puritanical lines. That would neither benefit women nor be conducive to promoting
healthy adult sexual relationship. Protection from sexual wrongs needs to be accompanied with
education about sexual rights.
Conclusion
Domestic violence and abuse of women is a problem that should not seen merely through
a gender oriented prism. It is much more complex. Just as the endeavour of good doctor
zapping cancerous cells is also to ensure that the healthy ones are not damaged, the Domestic
Violence Act should be geared to punish only the guilty. Swinging the pendulum to the other
extreme will be a travesty. In the medieval times, it was customary to amputate a criminal’s arm
even for a simple theft. Then it was realized that it was not the intensity of the punishment but
its certainty which deterred criminals. Unfortunately, India is not benefiting from this
accumulated wisdom. Just because far too many people escape punishment because of
infirmities in the criminal justice delivery mechanism, there is a tendency to demand more and
more severe provisions. Such laws, in the absence of impartial police and immaculate
investigation, are counter-productive and an exercise in futility. Moreover, the police and
judiciary too need sensitization about gender issues and domestic violence, otherwise
enforcement will lack teeth. Perhaps the government and NGOs could run campaigns about this
new Act. Legal experts are concerned that it could overlap with existing laws and cause
confusion.
For effective implementation the government has to provide funding to encourage
the registration of service providers who will need the protections of this new Law. The
government will also have to initiate a widespread campaign for public awareness. It will also
need to implement training programs to sensitise the police, media and judiciary to the
dimensions, scope and functioning of this new Law.
Its now widely recognized that despite the many progressive laws that have attempted to
give women equality of status, the most persistent barrier to their being recognized as equal is
not so much non-implementation of the law, as it is that nebulous thing, social attitude, a mindset
that refuses to accept the woman as equal. Its this same mindset that survives inside families and
homes and its this that makes for the kind of ongoing verbal abuse that can have such devastating
consequences.
We must coordinate with all branches of government, must coordinate their efforts to
stop violence. We must work in partnership with civil society to sent out the message that
violence in the home must stop. Besides judges, police, social workers, non-governmental
organization counselling cells and reconciliation agencies, now there are other quasi states actors
such as the National Human Right Commission (NHRC): The National and the State Women's
Commission and specialist units such as crime against women cells and family court. At least
two of these agencies, could work extremely effectively to bring about a coordinated response to
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violence against women and the medical community must work in a supportive way. With the
growing economic clout of women, who are now becoming a big part of the workforce, rising
social awareness as well as legal provisions, domestic violence ought to become an anachronism.
Regrettably, it is not the abuses will not be able to get away easily and it is hoped, incidents of
such abuse will come down. As Harry Potter has shown, creating a myth seems easy because
people need myths to live by, and demolishing them is far more difficult. Our strength are not
far from over. We still need to go miles to achieve full women’s empowerment through another
round of lobbying – the agenda before are the ‘Women’s Reservation Bill’, which has been
eluding enactment for so many years……
National Commission For Women
The national commission for women was set up as a statutory body in January 1992
under the commission for women act, 1990 (act no. 20 of 1990) of government of India, to
review the constitutional and legal safeguards for women, recommend remedial legislative
measures, facilitate redressal of grievances and advise the government, on the policy matters
affecting women commission also interacts with the media, social activists and representation.
Major Objectives of the National Commission for Women
Investigate and examine all matters to the safeguards provided for women under the
constitution and effective implementation of those safeguards for improving the condition of
women in the union of any state.
Look into the complaint and take suo moto of matters relating to: deprivation of women‘s
rights, non- implementation of laws enacted to provide protection to women and also to achieve
the objective of equality and development.
Non-compliance of policy decisions, guidelines or instructions aimed at mitigating
hardships and ensuring welfare and providing relief to women, and take up the issues arising out
of such matters with appropriate authorities.
Call for special studies or investigations into specific problems or situations arising out of
discrimination and atrocities against women and identify the constraints so as to recommend
strategies for their removal.
The commission have the power to investigate any matter referred have all the power of a
civil court trying a suit. The national commissions for women have the special cell, which is the
core unit of the commission and processes the compliant received oral, written or suo moto under
section 10 of the NCW act. The complaints are also used as case studies for sensitization
programmes for the police, judiciary, prosecutors, forensic scientists, defence lawyers and other
administrative functionaries.
Functions and role of the National Commission of Women
The commission constitutes expert committees for dealing with such special issues as
may be taken up by the commission from time to time. The expert committees are on different
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subjects are- law and legislation , political empowerment custodial justice for women, social
security, panchayati raj, women and media, development of schedule tribe women, development
of women of weaker sections, development of women of minority communities, transfer of
technology in agriculture for development of women.Women‘s movement in the country was
brought to the fore front by the efforts of the NGOS. The commission interacts and network with
the NGOs and the state commissions for ensuring gender equality and empowerment of women.
The women commission also interacts with the media, social activists and academicians to
suggest the ways of ensuring due representation of women in all spheres.
The commission undertakes state visits to evaluate the progress of development of
women in various states. It has covered the states of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan,
Uttar Pradesh, Orissa, Sikkim, Madhya Pradesh, Assam, Tripura, and Manipur.
The commission conducts seminars, workshops and conferences and sponsors such
events by providing financial assistance to reach organizations and NGOs. The important
Areas so far covered include violence against women, sexual exploitation of women at
work place, educational health and employment aspects, women in agriculture sector, women in
panchayati raj, custodial justice, mental health institutions etc.
The NCW holds public hearing on issues affecting large sections of women such as crime
against women, women in unorganized labour sector, women in agriculture and women of
minority groups. The deposition at these enquiries helps in appreciating and initiating remedial
action.
Legal amendments and bill proposed by the national commission of women till date are
as follows:
Amendments are: criminal procedure code, 1973; Indian penal code, 1860; Indian
evidence act, 1872; dowry prohibition act, 1961; Commission of sati (prevention) act , 1987;
Hindu marriage act, 1955; child marriage restraint act, 1929; Indecent representation of women
(prohibition ) act, 1986; immoral traffic (prevention) act , 1956 ( for elimination of child
prostitution and devising a comprehensive package for rehabilitation); Medical termination of
pregnancy act, 1971; family court act, 1984; foreign marriage act, 1969; guardians and wards act,
1890; Indian succession act, 1925; representation of the people act, 1951.
Bills are: The marriage bill, 1994; domestic violence to women (prevention) bill, 1994;
the orphan & destitute children (adoption) bill, 1994; the criminal laws (amendment bill, 1994
(with reference to child rape); the criminal laws (amendment ordinance, 1996; the prevention of
barbarous and beastly cruelty against women bill, 1995; the constitution 81st amendment bill,
1996.
Parivarik Mahila Adalat (PMLA): an alternative justice delivery system. The national
commission for women has evolved an innovative concept of PMLA for redessral and speedy
disposal of cases under legal service authority act, 1987, which has its roots in the traditional
nyaya panchayats. The essential features of PMLA are amicable mutual settlement and flexibility
in functioning. The NGOs in association with district legal aid and advisory boards, activists,
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advocates and others, organize Parivarik Mahila Lok Adalats with the commission’s financial
assistance. So far, 130 PMLAs have been held in which about 7500 cases were taken up.
Conferences and seminars conducted by national commission for women Conference on
“women and panchayati raj” in new Delhi October 1993; workshop of infant feeding practice
and the law- new Delhi, 1994; Public inquiry on crime against women- new Delhi, 1995;
Mangalam project Pondicheery- 1995, justice delivery by women for women;
Parivarik mahila lok adalat (PMLA) at Billur- Karnataka, 1997; Daughters of darknessno child prostitution, 1997; Silver lining – a documentary on mental health of women- 1998;
“tomorrow is ours” on mandate, functions & work of NCW; Making of a leader- political
empowerment of women; The national commission for women has initiated an ambitious
programme entitled “ preparing the women for tomorrow” with- awareness campaigns on laws
and legality, media, nutrition and health, consumerism, human rights , sex, and sexuality and
programmes to build capacity for management of time, interpersonal relationships, emotions and
develop skill for communication, thinking, negotiations and problem solving. Regional meetings
with state commission for women and NGOs Seminar on “Empowering women for sustained
development forging partnership urban local bodies and corporate”, Workshop on gender justiceforging partnership with law enforcing agencies. A study on systematic change in custody with
mentally ill people- west Bengal. District wise socio-economic gender disaggregated data
analysis and district mapping Maharashtra. Campaign against sexual harassment at work placewest Bengal, Nation wide workshop on amendment to dowry prohibition act 1961 and immoral
traffic (prevention) act 1956.
Legal awareness programmes: the national commission for women regularly extends
financial support to NGOs and educational institutions to conduct legal awareness programmes
to enable women and girls to know their legal rights, to understand the procedure and method of
access to the legal systems. so far 55 legal awareness prorammes have been conducted . The
national commission for women also sponsored research studies for the more involvement of the
people from all sections of the society. The research sponsored topics are: Social mobilization,
maintenance and divorce women, panchayati raj in action, women labour under contract, gender
bias in judicial decisions, family courts, gender- component in the various commission’s reports
for women, violence against women, women access to health and education in slums etc. to help
in formulation of NCWs policies for recommendations. The commission library has now become
a resource centre for research / activists. There are about 2250 books in the library. It subscribe
25 daily newspapers in different languages and 35 /Professional journals. The library has a
regular system of documenting newspaper clippings on women’s issues. The commission
regularly brings out a monthly newsletter “Rashtra Mahila” in Hindi and English.
Delhi State National Commission
The Delhi state national commission for women has been set up under an act of the
legislative assembly of the national capital territory of Delhi, passed in 1994.the Delhi act is
based on the lines of the 1990 act of the parliament under which the national commission for
women was constituted. The geographical area of operation assigned to the state commission is
the national capital territory of Delhi which has a population of over million. The main
objectives of the commission are to ensure security, development and well-being of women in
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every sphere of national life- particularly to suggest and ensure implementation of steps against
gender discrimination. the commission is also to ensure that adequate provision for women’s
advancement are included in all state policies, plan legislation and amendments to existing laws
to meet the objective of gender equity and advancement of women.
Programmes and Projects under taken by Delhi Commission for Women
Negotiating with the NGOs and the press specially for the work of engagement and
advancement of women at national and state level, full co-operation and assistance from the
police, net-working with NGOs and the community neighbourhood groups, legal assistance from
the commission through a consultant well-versed with the problem of women in delhi and
through legal aid centers.compulsory primary eduction both for boys and girls should not only
be a matter of policy but steps should be taken for its effective implementation.other urgent
measures suggested by DCW are: legal literacy be made compulsory for girls at high school and
college level and spread through mahila mandals in rural areas, all police cells cell.dealing with
the crime against women be linked effectively with the central cell. This would facilitate regular
survey-and-analysis of the crime situation.
Women’s Rights As Human Rights
Introduction
Since the ages women has been subjugated, oppressed and treated as a socially and
economically disadvantaged section of the society. Women always relatively, under
disadvantaged situation. Million of women throughout the world live in conditions of abject
deprivation of, and attacks against, their fundamental human rights for no other reason than they
are women. We live in a world in which women do not have basic control over what happens to
their bodies. Million of women and girls are forced to marry and have sex with men they do not
desire. Women are unable to depend on the government to protect them from physical violence
in the home, with sometimes fatal consequences, including increased risk of HIV/AIDS
infection.
Human rights provide an impetus for activities and programmes geared towards
achieving gender parity and social justice. Numerous assessment of women’s status in the
country consistently point out the low status and poor conditions of women. In September, 2000,
the UN millennium declaration among other principles, affirmed human rights democracy and
good governance. Increasingly , at an international level, equality between women and men is
accepted as a human right and women’s right are regarded as human right and women ‘s right
are regarded as human rights. The world conference on human rights affirms the charter of the
United Nations on human rights and specifically recognizes the right of women and girl children
as integral to universal human rights. That is, the right of women and girls are universally valid
and unilaterally non- discriminatory.
Discussions of women’s human rights have generally focused on civil and political rightthe freedom on civil and political right- the freedom ‘from’ (torture, unlawful arrested) and
freedom ‘of’ (assembly, religion)- the right of the individual with respect o their state as named
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in the UN universal declaration of human right. Social and economic right for example, the right
to an education, the right to employment- have tended to be seen as less important and
enforceable , but still these also rest on an individual right ‘to’ something provided by the state in
the public sphere.
Human rights are being reconceptualized by Indian women working for social change.
Politics, both within India and in the world at large have shifted dramatically in the past 20 years,
and activists have made the conceptual shifts to function strategically in these new
circumstances. Despite many constraints, NGOs and women’s groups plays a crucial role in
protecting and promoting the human rights of women through grassroots activities, networking
and advocacy. The most fundamental underlying constraint is the lack of political commitment
from the government to protect and promote the human rights of women.
The women’s rights division of human rights watch fights against thee dehumanization
and marginalization of women. Human rights promote women’s equality and women’s equal
rights. The realization of women’s rights is a global struggle based on universal human rights
and the rule of law. It requires all of us to unite in solidarity to end traditions, practices, and laws
that harms women. Ultimately, the struggle for women’s human rights must be about making
women’s lives matter everywhere all the time. In practice this means taking action to stop
discrimination and violence against women.
Women Rights as Human Rights is exclusive
The original contributors to women’s human rights were those who first The idea of
women’s human rights is often cited as beginning in 1792 with Mary Wollstonecraft’s book,
Vindication of Rights of women, published in response to the promulgation of natural rights of
man theory ‘Feminist historians argue that what distinguishes Wollstoncraft is that she was the
first to put her theories in the context of a broader liberationist modern human right, theory. In
addition, she wrote in a more modern style, defining and describing women’s limitations in
public and private life.
Historical Research, has revealed a much longer gestation period, beginning at least in
the early fifteenth century with the 1405 publication of Le livre de cite des dames (The Book of
the city of Ladies) by Christine de Pizan. This work stimulated what French Feminists call the
querelle des femmes (debate about women), which continues to the present.
As John Stuart Mill argued in 1869 in the easy the subjection of women, the question is
whether women must be forced to follow what is perceived as their “natural vocation”, that is,
home and family-often called the private sphere or should be seen in private and public life, as
the equal Partners of men. While the division of spheres, based on sex and known as patriarchy,
may have been justified as a necessary division of labour in the early evolution of the human
species the system long ago outlived its functionality and has been challenged by woman, and a
few men, since at least the fifteenth century. The feminist historian Gerda Lerner credits de Pizan
with the first deliberate effort to raise women’s consciousness but laments the fact that although
numerous women later published lists of famous women, few used de Pizan as a reference- an
example of how the lack of knowledge of women’s history impedes intellectual development.
Joan Kelly, another feminist historian argues that de Pizan opened the debate about women by
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establishing the basic postulates of feminism (feminism is used throughout his essay in its
original meaning: The Theory of and The Struggle for Equality for Women). Kelly also asserts
that de Pizan and her European Successors focused on what is now called “gender” the concept
that the opposition to women is not simply biologically based but culturally base as
well.(Chatterjee Mohini:2004:23)
The history of the drive for women’s human rights indicates not only when women are
literate, when they can articulate their view of life in publications and before audiences, when
they can organize and demand equally, when girls are educated and socialized to think of
themselves as citizens as well as wives and mothers and when men take more responsibility for
care of children and the home, then only women be full and equal citizens able to enjoy human
Rights. Women’s convention now popularly called the women’s Human Rights Treaty has been
satisfied or acceded to by 163 nations and has become a formidable weapon in the struggle for
world wide implementations of women’s human rights. Women’s groups around the world are
using the Principles set forth in the convention to promote women’s rights observance through
court cases; as the basis for advocacy in changing national laws and policies and for highlighting
abrogation’s of women human rights before international committees. Increasing numbers of
women’s organization are developing “Shadow Reports” on implementation of the treaty in
countries coming up for review by the CEDAW committee, which in turn is becoming more
aggressive in challenging governments on conformance with the treaty. Building awareness of
the human rights of women begin with making them visible Indeed, much of the credit for
putting his issue onto the agenda of United Nations Human Rights bodies goes to the nongovernmental women’s activists and organization who mobilized their efforts in conjunction
with the preparation for the world conference on Human Rights, held in Vienna in 1993. Before
this, women’s human rights were truly an invisible subject for the U.N. Human Rights
programmes.(Chaterjee Mohini:2004:21).
The United Nations and its Commission on the status of women
By the time the U.N was formed in 1945, women were deeply involved in the public
sphere primarily in non-governmental organization, but a numbers of countries had women
among their delegations. The suffrage movement had been successful in 31 countries. Women
from many countries also had gained extensive experience in lobbying govt officials locally,
nationally and even inter-nationally. The International Federation of Working Women (IFWW)
for example, had lobbied the international labour organization (ILO) and achieved adoption of
the 1919 conventions on maternity protection and night work for women. The equal rights of
men and women clause in the U.N. Charter established a legal basis for the international struggle
to affirm women’s human rights. Although only 11 of the 51 nations represented in the 1946
U.N. General Assembly had women on their delegations with the support of women’s NGOs,
women made their presence known. The purpose of all the initiative was to promote women’s
rights in all fields of human endeavour. The object was to elevate the equal rights and human
status of women, irrespective of nationality, race, language, or religion, is order to achieve
equality with men in all fields of human enterprise and to eliminate all discrimination against
women in statutory law, legal maxims or rules, or in interpretations of customary law.
By the time the United Nations was formed in the mid-Twentieth century, internationally,
a critical mass of women had been educated, were employed outside the home and had obtained
141
enough legal and social freedom to participate in public life, even at the international level.
Numerous international women’s organizations had 50 years of experience behind them. As a
result of lobbying by these organizations and with support from female delegates the phrase
‘equal rights of men and women’ was inserted in the U.N. Charter. When the universal
Declaration of Human Right (UDHR) was drafted the word “everyone” rather than the male
personal pronoun was used in most, but not all, of its articles, when the commission on human
rights failed to recognize women’s aspirations adequately, women delegates and the nongovernmental organization (NGO’s) supporting them were politically powerful and strong
enough to obtain a free standing commission on the Status of Women (CSW) by 1979 the CSW,
with the support of woman delegates and NGO’s and a new wave of feminism under way had
drafted and successfully lobbied the adoption of the convention on the Elimination of All Form
of Discrimination Against Women.
The drive to define women’s human rights & eliminate discrimination against them can
be seen as part of the worldwide democratization effort. The question of the beginning of the 21st
century is whether women will exercise their political muscle sufficiently at national local and
international levels to ensure universal implementation of the women’s Human Right Treaty.
This depends on whether women, in partnership with men, can effectively rationalize be
relationships between the Private and Public sphere- between work, family and public life. An
important related question is whether women in all countries will redeem their history and use it
to validate and support their struggle for equality and justice or as in the past, new women’s
movement will have to be organized every few generations to account for the lack of women’s
history and the short comings in traditional education and socialization of girls.
The Second world conference on Human Rights in Vienna:- By the 1980 and 1990s
the women’s human rights community began to present a critique of male bias in the
prioritization and interpretation of human rights at United Nations, especially its human rights
commission. To counteract the invisibility of abuses against women, the second world
conference on Human Rights held in Vienna: the Global campaign for women’s Human Rights
was organized to influence the outcome of this historic meeting. The centre for women’s Global
Leadership (based at Rutgers University’s Douglass College Campus in New Brunswick, New
Jersey, U.S.A) collaborated with women’s organization around the world to launch and cooridnate the campaign. The campaign goal was to give visibility to forms of violence against
women that United Nations experts in human rights and govt had failed to include as part of
human rights, especially those occurring in the community, family and private sphere, and to
demand govt accountability for eradicating them. To do this, the global campaign organized a
series of tribunals around the world, culminating in the Vienna Tribunal for women’s Human
Rights, in which 33 women testified to first-hand experience of violence in the family, war
crimes against women, violations of bodily integrity, socio-economic violations and political
persecution and discrimination. The testimonies were heard by an audience of non-governmental
organization (NGOs) and country delegates to the official conference and judged by a
distinguished panel. The strength and effectiveness of the Global Campaign can be seen in the
adoption of many of these recommendations in the Vienna Declaration, the conference’s final
document and later by U.N. The declaration to Eliminate violence against women was approved
by the General Assembly in December 1993. The United Nations Human Rights Commission
did approve a special Rapporteur on violence
against women, appointing Radhika
Coomaraswany. The optional protocol to CEDAW was approved by the United Nations general
142
Assembly in Dec 1999 and went into force in 2000. An International criminal court was
established in Dec 1999 that includes rape and other forms of sexual violence-including enforced
prostitution, forced pregnancy and sexual slavery as crimes against humanity and as war crimes
when committed in the context of international or internal armed conflict. Armed with these new
agreement with a rapporteur inside the Human Rights Commission, with an all-out effort at the
United Nations to integrate and mainstream a gender perspective in all its institutions, human
rights organization have been able to work more closely with women’s organization to bring
urgent issues of violence against women into the mainstream of human rights practice.
The Fourth World Conference:- On women held in Beijing in 1995 is notable in that it
finally put the UN stamp on the concept that “Women’s rights are human rights and also for the
fact that it initiated “gender Mainstreaming” which denoted the acceptance of “gender” as a
holistic approach to humanity-which denoted the acceptance of “gender as a holistic approach to
humanity- which includes both man and women. It took an exceedingly long time for the
realization to dawn that “gender” was not only women’s issues but was linked to most other
issues such as violence, health care or political participation. Gender mainstreaming seeks to
empower women by removing obstacles that have been constructed by societies that operate to
the disadvantage of women. By evaluating laws, policies, programmes, customs, practices, and
an array of inequities from a gender perspective women a men can identity those areas in which
women have been discriminated against and develop new policies to overcome that
discrimination. The greatest struggle has been simply to make the human rights of women
visible, whether it is with regard to the use of violence against women, or in issues of
employment, education, health care or other rights. As the UN’s human rights staff explained in
December 1999, “Gender Mainstreaming in thus the process of bringing an awareness of the
status of women into the public arena. In the field of women rights, this primarily involves
realizing that there is a gender dimension to every occurrence of a human rights violations”.
Mainstreaming also requires increasing women’s actual participation in the human rights
mechanism and to ensure that mainstreaming has an enduring effect on the way human rights
work is carried out, resolving a core bureaucratic problem of co-ordination and co-operation
among to many parts of the United Nations System. Indeed, much of the Credit for putting the
issue onto the agenda of U.N. Human rights bodies goes to the non-governmental women’s
activists and organizations who mobilized their efforts in conjunction with the preparations for
the world conference on Human rights, held in Vienna in 1993. Before this, women’s human
rights were truly an invisible subject for the U.N. human rights programmes.
The 1995 Beijing Platform for action stressed the importance of applying the six
international human rights instruments in ways that would clearly consider “the systematic and
systematic nature of discrimination against women that gender analysis has clearly indicated”
and that would ensure” full integrative and mainstreaming of the human rights of women”.
(Paragraphs 222, 231 b. 231 f). In 1999, the newly-reformed agenda of the commission on
Human Rights included for the first time, a separate agenda item on “integration of Gender and
the Human Rights of Women”. This change reflects years of effort. One of the great milestones
in the protection of women’s human rights was the adoption by the United Nations General
Assembly in December 1979 of the U.N. Convention to Eliminate all forms of Discrimination
against women (CEDAW). The convention laid the foundation and universal standard for
women’s equal enjoyment without discrimination of civil, Political, Economic, social and
cultural rights. Subsequent approval of new U.N. treaties, declaration and mechanism has
143
advanced the recognition and protection of women’s human rights. Since 1979,many
organizations have emerged throughout the united states and around the globe to promote
awareness of women’s human rights and to advocate their defence. Article-1 of the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), adopted by the U.N. in 1948 states that: “All Human
beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights”. In Article 2 it states that “Every one is
entitled to all the rights and freedom set forth in this declaration, without distinction of any kind,
such as race, colour, sex, language”. However these words proved, for women, to provide a false
hope even when subsequent treaties were approved, such as the international covenants on civil
and Political. Rights (1966) and on Social, Economic and cultural rights (1966), which were
intended to translate the UDHR into international Human Rights, Laws, Governments. agents
and private actors still discriminated against them and either carried out a tacitly condoned
violence against them. CEDAW seeks to advance women’s human rights protection by applying
a gender perspective to principle enunciated in the UDHR, CEDAW was the first international
human rights treaty to define discrimination against women. It’s first 16 articles call on
government to ensure the eradication of such abuses in practically all walks of life. In article 5,
CEDAW also holds government responsible for taking steps to modify practices based on
stereotypes about women’s role as well as beliefs about women’s inferiority. The implication of
this article is that discriminatory cultural, traditional or religious practices may be harmful to
women and girls and that government is responsible to take steps to modify it or eliminate them.
Toowoomba, International Women's Conference (Thursday, 25- 27 September 2007)
The inaugural session of Toowoomba International Women's Conference is in the
University of Southern Queensland (USQ) organized by omen’s Network Inc, Young
Women’s Place Inc, Lifeline Darling Downs and South West Queensland Ltd and the Domestic
and Family Violence Prevention Service have joined together to present this conference
exploring issues that affect the lives of women globally and to provide women with networking
opportunities, information, collaboration and sharing of resources both locally, nationally and
internationally.Day two of international women's conference kicked off in a lively fashion with
Professor Linda Duxbury's keynote address entitled "Standing still is NOT an option:
Australia needs to get serious about work/life balance. Professor Duxbury (pictured, with
conference organising committee member Majella Albion) examined Australia's industrial
relations and workplace trends, with a focus on work/life balance and workers' rights and
benefits. Using Canada as a case study example, she identified a generational shift in attitudes
towards work, and what governments and employers can do to accomodate and maximise on
these attitudes.The morning concurrent sessions included workshop on mind-mapping, papers
addressing themes of poverty solution, women in sport, and mobile phones. Three importamt
were papers: Shalene Worth's examination of visibility of sufferers of Invisible Chronic Illness;
Anacoreta Arciaga's presentation on a poverty alleviation scheme in the Phillippines that
provides women with oppurtunities to set up their own businesses; and Zohl de Ishtar (pictured)
gave a uncompromising examination of the legacy of colonialisation on a remote indigenous
community, and explored the traditions and leadership of women elders. Afternoon sessions
consisted of workshops on subjects ranging from spiritual self-worth to childcare.Chancellor
Bobbie Brazil welcomed the Governor of Queensland, Ms Quentin Bryce, who officially opened
the Conference with an insightful and challenging address. Ms Bryce spoke of the history of
women's emancipation and the struggle for equal rights in Australia, and gave an overview of the
nature of that struggle now, suggesting women's roles as carers and their work/family/life
144
balance are the areas that need to be focused on for the future.Ms Lillian Holt gave her keynote
address on the theme "Work, Dreams and Drudgery, Visions, Tasks and Hope", sharing the
story of her journey through education and academia, and gave her perspective on the role of
education in knowing one's true self. Afterwards the delegates gathered for morning teconcurrent
sessions. 17 papers were presented in rooms across the campus on a wide range of topics,
including spirituality, community, women in academia and in the workplace, and many
others..Chancellor Bobbie Brazil welcomed the delegates and delivered a paper on a woman's
role in sustainable farming and the rehabilitation of native ecosystems. A great opening to
what promises to be a relaxed and insightful conference.
Conclusion
Since the 1990s activists have embarked on a mission to create a new global community
and the notion of women’s rights as human rights is intrinsic to it. Women’s human rights now
hold out the promise of a good life, free from torture, intimidation, scarcity, and pollution with
access to good education, health care choices about childbearing and meaningful work. The
Beijing platform for Action and Beijing+5 may not have solved the problems of pollution,
poverty, homelessness or violence against women, but commitments to international platforms
set moral standards, providing women’s grassroots movement with leverage they can apply to
their own government, and enabling grassroots activists to organize across borders to compel
governments to comply. Women’s constant appearance in public spaces such as the international
meetings of United National is part of strategy to weave women into every conversation. The
slogan for that process is ‘human rights’, that form of human rights has never been codified in
national or international law, but the increasing frequency with which grassroots woman’s
groups have demonstrated for it indicates that human rights- as a social and ethical goal as well
as a democratic process- may hold more revolutionary potential then any of us had previously
imagined. The human rights of women are inalienable and indivisible part of universal human
rights, so equal and active participation of women in political and Economic life at national,
regional and international levels and the elimination of all forms of discrimination on the basis of
sex are now the main objective of all government’s. But women’s full access and enjoyment of
rights and freedom must link with their empowerment. And there is no short cut to changing
social evils and system deeply rooted in Indian society. To achieve justice in the society,
ignorance and helplessness need to be removed and the attitudes of the people should be changed
through awareness, education and skills and for this, a deeper and more sincere involvement of
the state and civil society in the working towards women’s rights, women’s security and
autonomy is most needed.
145
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147
Annexure - I
Milestones in the international legal history towards the
protection and empowerment of women
26 June 1945
Formation of United Nations Organization
16 February 1946
Creation of Commission on Hindu Rights and the SubCommission on the Status of Women
21 June 1946
Sub-Commission on Status of Women was elevated to the status
of “Commission on the Status of Women” at par with
“Commission on Human Rights”.
10 Decembers 1948
Adoption of the landmark ‘Universal Declaration of Human
Rights’
2 December 1949
Adoption of the Convention for the Suppression on the Traffic
in Persons and of the Exploitation of Prostitution of others.
29 June 1951
Adoption by International Labour
‘Convention on Equal Remuneration’
28 June 1952
Adoption by ILO the ‘Maternity Protection Convention’.
20 December 1952
Adoption of Convention on the ‘Political Rights of Women.
29 January 1957
Adoption of the ‘Convent on the Nationality of Married
Women’.
25 January 1958
Adoption by ILO ‘Discrimination
Occupation) Convention.
7 November 1962
Adoption of the ‘Convention on Consent to Marriage, Minimum
Age for Marriage and Registration of Marriages.
12 December 1963
The General Assembly of UN designates 1968 as the
International Year of Human Rights
1 November 1965
The adoption of ‘Recommendation on Consent to Marriage,
Minimum Age for Marriage and Registration of Marriages’.
16 December 1966
Adoption of the International Covenant on Civil and Political
Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and
148
Organization
(Employment
(ILO)
and
Cultural Rights.
7 November 1967
Approval of Declaration on the Elimination of Discrimination
Against Women.
18 December 1972
The General Assembly designates 1975 as the ‘International
Women’s Year’.
19-30 August 1974
The UN World Population Conference held in Bucharest under
its ‘Plan of Action’ affirm the central importance of women in
population policies.
5-16 Nov 1974
The World Food Conference held in Rome adopts the Universal
Declaration on the Eradication of Hunger and Malnutrition.
14 December 1974
Adoption of the Declaration on the Protection of Women and
Children in Emergency and Armed Conflict
1975
International Women’s Year.
7 March 1975
The UN First observes ‘International Women’s Day (8 March)
19June-2July 1975
The World Conference of the International Women’s Year in
Mexico City is the First Global conference to be held on
women’s issue, with 123 Government represented. The
Conference adopts a World Plan of Action for the Advancement
of Women for the coming Decade.
15 December 1975
The General Assembly proclaims 1976-1985 the United Nations
Decade for Women: Equally, Development and Peace.
1976-1985
United Nations Decade for Women: Equality, Development and
Peace.
18 December 1979
The General Assembly of the United Nations Adopts the
Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination
Against Women (CEDAW). The Convention comes into force
on 3 September 1981.
14-30 July 1980
The World Conference of the United Nations Decade for
Women takes place in Copenhagen with delegates from 145
Member States. Sixty-four Member States sign the Convention
on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against
Women.
23 June 1981
The ILO adopts the ‘Workers with Family Responsibilities
Convention’.
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16 April 1982
An expert panel to monitor compliance with 1979 Convention
(CEDAW) is established.
3 December 1982
The General Assembly adopts the ‘Declaration on the
Participation of Women in Promoting International Peace and
Cooperation’.
14 December 1984
The Voluntary Fund for the United Nations Decade for Women
is renamed the ‘United Nations Development Fund for Women
(UNIFEM).
20 April 1987
Naifs Sadik is appointed Director of the United Nation
Publication Fund- the first women to head a major UN
Programme.
1989
Adoption of ‘Convention on the Rights of the Child’.
5-9 March 1990
The World Conference on Education for All: Meeting Basic
Learning Needs, held in Jomtien, Thailand.
29-30 September 1990
The World Summit for Children, held at United Nations
Headquarters in New York.
14 December 1990
The General Assembly decides to hold a fourth world
conference on women in 1995.
21 December 1990
The General Assembly adopts resolution 45/239 establishing
targets for the employment of women in the Secretariat of 35
percent women in professional posts subject to geographical
distribution by 1995 and 25 percent women in senior posts.
18 June 1991
The UN publishers The World’s Women 1970-1990: Trends and
Statistics.
22 July 1991
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees issues
Guidelines on the Protection of Refugee Women.
31 January 1992
CEDAW adopts General Recommendations 19 on Violence
against Women.
25-26 February 1992
The Summit On Economic Advancement Of Rural Women is
held in Geneva under the auspices of the International Fund for
Agricultural Development.
14-25 June 1993
The World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna adopts the
Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action.
20 December 1993
The General Assembly, adopts the ‘Declaration on the
Elimination of Violence against Women’.
4 February 1994
CEDAW adopts General Recommendation 21 on equality in
150
marriage and family relations.
11th March 1994
The United Nations Commission on Human Rights appoints a
Special Rapporteur to collect information on acts of genderbased violence and to recommend measures at the national,
regional and international levels for its elimination.
5-13 September 1994
The International Conference on Population and Development
in Cairo affirms that there are four requirements for any
programmes of population and development: gender equality
the empowerment of women: the ability of women to control
their own fertility; and the elimination of violence against
women.
6-12 March 1995
The World Summit for Social Development in Copenhagen, the
largest gathering in history of heads of State or Government,
proclaims the central role of women in fighting poverty,
creating productive employment and strengthening the social
fabric. It includes a commitment by world leaders to make
equality and equity of women and men a priority.
15 March-7April 1995
The Commission On The Status Of Women Undertakes Second
Review and appraisal of the Nairobi Forward Looking
Strategies And Holds The Final Preparatory Meeting for the
Fourth World Conference on Women.
12 July 1995
The Security Council and the General Assembly of the UN elect
Rosalyn Higgins (United Kingdom) to the International court of
Justice (ICJ), the first woman to sit on the court.
4-15 September 1995
The Fourth World Conference on Women is held in Beijing,
with delegation from 189 countries. The largest UN Conference
ever, adopts by consensus the Beijing Declaration and a FiveYear Platform for Action, which identifies 12 critical areas of
concern.
6 October 1999
Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Elimination of All
forms of Discrimination Against Women.
1995-2004
UN decade for spread of ‘Human Rights Awareness’.10
10
Source, United Nations, The United Nations and The Advancement of Women 1945-1996. UN New York (1996).
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Annexure - II
IMPORTANT WORLD CONFERENCE FOR THE EMPOWERMENT OF WOMEN
1975
First world Conference on Women, in Mexico City. Focus
on issues of development and on an increased
contribution of women in strengthening world peace. A
world Plan of Action for the implementation of the
objectives of the International Women’s Year adopted,
which called for a convention with effective procedures
for its implementation. Led to the establishment of the
UN gender bodies: United Nations Development Fund for
women (UNIFEM) and United Nation International
Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of
Women (INSTRAW).
1980
World Conference of the UN Decade for women:
Equality, Development and Peace, also known as the
Second World Conference on Women, in Copenhagen.
Pinpointed three areas for highly focused action if goals
of equality, development and peace to be reached: equal
access to education, employment opportunities and
adequate health care services. Violence against women
was raised in an UN conference for the first time.
1985
World Conference to Review and Appraise the
Achievement of the United Nations Decade for Women in
Nairobi, (also known as the Third World Conference on
Women). Nairobi Forward-Looking Strategies for the
Advancement of Women unanimously adopted: called for
increased participation of women in decision-making at
all levels. Introduced a wider approach to the
advancement of women.
1993
UN World Conference on Human rights, in Vienna.
Watershed in many respects. The Vienna Declaration and
Programme of Action Sought to achieve consensus on
principle that women’s rights are human rights.
Acknowledge need for new procedures to strengthen the
implementation of women’s human rights and called on
CSW and CEDAW to examine the possibility of
introducing an optional protocol to CEDAW.
Appointment of a Special Rapporteur on Violence against
Women.
152
1994
International
Conference
on
Population
and
Development, in Cairo. Objectives: reduction of infant
and maternal mortality, universal access to education
(especially for girls) and universal access reproductive
health and family to planning services.
1995
Fourth World Conference on Women: Action for
Equality, Development and Peace, in Beijing. The Beijing
Declaration and Platform for Action adopted: 12 priority
areas of concern: poverty, education and training access to
health care, elimination of violence against women,
women living in situations of conflict and under foreign
occupation, economic structures and policies, sharing of
power and decision-making, mechanisms for the
advancements of women, human rights, access to
communications systems, managements of natural
resources and the rights of the girl child. Called for
support for the Optional Protocol to CEDAW.
2000
Special Session of the UN general assembly, Women
2000: Gender Equality, Development and Peace for the
21st Century, reviewed progress since Beijing. Beijing + 5
Outcome Document affirmed Beijing Platform for Action
and strengthened it by focusing on very specific issues:
measures on globalization and its impact on women, the
gendered impacts of HIV/AIDS, sexually transmitted
infections, malaria and tuberculosis on women, marital
rape, crimes of honour and passion, racially motivated
crimes against women and trafficking of women. Called
for increasing women’s participation in decision-making,
mainstreaming of gender and anti-poverti strategies and
ratification of the Optional Protocol.
2005.
Beijing + 10 Review. There have already been several
regional and global meetings in preparation and concerns
expressed by NGOs on desirability of review. Some relate
to efficacy, others centre on grave consequences of losing
gains made by previous conferences. According to
WEDO ‘there is a danger that these reviews may lead to
negotiations which could leave women once again having
to fight for their material and reproductive rights. It is not
too late to influence these negotiations at the regional
level, and to strategies and act to avoid negotiations at the
global level in 2005. At the 47th Session of the
Commission on the Status on women (CSW) in 2003, a
group of NGOs met to discuss Beijing+10 and a possible
153
fifth world conference on women. One consensus point
was that there should be assessment of implementation,
but no new negotiations in the Beijing +10 Review.11
2007
11
Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia Education,
Employment and Ever thing the triple layers of a
woman’s life Raising awareness of current debates.
Surrounding education & employment for women,
including industrial relations reform, work, life balance
and opportunities of work.
Sources: www.un.org, Pietila and Vickers (1994); www.choike.org, Antrobus (2003).
154
LESSON 6
WOMEN’S MOVEMENT IN INDIA
Introduction
The status of women has remained low since time immemorial. There is no record history
to explain the answer to how and why women got to receive secondary position in the society.
Indian women are inheritors of a very complex pattern of social models and cultural ideals. Some
of the most acrimonious and emotionally charged debates of the nineteenth century round
precisely those issues which signified women's oppression and their poor position. Inevitably,
the perceived indicators of women's low status like purdah, sati, female infanticide, child
marriage and enforced widowhood, - formed essential items in the agenda of attack of almost all
the major reformers of the ninetieth century India, whether they belong to the Brahmo samaj of
Bengal and eastern India indifferent to the fact that, the Arya samaj of north India or the Prathana
samaj of Maharashtra and western India. The problem of women received the attention of social
reformers right from the beginning of the nineteenth century. In the modern times, some
individuals, organized associations and journals and significantly played remarkable role in
bestirring the Indian society to focus it's attention on this problem and make efforts in the
direction of the general emancipation of Indian women's. The aim of this chapter is to examine
the status of women in society prior to the beginning of the women's movement in India and
chronicle briefly their participation and role during women’s movement from 1880-2000. It also
focuses on revealing the status of women in pre-colonial Indian society and pin points the fact
that there was no change observed in women’s lives and injustice done to them within the
patriarchal society continued even during the British reign. The women's movement in India is a
rich and vibrant movement which has taken different forms in the different parts of the country.
It is important to well recognize the fact that for a country like India’s, change in male-female
relations and the kinds of issues the women's movement is focusing on, will not come easy. For
every step the movement takes forward, there will be a possible backlash, a possible regression.
And it is this regression that makes space for the exception to occur, this factor that makes
women who can aspire to, and attain, the highest political office in the country, and for women to
continue to have to confront patriarchy within the home, in the workplace, throughout their lives.
Individual Contribution For The Resurrection of Women Issues in India
Rani Lakshmi Bai of Jhansi whose heroism and superb leadership laid an outstanding
example for all future generations of women freedom fighters. Married to Gangadhar Rao Head
of the state of Jhansi. She was not allowed to adopt a successor after his death by the British, and
Jhansi was annexed via British policy of doctrine of lapse. With the outbreak of the Revolt she
became determined to fight back. She used to go into the battlefield dressed as a man. Holding
the reins of her horse in mouth she used the sword with both hands. Under her leadership the
Rani's troops showed undaunted courage and returned shot for every shot. Considered by the
British as the best and bravest military leader of rebels this sparkling epitome of courage died a
hero's death in the battlefield. Since then whenever women are being talked about the first name
that comes to mind is that of the famous Rani Laxmibai of Jhansi. A figure dressed in men’s
clothes, led her soldiers to war against the British troops. Even her enemies admired her courage.
She fought valiantly and although in a beaten state she refused to surrender and fell on the
155
ground as a warrior should, fight the enemy to the last. Her remarkable courage always inspired
many men and women in India to rise against the alien rule during the later years.
Begum Hazrat Mahal, the Begaum of Oudh. She took active part in the defence of state of
Lucknow against the British. Although, she was queen and used to live a life of luxury, she
appeared on the battle-field herself to encourage her troops. Begam Hazrat Mahal held out
against the British with all her strength as long as she could. Ultimately she had to give up and
take refuge in Nepal. In the early nineteenth century, women occupied a very low status in Indian
society. Customs such as sati, child marriage and polygamy were widely prevalent. The first man
to speak out publicly against the injustices perpetrated on women in the mane of tradition and
religion was Raja Ram Mohan Roy who, in 1818, wrote a tract condemning sati. He also
attacked polygamy and spoke in favour of the property rights for women. Ishwar Chandra
Vidyasagar took up the cause of widows which led to the passing of the widow remarriage act
of 1956.Behramji Malabari (1853-1912), a Parsi reformer from Bombay; launched An AllIndia Campaign to raise the age of consent for marriage from 10 years to 12 years. In later
years, the age of consent of marriage act as proposed by Malabari was passed in 1891.
Swarnakumari devi, sister of Peot Rabindranath Tagore, an author in her own right and a
novelist of distinction, organized the Shakti Samiti in 1882. Pandita Ramabai Saraswati, that
remarkable woman from Poona, founded the Arya Samaj and went on to set up a series of
woman’s association in various towns of Bombay presidency. She also started the Sharda
Sadan to provide employment and education to women, particularly young widows. Ramabai
Ranade established the Seva Sadan. The year 1908 saw the beginning of a Gujarati Stree
Mandal in Ahmedabad and a Mahila Sewa Samaj was founded in Mysore in 1913 and in
Poona in 1916. women‘s organization were started in madras also. Initially, these associations
were confined to a locality or a city. The credit for starting the first All-India women’s
organization, the Bharat Stri Mahamandal (1901) must go to Sarladevi Chaudrani, the
brilliant daughter of Swarnakumari devi. But later on it was propagated only in 1917, within the
Madras city by Annie Beasant, Dorothy Jinarajadasa and Margaret cousins, together with a
group of Indian women .Being Conscious of their political rights and also influenced by western
democratic values, all of these women worked actively to generate political consciousness
among contemporary women during the early decades.
In a few reform efforts, issues of caste and class were also combined as well, for example
Satyashodak Mandal was set up by Jotibha Savithribai Phule. It was meant to promote
alliance between sudras and women of the upper class. They built school for lower class girls.
This led to a questioning of upper-caste values based on the wisdom of the Vedas, as well as, the
callous treatment of women, irrespective of caste. The late nineteenth-century writings of women
such as Muktabai and Tarabai Shinde are instances of some early feminists perspectives,
appearing at the time of first attempts at reforming women’s education, especially among the
lower caste.( Rosalind O’hanion:1994; Susie Tharu and K. lalitha:1993) Reform movements in
different regions such as the Brahmo Smaj, the Parthanan Samaj, the theosophical society
supported female education and also marked a turning point for its growing acceptance and
development . Major development took place in north india when member of Arya Samaj
opened the Arya Kanya Pathshala and the Kanya Mahavidyalaya in Jullunder. In Bengal,
the Bramho Samaj supported female education and progressive organization for women. In the
madras the theosophical society was critical of child marriage , child widowhood, and sati, as it
sough to regain the greatness of the Indian past where Hindu women were said to have been
highly educated and had considerable freedom. The other remarkable woman elected for the
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president ship of Indian National Congress was Sarojini Naidu. She became its president.
Dramatic meeting with another respected leader of time, Gokhle, in 1906 was to change her life
forever. His response to her fiery speech brought into her life the impact of a visionary who saw
in her oratory and brilliance a leader of the future. The period from 1917 to 1919 was the most
dynamic phase of Sarojini's career. During this time, she campaigned for the Montagu
Chelmsford Reforms, the Khilafat issue, the draconian Rowlett Act and the Satyagraha. When
Gandhi launched the Civil Disobedience Movement, she proved a faithful lieutenant. With great
courage she quelled the rioters, sold proscribed literature, and addressed frenzied meetings on the
carnage at Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar.In 1930 when Mahatma Gandhi chose her to lead the
Salt Satyagraha the stories of her courage became legion.
After Gandhi's arrest Sarojini took the responsibility and occupied the streets with 2000
volunteers to raid the Dahrsana Salt Works, the group was chased by police carrying rifle and
lathis with steel tipped clubs. The volunteers wildly cheered when she shook off the arm of the
British police officer who came to arrest her and marched proudly to the barbed wire stockade
where she was interned before being imprisoned. Freedom struggle was in full force and she
came under the influence of Gopalakrishna Gokhale and Gandhi. Gokhale advised her to spare
all her energy and talents for nation's cause. She gave up writing poetry and fully devoted herself
to emancipation of women, education, Hindu-Muslim unity etc. She became a follower of
Gandhiji and accompanied him to England. Whenever in England, she openly criticized British
rule in India which caught the attention of scholars and intellectuals.
Vallabhbhai Patel, a veteran of the Khedha Satyagraha, the Nagpur Flag Satyagraha,
and the Borsad Punitive Tax Satyagraha, he had emerged as a leader of Gujarat who was second
being to Gandhiji. His capacities as an organizer, speaker, indefatigable campaigner, inspirer of
ordinary men and women were already known, but it was the women of Bardoli who gave him
the title of Sardar. The main Satyagraha mobilization was done through extensive propaganda
via meetings, speeches, pamphlets, and door to door persuasion. Special emphasis was placed on
the mobilization fo women and many women activists like Mithuben Petit, a Parsi lady for,
Bombay, Bhaktiba, the wife of Darbar Gopaldas, Maniben Patel, the Sardar’s daughter,
Shardaben Shah and Sharda Mehta were recruited for the purpose. As a result, women often
outnumbered men at the meeting and stood firm in their resolution not to submit to the
Government threats Chandra Bipan 1989:207). Gandhiji called for a vigorous boycott of foreign
cloth and liquor shops, and had especially asked the women to play a leading role in this
movement. “To call woman the weaker sex is a libel; it is man’s injustice to woman”, he had
said; and the women of India certainly demonstrated in 1930 that they were second to none in
strength and tenacity of purpose. Women who had never stepped unescorted out of their homes,
women who had stayed in purdah, young mothers and widows and unmarried girls, became a
familiar sight as they stood from morning to night outside liquor shops and opium dens and
stores selling foreign cloth, quietly but firmly persuading the customers and shopkeepers to
change their ways. Along with the women, students and youth played the most prominent part in
the boycott of foreign cloth and liquor. Chandra Bipan 1989:276). Annie Besant, already sixtysix in 1914, had begun her political career in England as a proponent of Free Thought,
Radicalism, Fabianism and Theosophy, and had come to India in 1893 to work for the
Theosophical Society. Since 1907, she had been spreading the message of Theosophy from her
headquarters in Adyar, a suburb of Madras, and had gained a large number of followers among
the educated members of many communities that had experienced no cultural revival of their
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own. In 1914, she decided to enlarge the sphere of her activities to include the building of a
movement for Home Rule on the lines of the Irish Home Rule League. For this, she realized it
was necessary to get both the sanction of the Congress, as well as the active cooperation of the
Extremists. She devoted her energies, therefore, to persuade the Moderate leaders to open the
doors of the Congress to Tilak and his fellow-Extremists. But the annual Congress session in
December 1914 proved to be disappointing Pherozeshah Mehta and his Bombay Moderate group
succeeded, by winning over Gokhale and the Bengal Moderates, in keeping out the Extremists.
Tilak and Besant thereupon decided to revive political activity on their own, while still
maintaining their pressure on the Congress to re-admit the Extremist group. In early 1915, Annie
Besant launched a campaign through her two papers, New India and Commonweal, and
organized public meetings and conference to demand that India be granted self-government on
the lines of the White colonies after the War. From April 1915, her tone became more
peremptory and her stance more aggressive. (Chandra Bipan: 1989:160)
Many women of the Nehru family too had joined the Civil Disobedience Movement.
Kamala Nehru, Jawaharlal Nehru's wife gave full support to her husband in his desire to work
actively for the freedom struggle. In the Nehru hometown of Allahabad she organized
processions, addressed meetings and led picketing of liquor and foreign cloth shops. She played
a prominent part in organizing the No Tax Campaign in United Provinces (now Uttar Pradesh).
The AIWC played an active role in initiating and campaigning for social legislation that
would improve the position of women. It helped in getting the following acts passed: the sarda
act 1929; the special marriage act , 1954; the Hindu marriage and divorce act, 1955; the Hindu
minority and guardianship act, 1956; the Hindu adoption and maintenance act, 1956; the
suppression of immoral traffic in women act, 1956.
The AIWC founded a number of pioneering institutions, many of which now function as
autonomous apex bodies in their respective fields. These include: the lady Irwin college for
home science, new Delhi, which is now an institution offering graduate and post- graduate
courses in a varsity of subjects; the Family planning centers, now the family planning association
of India; save the children committee, now the Indian council of child welfare; the cancer
research institute, madras; the Amrit Kaur Bal Vihar for mentally retarded children’s society.
Kamaladevi chattopadhyaya, one of the founders of the AIWC, a valiant freedom fighter
dedicated to constructive work, an eminent writer and one of the most dynamic women of India,
contested the election to the madras legislative assembly as an independent candidate but was
defeated by a margin of 50 votes. Dr. Muthulakshmi Reddy, the first women medical graduate
of madras and one of the founding members of the AIWC, was, however, nominated to the
legislature by the government. The First All India Women’s Conference on Educational
Reform was held at Poona from 5th to 8th January, 1927. It was a historic event. It brought
together women from different parts of India and from all castes and communities. The main
concern of all the women who assembled there was women’s education. Women’s education had
been pioneered by Ramabai Saraswati, Mahadev Govind and Ramabai Ranade, Jyotiba
Phule and Maharshi Karve, all of them well- known social reformers of the late ninethenth and
early twentieth centuries.
The AIWC is a premier women’s organization that has attacked the most talented and
capable Indian women’s of the century, among them: Sarojini Naidu, Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit
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Rajkumari Amrit Kaur, Rameshwari Nehru, Dhanvanthi Rama Rau, Kamaladevi
Chattopadhyaya, Muthulakshmi Reddy, Charulata Mukherjee, Vidyagauri Neelkanth,
Hansa Mehta, and many others. It is equipped to play a crucial role to help women attain
economic self- sufficiency and fight gender inequalities.(Aparna Basu & Bharti Ray:1990).
The AIWC has a three- dimensional significance. Firstly, it symbolizes that women were
entirely responsible for their own regeneration.
In the nineteenth century, the movement for women’s education and upliftment was
initiated and led by men. In the twentieth century, as women became more educated, they came
to form their own associations and occupy leadership position. The AIWC has been the premier
and pioneer organization in this arena. It has been a path-breaker. Secondly, the AIWC was
formed at the instance of western and western-educated women. In its early phase, it looked
towards western role-models. The deliberations of the organization indicate that by now the
western stereotype had been totally rejected. The leadership is fully Indian, the members are
drawn from the Indian middle class, the approach to problem has an indigenous bias, and the
models for ideals women hood are drawn from great women of ancient India. Thirdly, the
organization has provided with opportunities to come out into the world outside the parameters
of the home, in order to contribute something to society at large. Most of the women members
are housewives and have exhibited initiative and will in carrying out their organizational
activities. For providing the lead in such a crucial areas of life, the AIWC must be given a place
of pride in Indian history (Aparna Basu, Bharti Ray :1990)
Women’s Mobilization, Colonialism and National Movements
In the early nineteenth century, the women question was raised primarily by elite upper
caste Hindu men. The women question included issues like women’s education, widow
remarriage and campaigns against sati. In the 1920s Indian women entered into a new era- with
what is defined as feminism leading to the creation of localized women’s associations that
worked on issues of women’s education, livehood strategies for working class women, as well as
national level women’s associations such as the all India women’s conference. The latter were
closely allied to the Indian national congress, and worked within the nationalist and anti-colonial
movements, and under the Gandhi’s leadership, mass mobilization of women became an integral
part of nationalism. Women therefore played an important role in various nationalists and anticolonial struggles including the civil disobedience movements in the 1930s (Sarkar1985)
Begum Rokeya (1880-1932) came from a conservative home, the daughter of a Muslim
zamindar from rangpur district in north Bengal in what is now Bangladesh. Her father was not in
favor of educating his daughter and she was married early to Syed Sakhawat hossain, a widower
from Bihar. Her husband, though much older than her, was an educated liberal .(Bharati Ray
2003) He encouraged his young wife’s literary pursuit – and she in turn named the school that
she founded with his money after his death , the sakhawat memorial school. The institution- that
continues to this day – was the result of the tireless energy and commitment of an amazing
woman. In the most cases, however, the education of muslim girls, as also those from other
religious communities, owed much to male initiatives. Sayyid karamat hussain founded the
karamat hussain girls college in luck now in 1912 and advocated a separateCurriculam for
women befitting their separate sphere of activity. The Muslim girls college in Aligarh was set up
by sheikh Abdullah and his wife wahid jahan with the purpose of contributing to cultural
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continuity and perpetuating the norms of parda and familial roles, rather than doing away with
them.
As early as 1879, college classes were added to the Bethune school in Calcutta – with
kadambini basu as th only student in the years to come, higher education was encouraged by
missionaries (Isabella thoburn, lucknow and kinnaird college, Lahore were started in 1886 and
1913 respectively) and reformers like D.K.Karve and sister subbalakshmi. In the 1920s, it was
the commitment of women like sister subbalakshmi towards upliftment of young widows that
prepared the ground for succeeding generations. Women’s productive roles therefore remained
invisible, both within the household and at the work place. They always performed underpaid,
unskilled ,and undervalued tasks and were regarded by all –the state, employers, trade unionist,
and their own families- as supplementary workers. The Women’s Indian Association (WIA)
was the first organization to take up issues relating to women workers in the 1930s in a limited
way women’s organizations agitated for protective legislation for workers in some sectors.
Kadambini Ganguly , one of the first woman doctor of the British Indian empire, was deemed a
whore by Bangabasi , a conservative journal. Her counter part in Maharashtra , Anandibai Joshi,
graduated from the women’s medical college in Philadelphia in 1886, became the first Indian
student to study medicine abroad .Earlier, Kadambini and other eminent Brahmos committed to
women emancipation had launched a counter offensive in the columns of the Brahmo
publication, the Indian messenger. Medicine was the earliest profession open to women, in part
dictated by the demands of parda society for female doctors to attend pregnant women. a large
number of Christian women became the earliest Doctors. Hilda lazarus, who was born in 1890
was among the most Successful Indian Christian doctors. She wore home spun-khadi saris,
learned a number of languages, and identified deeply with the nationalist cause. Three important
national women’s organizations were set up in the 1920s: The Women’s Indian Association
(WIA, 1917), The National Council of Indian Women (NCWI, 1925), and The All-India
Women’s Conference (AIWC, 1927). The President of the AIWC included kamala Devi
Chattopadhyay, Muthulakshmi Rddey, Sarojini Naidu, Margaret Cousins, and Drameshwari
Nehru. In the Mean time, the growing women’s movement played an important role in
legislation against child marriage in 1929 when, an important the sharda act (the child marriage
restraint act ) was passed with the support of the some prominent nationalist leaders. In the
1930s, a campaign for the removal of women’s legal disabilities in marriage and inheritance,
primarily in Hindu law, began in real earnest and a few of the important laws passed in the 1930s
included the Hindu women’s rights to property act (1937), the Muslim personal law (Shari at)
application act (1937), and the dissolution of Muslims marriage act (1939) (Nair janaki: 1996;
181-211). In addition, the campaign for women’s enfranchisement was consistent and long, with
some success and many retreats
Gandhi And Indian Women
Gandhi ji always wanted women to be a part of the national movement (sita ram singh:
134-206).he believe that if women did not join the movement, India’s march to Swaraj would be
delayed.(L.S.S. O’Malley:93) before Gandhi entered the Indian political scene , very few women
took part in social welfare and revolutionary movements. (Susma Sharma: 1975:38-40) India had
a very few women like Mata Tapaswini, Madame Cama, Sarla Debi as prominent terrorist
even before 1857. (The illustrated weekly of India: 1973:21). Revolutionary activities increased
later. Two students of government High School, Shanty Ghosh and Smriti Chaudhuri, had
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killed the district Magistrate of Tipperah (Tripura). Bina Das tried to kill the governor of Bengal,
and later many women revolutionaries fought for the freedom. For instance Pritti Lata
Waddekar was an important member of militant organization (Kiran Devendra: 1985:25).
Banalata Das Gupta was detained without trial for possessing unlicensed arms in her hostel.
She died July 1, 1936 in Calcutta as she refused to give an undertaking that she would keep
away from politics. Gandhi inspired women with confidence.
The political awakening of Indian women may largely be attributed to the movement
Gandhi initiated (Vijay Agnew:35), and the general improvement in the status of women in
India’s owes a great deal to the infinite interest that Gandhi took from the very beginning. A
band of emancipated women emerged under the influence of Gandhi. The women’s movement in
India was an integral part of the nationalist politics of Gandhi.
Kamala Devi Chattopadhya sold banned literature during Satyagraha, organized cultural shows
for the freedom struggle, joined the Seva Dal and pledged to work until Swaraj was won. She
became as an Prominent social worker and edited the Indian social reformer. Kamala devi
worked for the formation of the all India women’s conference in 1927 and became its general
secretary. It was her idea to make women’s struggle a part of the freedom struggle. In reading
about her life we come across expression of her respect for Gandhi. She was arrested in the civil
disobedience movement and confined in Yeravada Jail, Nasik. She admitted that her staying in
jail made her better understand Gandhi (Kiran Devendra: 1985:27) In the 1920s in the noncooperation movement, women like Renuka Ray gave away her jewelry. Sarrojini Naidu was
an extraordinary woman to whom Gandhi said in 1922, when he was sentenced to six years’
imprisonment: “I entrust the destiny of India to your hands.” Her contribution to the renaissance
of Indian womanhood cannot be underestimated. Rajkumari Amrit Kaur, Mridula Sarabai,
Sucheta Kripalani, Padmaja Naidu , Durgabai Deshmuki, Aruna Asaf Ali, worked with men
during the various times of test. Mrs. Sucheta kriplani went underground along with Jaya
Prakash Narayan and Ram Manohar Lohia and was active in organizing the Anti- British
Resistance. She was arrested in Patna in 1944 and kept in solitary confinement for more than a
year. The daring acts of Mrs. Aruna Asaf Ali to keep the movement going are incredible. The
movement could have collapsed had women not worked underground while the male leaders
were in prision. Kasturba Gandhi, Mahatma Gandhi's wife joined her husband while he was in
South Africa and worked with him for many years there. She was a leader of Women's
Satyagraha for which she was imprisoned. She helped her husband in the cause of Indigo
workers in Champaran, Bihar and the No Tax Campaign in Kaira, Gujarat. She was arrested
twice for picketing liquor and foreign cloth shops, and in 1939 for participating in the Rajkot
Satyagraha.
Contribution of foreign women in India’s freedom struggle for independence
Meera Ben and Sarla Ben popularly known as Mahatama Gandhi's two English daughters also
made significant contribution to the cause of freedom. Meera Ben whose real name was
Madeleine Slade attended the second Round Table Conference with Gandhi. She sent news
releases concerning Gandhi's campaign to the world press for which she was repeatedly
threatened by the government, but she continued her work. She undertook Khadi tour throughout
the country. She was arrested for entering the city of Bombay in violation of the government
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order. Catherine Mary Heilman or Sarla Ben as she was better known went from village to
village helping the families of political prisoners.
Annie Besant an Irish lady became the leader of the of the Theosophical Society. In 1902
while in London she criticized England for the conditions prevalent in India. In 1914 she joined
the Indian National Congress and gave it a new direction. The idea of the Home Rule League
was first discussed by her. She with the radical congress leader Tilak presented a memorial to
Montagu on December 18, 1917 which gave equal rights to women in the matters of political
franchise. She was the first woman president of the Congress and gave a powerful lead to
women's movement in India. The Mother She took charge of Ashram in Pondicherry in 1926.
She was the inspirer of Auroville, the international town near Pondicherry. It was to serve as a
meeting place for the followers of Shri Aurobindo. Paying her tribute to the Mother at a
women’s gathering in Kanpur the late Prime Minister, Mrs. Indira Gandhi said: “The Mother was
a dynamic lady, who came from France and adopted the Indian culture. She played an important
role in motivating women like Mrs. Annie Besant and Mrs. Nellie Sen Gupta, The Mother had
also contributed to enrich India’s age-old heritage and culture”.
Sister Nivedita was one among the host of foreign women who were attracted towards
Swami Vivekananda and Hindu philosophy. Born in Ireland on 28 October 1867, she arrived in
India in January, 1898, in search of truth. She was impressed by the ideals of Womanhood in
India. She once remarked that India was the land of great women. She, however, felt that Indian
women needed, to cultivate among themselves a wider and broader concept of the nation, so that
they could participate along with men in building a free and strong nation.She propagated for the
cause of India throughout America and Europe. Swami Vivekananda described her as a real
Lioness. Rabindranath Tagore regarded her as Lok-Mata and Aurobindo Ghosh as Agni-sikha
besides the hundreds and thousands of Indian women who dedicated their lives for the cause of
their motherland; there were a number of noble and courageous foreign women who saw in India
- its religion, its philosophy and its culture, a hope for the redemption of the world. They thought
that in India’s spiritual death shall world find its grave. These noble women were sick of the
material west and found in India and in its civilization, solace for their cramped souls. Subhash
Chandra bose or netaji as he was polpularly known, accompied by captain Lakshmi
Swaminadhan (later Sehal), joined the rani jhansi regiment at Singapore. The women’s
regiment was a wing of the INA raised during world war II for the liberation of India. Lakshmi
sehgal is the doughter of ammu swaminadhan, an eminent congress worker and member of the
women’s movement. a medical doctor, lakshmi too is an ardent champion of workers’ and
women’s rights. Charulata mukerjee (1880-1969) eldest daughter of distinguished educationasts
P.K. and Sarla Ray, she was among the first two women to be admitted to the prisedency
college, Calcutta. She was a pioneer in starting mahila samitis and girls‘s schools in Bengal
districts.
Sarojini’s daughter Miss Padmaja Naidu devoted herself to the cause of Nation like her mother.
At the age of 21, she entered the National scene and became the joint founder of the Indian
National Congress of Hyderabad. She spread the message of Khadi and inspired people to
boycott foreign goods. She was jailed for taking part in the “Quit India” movement in 1942.
After Independence, she became the Governor of West Bengal. During her public life spanning
over half a century, she was associated with the Red Cross. Her services to the Nation and
especially her humanitarian approach to solve problems will long be remembered.
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In Shimla, Raj kumari Amrit kaur took a leading part in the protest meetings and
processions which were subjected to ruthless lathi charge about 14-15 times between 9 and 10
August 1942.Raj kumari Amrit Kaur was arrested along with other workers. Shakuntala
Sharma, a first year student of Allahabad University, succeeded in hoisting the Congress
Tricolour on the top of the kuchehri building.
The Quit India Movement marked a new high in terms of popular participation in the
national movement and sympathy with the national cause. Women, especially college and school
girls, played a very important role. Aruna Asaf Ali and Sucheta Kripalani were to major women
organizers of the underground, and Usha Mehta important members of the small group that ran
the Congress Radio. The adoption of non-violent forms of struggle enabled the participation of
the mass of the people who could not have participated in a similar manner in a movement that
adopted violent forms. This was particularly true of women’s participation. Women would have
found it difficult to join an armed struggle in large numbers. But when it came to undergoing
suffering, facing lathi-charges, picketing for hours on end in the summer of the winter; women
were probably stronger than men. (Chandra Bipan: 1989:514). Aruna Asaf Ali, a radical
nationalist played an outstanding role in the historic Quit India Movement launched by Mahatma
Gandhi on August 9, 1942, and was a prominent leader of the underground movement. She
published bulletins, went from place to place and even met Mahatma Gandhi avoiding arrest. She
edited Inqulab a monthly journal of the Indian National Congress.
Women Participation in Post- Independence Era
The immediate aftermath of partition and independence saw a steadily increasing sense of
betrayal on the part of workers and peasant, communists and socialists. The delays of the
congress in the fulfillment of its promises of speedy and effective land redistribution infused the
kisan sabhas with a new spirit of opposition at a time when the impact of the Chinese revolution
was being felt by Indian communists, and there were sharecroppers, rallies, strikes and
demonstrations, led by the kisan sahbas, criticizing government measures as insufficient and
demanding land reforms. Most of these agitations were suppressed by the government through
the arrest of peasant leaders, but this was not possible in the case of one of the earliest and most
militant sharecropper’s movements, the 1948-50 telangana movement in Andhra. Under the
leadership of maoist- influenced members of the CPI, some two thousand five hundred villages
in telangana district were ‘liberated sharecroppers’ debts were cancelled, rent payments were
suspended and land redistributed. In September, 1948, Indian troops took over the state, arresting
peasant leaders, and firing upon demonstrators. The CPI was outlawed, and the movement forced
underground where it took to guerilla tactics. though thousands of women had been active in the
strikes and rallies, and leaders of the telangana movement were unusual for their time in the
attention they paid to such women’s problems as wife-beating , making it known that they would
chastise offenders, the attitude towards women reminded one of benevolent paternalism, and
when the movement went underground women were not allowed to join the guerillas but were
expected to perform the ancillary tasks of providing shelter, acting as messengers, etc (Menon,
Latika, 1998:265).
The Late 1960s and early 1970s saw a radicalization the Gandhian or Sarvodaya tradition
of non-violent protest. The Sarvodaya response to the political and economic crisis of the period
were movement like the Nav Niman in Gujarat and the Bihar Movement led by J.P Narain,
Sarvodaya led and based among intellectuals the Navman activists called for accountability
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among the people, mainly the intelligentsia, as citizens. Many Nav Nirman went to Bihar and
later joined the movement there. The Bihar movement acknowledged the Futility of a
preoccupation with the politics of power alone. Much more fundamental change was needed,
according to it, in order to achieve a just society. The movement called for a Total Revolution
and raised among its carders and supporters a wide range of question regarding women. Issues
like man – women relations, family violence, rape and unequal distribution of work and
resources were debated openly, and created a widespread ferment among its women cadres. The
Bodhgaya Struggle, which Govind Kelkar and Chetna Gala document, was led by the Chhatra
Yuva Sangharsh Vahini, a youth organization that formed the van-guard of the Bihar movement.
The position it took on land rights for women during the struggle against the feudal rule of the
Bodhgaya Math was a product of this ferment (Mohanty Manoranjan 2004-326). The Chipko
movement in the Uttarkhand Himalaysas, where village women resisted commercial forest
felling, dates fromk the early 1970s, basically the same period as the Bihar movement.
Philsophically traceable to Gandhian origins as well, the movement raised crucial questions of
ecological balance and developmental priorites. Chipko achieved high levels of women’s
participation like the Bihar movement, although its theoretical stand on the women’s question
appears to be different. While the Bihar movement took a stand on the equal legal rights of men
and women Chipko based its campaign for women’s mobilization on the latter’s supposed
special responsibilities for nurture related activities and generalized from this that women had a
special concern for the preservation of life and ecological systems. The movement of adivasis
and growth of the Sharmik Sangathana in Maharashtra’s Dhulia district is another significant
pre-Emergency movement. In essence it was a movement for the restoration of the social and
economic dignity of the disinherited tribal peasantry of Shahada whose lands and assets had been
appropriated by settlers from outside. The tribal people worked for less than subsistence wages
on lands that were formerly theirs. The frequent sexual violation of the tribal women was a
symbol of the humiliation of the entire tribe. The Shranik Sangathan’s militant struggles led to a
change in this. Initially the main focus in the Sangathans’s work with women was on their
mobilization. Along with the attack on violators of women’s dignity from outside the
community-which fitted in very well with the focus of the entire organization-the presence of
outside activists was responsible for the injection into the movement of issues of domestic
violence, alcoholism, etc. that challenged patriarchal relations within the tribal community. And
it was through the efforts of the women’s front that a systematic expose of the subordinations of
women in customary tribal law became available. (Mohanty Manoranjan : 2004:327). The
Kerela Fishworkers movement developed out of the crisis in the traditional fisheries sector in
the wake of mechanized fishing. The beginnings of this crisis, with dwindling catches and
overfishing of the seas, can be traced to the mid-1960s, although the union of Federation the
Kerla Swatantra Matrya thozilai-dates from the late 1970s Social activists from Church related
groups were important in organizing the fisher folk. Although women in Kerala do not actually
fish. They undertake the major responsibility for marketing the catch. Sensitivity to their
problems was woven into the struggle from the beginning. The struggle of the Kerla fisher folk
eventually merged with the struggles of fisherfolk in Goa. Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, and today
is an extremely powerful voice basing itself on workers’ solidarity, environmental wholeness and
sound developmental planning. As far as women specifically are concerned, the organization
took up the issue of women’s rights to public transport for vending fish. Within the movement to
a significant debate took place -on organizational model for women’s involvement. The demand
that women be accorded full union membership began in the Trivandram unit where women
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were strongest in leadership positions, and subsequently, the issue of whether women needed a
separate front for their women specific issues, in addition to the union platform, had to be
argued and sorted out in the entire organization. (Mohanty Manorajan 2004-328). The
experiences of the Nipani’s bidi workers, Tamil Nadu construction workers, Rajanandgaon
textile workers all base themselves on a basis trade union structure. Each is however unique in
extending the scope of the trade union into a much wider social field. The sheer size of the
women membership exerts a pressure on the union to take up trade union and social issues that
focus on women. From the Nipani struggle has emerged an attack on social practices that oppress
women, such as the devdasi system, while Dalli Rajhara’s contribution has been to stress the
specificity of the women workers’ point of view, something that has enriched both the worker’s
struggles out of traditional trade union fields like the workplace into a whole range of social
situations including health and culture. The Tamil Nadu construction worker’s union has woven
sensitivity to the women’s perspective in its entire working and struggle practices. The union has
became a forum for the articulation of the tensions between women and men workers, their
differing work conditions, as well as expectations and prospects in the industry. The Assam
agitation against ‘foreigners’ in the early 1970s brought women out on the streets in a patriotic
cause in a manner reminiscent of the nationalist movement. (Mohanty Manoranjan 2004:328).
Sporadic Movements
The activism of the Indian women’s movement it generally seen to have reached some
kind of significant point in the mid-seventies and early eighties. It is from this time that the
history of the movement is said to come into a kind of new phase, a resurgence of activity after
what is seen as a period of quietude. One of the first ‘Cases’ to come to light was the rape of
poor Muslim woman, Rameeza Bee, in Hyderabad in 1978. The story goes that Rameeza Bee
and her rickshaw puller husband were returning one night from a film when they were picked up
by the police-as the poor and vulnerable often are in India-and accused of being criminals,
prostitutes, and drug pushers and so on. In this case the couple was taken to the police station for
questioning and Rameeza Bee was accused of being a prostitute. Taking this as license, inside
the station the police who, shamefully, rank high among the number of rapists in India and who
are popularly known as the single most organized criminal force in the country, lived up to their
reputation and raped Rameeza Bee. When her husband tried to protest, they beat him to death.
One of the accusations that is often leveled against the women’s movement is that it is largely
middle class and urban. While there may be some truth in this statement, it is, as always, difficult
to generalize. In Rameeza Bee’s case for example, it was not middle class feminists who took up
her cause (although they joined in later) but local citizens, particularly the poor, who marched in
their thousands through the city of Hyderabad, carrying the body of her dead husband, and
placed it in the verandah of the police station. When the guilty policemen refused to emerge, the
angry public cut their telephone connections, set up roadblocks so no one could escape, set fire to
bicycles and other objects lying in the compound and began to stone the police station. Later this
too was set on fire. Two platoons of armed police were needed to quell the crowd. In the days
that followed, a string of protest actions took place all over the state of Andhra, and as many as
26 people died in the demonstrations and reprisals. Not surprisingly, for this often happens in
India, the case soon moved into the political arena, with angry opposition members surrounding
the Chief Minister and demanding action. In the end the government was forced to give in to
pressure from women’s organizations and others, and appoint an enquiry commission, and the
situation was brought under control with difficulty. By this time the only people who continued
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to focus on the issue as a ‘women’s’ issue, and on the victim as someone who was central to it,
were women’s groups. For others, particularly for the politicians who joined in the fray,
Rameeza Bee herself was of little consequence. (Urvarshi Butalia 2005). In taking up the
Rameeza Bee case, women’s organizations were following a tradition established by other
groups before them. As early as 1986, three organizations in Gujarat (Sahiyar, Chingari and the
Lok Adhikar Sangh) had filed a joint petition in the Supreme Court demanding an enquiry into
the gang rape by policemen of Guntaben, a tribal woman from Bharuch district in Gujarat. The
enquiry was led by justice P.N. Bhagwati and the Enquiry Commission interviewed as many as
584 persons. In the end, nine of them were found guilty (Gandhi and Shah 1992.39-40). It was,
however the Supreme Court judgment in the Mathura rape case (1980) that finally crystallized
and focused the energies of women’s groups all over the country. In Maharashtra, Mathura, a
young woman, was raped by two policemen (although most of these early cases were cases of
police rape, the police were by no means the only offenders), who were found guilty by the High
Court of India. But, in a dramatic reversal of the High Court judgment, the Supreme Court
acquitted them. In response, four eminent lawyers wrote an open letter to the Chief Justice of
India, protesting the judgment of the Supreme Court. This letter sparked off a wave of protests
and demonstrations against the Supreme Court judgment all over the country. The initiative was
taken by women’s groups in Mumbai (Bombay), who contacted groups elsewhere and a series of
coordinated demonstrations were organized in various places (Pune, Delhi, Hyderabad,
Bangalore, Ahmadabad, Nagpur). Women’s groups demanded action and accountability
expressed their solidarity with the affected women, began to carry out investigations into other
incidents that had so far remained out of the public eye and a whole lot of other incidents (for
example in Punjab, Karnataka, Assam, West Bengal, Bihar) came to light. It became clear that
the police were by no means the only criminals, but that they were joined, everywhere, by their
brothers in uniform, the army, and a host of ordinary men, both rich and poor, for whom rape
was the most powerful weapon to keep women in a state of subjugation. (Urvarshi Butalia 2005).
Often the woman was young, sometimes new bride or mother; she had been subjected to
harassment and violence, had been the target for demands (aimed of course at her family for
women rarely have any disposable income of their own and when they do, they seldom have
control of it). Interestingly, and tragically, although there were often other women in the house,
and the likelihood of their working in the kitchen was strong. The only woman to suffer and die
was the young bride. In most families where In most families where such accidents took place,
the police were slow to seal the place, allowing the offending family ample time to destroy
valuable evidence. Where investigations did take place, women were often unwilling to implicate
their husband so strong was their socialization as ‘good wives’. It was rare, therefore, to get
dying declaration that indicated the husband - much more common was the woman’s insistence
that she had taken her own life. This issue of women’s consent to and acceptance of violence
against themselves was one that was to trouble feminist activists even as they became
increasingly convinced that the majority of these deaths were, in reality, cold blooded murders.
Dowry had been legally prohibited since the sixties but continued to be part of the marriage
rituals of many communities. Agitations against it began in the late seventies with much of the
action being concentrated in Delhi. In the early days, two Delhi based groups, the Mahila
Dakshata Samiti and Stree Sangharsh, were in the forefront of this agitation. As early as 1978
the Mahila Dakshata Samiti, whose main focus was on campaigns against price rises, published a
report on dowry deaths which identified them as murders (Mahila Dakshata Samiti 1978).
However, the campaign took off in a major way only with the first demonstration organized by
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Stree Sangharsh. This related to the death of Tarvinder Kaur, a young woman who was murdered
by her in -laws because her parents, like many others, were unable to fulfill their continuing
demands for cash and goods. Stree Sangharsh’s protest march through the streets of the
residential area were tarvinder had lived and died, gathered, hundreds of supporters and was
widely reported in the national press. porters and was widely reported in the national press
Ironically Stree Sangharsh, had itself been created following a similar death in Jangpura, that of
Hardip Kaur, a friend of Tarvinder’s. Subsequently, a number of other demonstrations were
organized in Delhi which targeted the police, the state, the offending families and the
communities who tacitly provided support to the perpetrators of violence against women.
(Urvarshi Butalia 2005)
The Campaign against Widow Immolation
In 1987 a rather different (and spectacular) case of the violent death of a young woman
came to public attention. Married for barely eight months (of which only one had been spent
with her husband) Roop Kanwar became a window when her husband died in an accident. It is
unclear who took the decision to immolate her on her husband’s pyre-turning her into a sati but it
was reported that she was forced onto the pyre and prevented from escaping by a phalanx of
armed guards who surrounded her, and that her shouts for help were ignored. But this reality was
quickly quashed and a veritable mythology was built up around her death which represented it as
a voluntary act of ‘heroism and valour’ true to the supposedly ‘authentic’ tradition of Rajasthan,
the state she came from. In this mythology, Roop Kanwar was represented as having ‘willingly’
ascended the funeral pyre, where she sat serencly amidst the flames, impervious to pain. Roop
kanwar’s death, though not of a widespread phenomenon such as the increasing number of
dowry deaths, was extraordinarily important symbolically, due to the public approval that her
murder received from thousands of people: those who were instrumental in carrying it out, those
who witnessed it but turned a blind eye to it, and the multitudes who tacitly and overtly
supported it as an act that was part of Rajasthan’s ‘authentic tradition’ of valour and heroism and
who came to worship at the site of the pyre. In Rajasthan, at the time, Roop Kanwar’s murder
was also supported by the state and the government in power, as well as by various sections of
the intelligentsia who resorted to splitting hairs and offering approval of what they described as
the ‘voluntary’ nature of the act. In a perceptive essay on the subject, Kumkum Sangari and
Sudesh Vaid point out that window immolation is one of the most violent of patriarchal
practices, distinct from other forms of patriarchal violence, first in the degree of consent it has
received, and second in the supportive institutions and ideological formulations that rationalize
and idealize if (my italics, and this was certainly in evidence in Rajasthan and in many other
parts of India). In fact the violence, in Rajasthan and in many other parts of India). In fact the
violence, the consent and the complex of institutions and ideological formations are mutually
interrelated. The event is mythologized precisely because of and proportionate to the intensity of
violence inherent in it’ (Sangari and Vaid 1996.240)
The Shahbano Case
In the early seventies, Shahbano, a Muslim woman in her seventies, was divorced by her
husband, Mohammed Ahmad Khan. For a short while, Shahbano’s husband paid her a small
amount as maintenance for her and their children, and then, abruptly, the payments stopped.
Shabano then filed an application, under Section 125 of the Criminal Procedure Code (which is
meant to prevent women from becoming destitute, provided, their husbands are not destitute
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themselves). This section of the law fixes a maximum amount of Rs. 500 a month as
maintenance hardly enough to keep anyone, let alone a whole family, together. The case went
back and forth for a considerable time, with arguments taking in the purview of personal law and
its possible conflicts/contradictions with the Criminal Procedure Code and, finally, it came
before a bench of the Supreme Court for judgment. The five member Constitution Bench upheld
Shahbano’s right to maintenance both under Section 125 and under Muslim personal law, and it
criticized ‘the way women have been traditionally subjected to unjust treatment’ citing both the
Hindu lawmaker Manu, and the statements of the Propher, as examples of traditional justice
(Kumar 1993: 161 -62 ). Their judgment caused an uproar among Muslim religious leaders who
claimed that it represented an attack on Islam. Muslim women, they held, were to be governed
by the Muslim Personal Law, and the Supreme Court, or indeed any other authority, had no right
to pronounce on the teachings of the Prophet. They demanded therefore that Muslim women be
excluded from the purview of Section 125. In August 1985, a Muslim Member of Parliament
introduced a bill to this effect in Parliament (this later became an act, the Muslim Women’s
Maintenance of Right on Divorce Act of 1986). Despite considerable opposition to this Bill from
many groups, and initially from the ruling party itself, the Bill went through. It was widely
believe that this was the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s way of compensating the Muslims
(and thereby safeguarding their vote) for having allowed the locks to be opened at Ayodhya).
The campaign which fought for Shahbano’s right to a life of dignity and respect as a citizen of
India, and not as a member of a cultural or religious grouping and the counter campaign which
eventually resulted in the Muslim Women’s Maintenance of Rights on Divorce act, were fought
both in Parliament and in the streets. All over India there were mass protests both for and against
the passing of this legislation. While women’s groups protested that the government was
sacrificing the interests of women for the sake of mathematics of electoral politics, selfappointed leaders of the Muslim community mobilized vast numbers of people both men and
women, to protest at what they said was the state’s interference’s in Muslim culture and identity.
In many ways the two campaigns, against sati and in support of Shahbano, raised similar issues
for women activists. Both the Hindu Right and the defenders of the Muslim ‘community’-male
leaders and politicians in each case-used women as symbols to defend what they defined as the
identity of the community, and called upon women to come out in its defence. The Muslim
Women’s Act (Protection of Rights on Divorce) was the government’s sop to the Muslim
‘community’ – in reality the Muslim religious leadership and some Muslim vote banks-designed
to compensate for the concessions they had been making to the Hindu Right, where women were
concerned, however, the passing of this legislation carried a very real message about the alacrity
and willingness with which the state was willing to sacrifice their rights in the interest of the
mathematics of electoral politics. Nonetheless, on of the outcomes of the furor over the
Shahbano case, as it came to be known, was that it brought the question of identity politics
squarely into the public arenas. The large numbers of Muslim women who came out in support
of the demand for a Muslim women ‘s Bill and against the judge who was seen to have made
derogatory remarks about the ‘Muslim community’, provided ample evidence that Muslims too
could be divided along lines of religious identity. The panacea of sisterhood was no longer one
that activists could unproblematic ally believe in.
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Participation of Women and Environmental Movements in India
Chipko movement and participation of women
One of the first environmentalist movements which were inspired by women was the
Chipko movement (Women tree-huggers in India). It began when Maharajah of Jodhpur wanted
to build a new palace in Rajasthan which is India’s Himalayan foot hills. While the axemen were
cutting the trees, martyr Amrita Devi hugged one of the trees. This is because in Jodhpur each
child had a tree that could talk to it. The axmen ignored Devi and after taking her off the tree cut
it down. Her daughters who followed her and the mother were all were killed. People from fortynine villages around Jodhpur responded to this act and hugged the trees the axemen were trying
to cut. This act by Himalayan village women was a nonviolent resistance movement to save the
forest. Chipko movement doesn’t have any formal structure, board of director or any specific
leaders. Women who participated in this movement were largely rural women, who are
connected to each other horizontally rather than vertically via a hierarchy. Chipko activists
haven’t focused on one area and they shift their hub into any region which faces the risk of
deforestation. Chipko’s idea and philosophy spread through word of mouth mostly by women
who talked about them on village paths or markets. chipko movement started in uttaranchal. it
was started by a woman called gaura devi. Later on she was supported by environmentalists like
chandi prasad bhatt and sunderlal bahuguna. For rural women, saving the environment is crucial
to their economic survival. As primary food, fuel, and water gatherers, women have strong
interests in reversing deforestation, desertification, and water pollution. Against these harmful
deforestation policies a movement called Chipko was born. “Chipko” in Hindi means to cling,
reflecting the protesters main technique of throwing their arms around the tree trunks designated
to be cut, and refusing to move. We can also refer here another movement, which is one of
biggest in women and environmental history, is the Green Belt movement. Nobel Prize winner
Wangari Maathai founded this movement on the World Environment Day in June 1977. The
starting ceremony was very simple, with a few women participating, who planted seven trees in
Maathai’s backyard. By 2005, 30 million trees had been planted by participants in the Green Belt
movement on public and private lands. The Green Belt movement aims to bring environmental
restoration along with society’s economic growth. This movement leaded by Maathai focused on
restoration of Kenya’s rapidly diminishing forests as well as empowering the rural women
through environmental preservation, with a special emphasis on planting indigenous trees.
Women Participation in India and Narmada Bachao Andolan
Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) is a non-governmental organisation (NGO) that
mobilised tribal people, adivasis, farmers, environmentalists and human rights activists against
the Sardar Sarovar Dam being built across the Narmada river, Gujarat, India. It originally
focused on the environmental issues related to trees that would be submerged under the dam
water. Recently it has re-focused with the aim to enable the poor citizens especially the oustees
to get the full rehabilitation facilities from the government. Their mode of campaign includes
hunger strikes, mass media publicities, garnering support from noted film and art personalities
etc. Narmada Bachao Andolan, together with its leading spokespersons Medha Patkar and Baba
Amte, was the 1991 recipient of the Right Livelihood Award. Post-1947, investigations were
carried out to evaluate mechanisms in utilizing water from the Narmada river, which flows into
the Arabian Sea after passing through the states of Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Maharashtra.
Due to inter-state differences in implementing schemes and sharing of water, the Narmada Water
Disputes Tribunal was constituted by the Government of India on October 6, 1969 to adjudicate
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over the water disputes. This Tribunal investigated the matters referred to it and responded after
more than 10 years. On December 12, 1979, the decision as given by the Tribunal, with all the
parties at dispute binding to it, was released by the Indian Government. As per the Tribunal's
decision, 30 major, 135 medium, and 3000 small dams, were granted approval for construction
including raising the height of the Sardar Sarovar dam. In 1985, after hearing about the Sardar
Sarovar dam, Medha Patkar and her colleagues visited the project site and noticed the project
work being shelved due to an order by the Ministry of Environment and Forests, Government of
India. The reasons for this were cited as "non-fulfillment of basic environmental conditions and
the lack of completion of crucial studies and plans".] What she noticed was that the people who
were going to be affected were given no information, but for the offer for rehabilitation. Due to
this, the villagers had many questions right from why their permission was not taken to whether
a good assessment on the ensuing destruction was taken. Furthermore, the officials related to the
project had no answers to their questions. While World Bank, the financing agency for this
project, came into the picture, Patkar approached the Ministry of Environment to seek
clarifications. She realized, after seeking answers from the ministry, that the project was not
sanctioned at all, and wondered as to how funds swere even sanctioned by the World Bank. After
several studies, they realized that the officials had overlooked the post-project problems.
Through Patkar's channel of communication between the government and the residents, she
provided critiques to the project authorities and the governments involved. At the same time, her
group realized that all those displaced were only given compensation for the immediate standing
crop and not for displacement and rehabilitation. As Patkar remained immersed in the Narmada
struggle, she chose to quit her Ph. D. studies and focus entirely on the Narmada
activity.Thereafter, she organized a 36-day long, solidarity march among the neighboring states
of the Narmada valley from Madhya Pradesh to the Sardar Sarovar dam site. She said that the
march was "a path symbolizing the long path of struggle (both immediate and long-term) that
[they] really had".This march was resisted by the police, who according to Patkar were "caning
the marchers and arresting them and tearing the clothes off women activists".There were groups
such as Gujarat-based Arch-Vahini (Action Research in Community Health and
Development) and Narmada Asargrastha Samiti (Committee for people affected by the
Narmada dam), Madhya Pradesh-based Narmada Ghati Nav Nirman Samiti (Committee
for a new life in the Narmada Valley) and Maharashtra-based Narmada Dharangrastha
Samiti (Committee for Narmada dam-affected people) who either believed in the need for fair
rehabilitation plans for the people or who vehemently opposed dam construction despite a
resettlement policy. While Patkar established Narmada Bachao Andolan in 1989, all these groups
joined this national coalition of environmental and human rights activists, scientists, academics
and project-affected people with a non-violent approach.
She further undertook a similar fast in 1993 and resisted evacuation from the dam site.In
1994, the Bachao Andolan office was attacked reportedly by a couple of political parties, where
Patkar and other activists were physically assaulted and verbally abused.In protest, a few NBA
activists and she began a fast and 20 days later, they were arrested and forcibly fed
intravenously. While the tribal people spend most of their time in their own villages and forests
around them, they migrate seasonally to neighbouring peasant villages to harvest crops and earn
some cash or grain. The lands on which the adivasis practice their primitive agriculture usually
are classed as forest lands technically not available for cultivation but which have been under the
use of the adivasis since time immemorial. The adivasis are denied titles to those lands and are
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held to be encroachers and are subject to periodic illegal exactions by the forest officials. The
peasant villages usually set in fertile valleys are stratified into various hierarchically ordered
castes, some being relegated into being landless untouchable outcastes. Among the peasants
some are very rich, producing for the market, using modem machinery and wage labour. The rest
of the peasants are middle and small farmers. The rich peasants may have large holdings but
large feudal land holdings are a rare phenomenon. As mentioned above they use the underpaid
labour of the dalits and adivasis. The compensation promised by the government is highly
unequal: only those who already own land and can show their title to it are entitled to land
compensation. Thus the dalit labourers , women and the adivasi 'encroachers' are not entitled to
any land compensation. (Gujarat however, promises land to all though it has not been able to
show how it proposes to keep its promise). Of the people threatened with submergence the
overwhelming majority are adivasis and as such the tribal question is central to the whole issue.
Institutionalization of women’s movements
Women self help group
Nilakantha Mahila Kosha is the name of a women self help group from Puran
Panchayat of Balianta Block. It was created, with the help of a local NGO, after the Super
Cyclone, in 1999. This eighteen member group, besides undertaking micro credit enterprise,
shares all their problems and try to resolve it collectively. During the critical floods from
2001 the group faced one more challenge. It fortunately could be solved with techniques and
information they acquired in the trainings promoted by the Disaster Campaign and
Preparedness Programme. It was last year, when one of the villagers got drunk. He did not
take proper care and went near the river to see the floodwater. Suddenly, he swayed and fell
into the river and began to drown. The self-help group was informed in time and, with the
help of the local youths, could save him. As he required some medical support, also because
his wife was about to give birth, again Nilakantha Mahila Kosha came to his rescue. The selfhelp group gave from their savings a financial assistance to the family. The group, after this
experience, called a meeting with all the male members of the village to try to close all the
liquor shops of the village. Also, the local police and the Panchayat - the village level
politician - assisted them in this mission. In addition, the villagers came forward to prepare a
contingency plan for the natural disaster faced by them and this women self help group took
the lead in doing so. They organized male groups and started rehabilitation works of the
community by repairing roads, monitored relief distribution and management of village
affairs.
The All India Women's Conference (AIWC)
AIWC was founded in 1927 "to function as an organization dedicated to the upliftment
and betterment of women and children". The organization continues its mission and has since
diversified into various social and economic issues concerning women. In the 80th year of
service to the nation, over 1,56,000 members in more than 500 branches of AWIC across the
country carry on the work zealously with selfless dedication. AIWC is recognized the world over
as a premier organization working for women's development and empowerment.
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AIWC Was registered in 1930 under Societies Registration Act, XXI of 1860. (No. 558 of
1930) The main objectives of the organization are:
•
To work for a society based on the principle of social justice, personal integrity and equal
rights and opportunities for all.
•
To secure recognition of the inherent right of every human being to work and to achieve
the essentials of life, which should not be determined by accident of birth or sex but by
planned social distribution.
•
To support the claim of every citizen to the right to enjoy basic civil liberties.
•
To stand against all separatist tendencies and to promote greater national integration and
unity.
•
To work actively for the general progress and welfare of women and children and to help
women utilize to the fullest, the Fundamental Right conferred on them by the
Constitution of India.
•
To work for permanent international amity and world peace.
At and international level, AIWC has
•
Consultative status with the United Nations (ECOSOC)
•
Membership of UNICEF Executive committee for 10 years
•
Membership of CONGO. Elected as Vice-President of CONGO for two terms.
•
A national Focal Point for International Networking for Sustainable Energy (INforSE)
•
Membership of the World Renewable Energy Network (WREN)
•
Membership of ENERGIA International Network on Gender and Energy
•
Global Village Energy Partnership
•
Membership of World Water Partnership
•
Affiliated member of the International Alliance for Women (IAW)
•
Affiliated to the Pan Pacific South-East Asian Women’s Association (PPSEAWA)
•
Affiliated to NIMROO Education Centre, Japan
Kali For Women: Zubaan
In 1984, Urvashi Butalia and Ritu Menon founded Kali for Women, Indiaís first feminist
publishing house. Their objectives were to publish quality work, keep overheads low, and ensure
that not only the content, but also the form of what they published met international standards.
Within five years of its establishment, Kali had become self-sufficient. Over the years Kali has
come to be seen as one of the most significant publishing houses within Indian and
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internationally. Its name stands for quality, editorial attention, excellence of content, and, most
importantly, for providing a platform for womenís voices to be heard. started in 1984, in a Delhi
garage, Kali has been providing a viable publishing mouthpiece to Indian feminism. Both Ritu
Menon (Publishing for Social Change) and Urvashi Butalia came to publishing with substantial
technical training as well as a strong commitment to feminist activism. It is not surprising then
that from its early days Kali's catalogue shows an interesting mix of theory and practice. Some of
Kali's biggest print runs have been activist publications which don't necessarily bring in any
money, but redefine issues of women's lives in a positive way. It also has titles that are more
theoretical in orientation and are targeted at academia. Whoever may be the specific audience in
mind, Kali's objective is to increase the body of knowledge on women in the Third World, to
give voice to such knowledge as already exists and to provide a forum for women writers. Apart
from publishing English translations of significant fictional writings by women from various
Indian languages, Kali also deals with issues of representation of women in the media, their
social roles under right wing Hinduism and Islam, as a workforce in agriculture, and as victims
and saviours of environmental degradation. Kali's list of authors include well known writers like
Radha Kumar, Vandana Shiva and Maria Mies and many others. As the definition of Feminism
in the subcontinent and indeed world wide becomes amorphous and wide ranging Kali has been
able to pour its energies into each new opening with immense fluidity. Publishing a wide range
of genres Kali reaches out to a readership that is not confined to a country or region. Kali for
Women has now split into two independent imprints. The co-founders of Kali, Urvashi Butalia
and Ritu Menon have established their independent publishing imprints - Zubaan and Women
Unlimited respectively, K-92, First Floor, Hauz Khas Enclave, New Delhi ñ 110016, INDIA,
Tel: +91-11-2652 1008, 2686 4497 and 2651 4772,Email: [email protected]
The Centre for Women’s Development Studies
The Centre for Women’s Development Studies (CWDS) was established on 19th April
1980, in the middle of the International Women’s Decade, by a group of men and women, who
were involved in the preparation of the first ever comprehensive government report on the
‘Status of Women in India’ entitled ‘Towards Equality’ (Report of the Committee on the Status
of Women in India, (CSWI), Government of India) and who were later associated with the
Women’s Studies Programme of the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR). The
Advisory Committee on Women's Studies of the ICSSR recommended the need for an
autonomous institute to build on the knowledge already generated, but with a wider mandate and
resources to expand its activities in research and action. The recommendation was accepted by
the ICSSR, and communicated to the Women’s Bureau of the Ministry of Social Welfare,
Government of India. A few months later, under the leadership of late Prof. J.P. Naik, the CWDS
was registered under the Societies’ Registration Act, 1860 in New Delhi and started functioning
since May 1980, with a small financial grant from the Vikram Sarabhai Foundation, under the
Chairpersonship of Dr. Phulrenu Guha and Dr. Vina Mazumdar as the Director. In 1984-85, on
the recommendation of a visiting committee appointed by the Indian Council of Social Science
Research, CWDS began to receive an annual maintenance grant from the ICSSR and became
recognised as one of the Research Institutes supported by ICSSR.
Established in 1987, the Women Studies and Development Center - WSDC became
an integral part of the University of Delhi in 1998 and is now covered by the maintenance grant
of the University. WSDC receives direct support from the University Grants Commission which
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requires it to act as 'nodal' agency for the colleges and for the region. The responsibilities extend
to evolving projects that provide leadership in identifying key areas in women's studies research
and curriculum, and in actively collaborating with organizations serving development goals for
women. In believing that gender sensitization creates the necessary base for balanced
perspectives on socials construction, the WSDC initiates and implements appropriate research,
curriculum development, teaching, advocacy and action. Using its location on campus to
advantage, the WSDC programmes strive to engage the academic community in current issues
relating to women from every strata of society. As part of a network, it seeks to strengthen
individual and institutional efforts that enable women's empowerment. Women’s Studies &
Development Centre, Academic research centre, II floor, Patel Marg, University of Delhi,
delhi-110007, India, Tel. no. : 011- 27666669 email:[email protected], University of Delhi
website:www.du.ac.in
National Commission For Women
The national commission for women was set up as a statutory body in January 1992
under the commission for women act, 1990 (act no. 20 of 1990) of government of India, to
review the constitutional and legal safeguards for women, recommend remedial legislative
measures, facilitate redressal of grievances and advise the government, on the policy matters
affecting women commission also interacts with the media, social activists and representation.
Major Objectives of the National Commission for Women
Investigate and examine all matters to the safeguards provided for women under the
constitution and effective implementation of those safeguards for improving the condition of
women in the union of any state. Look into the complaint and take suo moto of matters relating
to: deprivation of women‘s rights, non- implementation of laws enacted to provide protection to
women and also to achieve the objective of equality and development. Non-compliance of policy
decisions, guidelines or instructions aimed at mitigating hardships and ensuring welfare and
providing relief to women, and take up the issues arising out of such matters with appropriate
authorities. Call for special studies or investigations into specific problems or situations arising
out of discrimination and atrocities against women and identify the constraints so as to
recommend strategies for their removal.
The commission have the power to investigate any matter referred have all the power of a
civil court trying a suit. The national commissions for women have the special cell, which is the
core unit of the commission and processes the compliant received oral, written or suo moto under
section 10 of the NCW act. The complaints are also used as case studies for sensitization
programmes for the police, judiciary, prosecutors, forensic scientists, defence lawyers and other
administrative functionaries.
Functions and role of the National Commission of Women
The commission constitutes expert committees for dealing with such special issues as
may be taken up by the commission from time to time. The expert committees are on different
subjects are- law and legislation, political empowerment custodial justice for women, social
security, panchayati raj, women and media, development of schedule tribe women, development
of women of weaker sections, development of women of minority communities, transfer of
technology in agriculture for development of women.Women‘s movement in the country was
brought to the fore front by the efforts of the NGOS. The commission interacts and network with
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the NGOs and the state commissions for ensuring gender equality and empowerment of women.
The women commission also interacts with the media, social activists and academicians to
suggest the ways of ensuring due representation of women in all spheres.
The commission undertakes state visits to evaluate the progress of development of
women in various states. It has covered the states of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan,
Uttar Pradesh, Orissa, Sikkim, Madhya Pradesh, Assam, Tripura, and Manipur. The commission
conducts seminars, workshops and conferences and sponsors such events by providing financial
assistance to reach organizations and NGOs. The important Areas so far covered include
violence against women, sexual exploitation of women at work place, educational health and
employment aspects, women in agriculture sector, women in panchayati raj, custodial justice,
mental health institutions etc. The NCW holds public hearing on issues affecting large sections
of women such as crime against women, women in unorganized labour sector, women in
agriculture and women of minority groups. The deposition at these enquiries helps in
appreciating and initiating remedial action.
Delhi State National Commission
The Delhi state national commission for women has been set up under an act of the
legislative assembly of the national capital territory of Delhi, passed in 1994.the Delhi act is
based on the lines of the 1990 act of the parliament under which the national commission for
women was constituted. The geographical area of operation assigned to the state commission is
the national capital territory of Delhi which has a population of over million. The main
objectives of the commission are to ensure security, development and well-being of women in
every sphere of national life- particularly to suggest and ensure implementation of steps against
gender discrimination. the commission is also to ensure that adequate provision for women’s
advancement are included in all state policies, plan legislation and amendments to existing laws
to meet the objective of gender equity and advancement of women.
Programmes and Projects under taken by Delhi Commission for Women
Negotiating with the NGOs and the press especially for the work of engagement and
advancement of women at national and state level, full co-operation and assistance from the
police, net-working with NGOs and the community neighbourhood groups, legal assistance from
the commission through a consultant well-versed with the problem of women in Delhi and
through legal aid centers. Compulsory primary education both for boys and girls should not
only be a matter of policy but steps should be taken for its effective implementation. other urgent
measures suggested by DCW are: legal literacy be made compulsory for girls at high school and
college level and spread through mahila mandals in rural areas, all police cells cell dealing with
the crime against women be linked effectively with the central cell. This would facilitate regular
survey-and-analysis of the crime situation. Delhi Commission of Women,Govt. of Nct of
Delhi, A-block, 2nd floor, Vikas Bhawan, I.P. Estate, New Delhi- 110002, Fax: 23378325,
Website: www.dcw. delhigovt.inc.in, Helpline nos. 011-23379181, 011-23370597.
Emergence of feminist groups
The anti-rape campaign took off in different cites of the country almost simultaneously.
In Mumbai, FAR was formed on January 1980, made up of a conglomerate of women, some
already active in left-wing parties, others who had entered politics for the first time. In other
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parts of India, autonomous women’s groups emerged, including Saheli and Stree Sangarsh in
Delhi, Asmita in Hyderabad and Vimochna in Bangalore.
From forum against rape to forum against oppression of women
In the 1980s and 1990s, a number of groups emerged in Bombay and all over the country,
which took up women’s issues. Members of FAR (forum against rape) identified themselves as
an ad hoc body, predominantly made of westernized women with ‘cosmopolitan’ values, and
well informed about western liberation movements. As an issues based federation, FAR lasted
only 2 years, and moved on to a forum that addressed broader issues of women’s oppression,
renaming themselves as forum against oppression of women in 1982. the broader issues that
were addressed –and indeed continue to be addressed- include sexual harassment in the
workplace and in public spaces, dowry related violence and murders, domestic violence,
representation of women in the media, discrimination against women in civil and criminal law,
rights of working class women, including sex workers, women’s health and reproductive rights
and support the work of social movements working against poverty, class and caste oppression.
Advocacy to support women’s centre
Working on violence against women created an awareness of the vulnerability of women
within the home and outside it, therefore some activist within the FAOW felt the need to provide
women with support during moments of crisis. This need was partially met in 1981 by the
establishment of feminist group, which called itself women’s centre. The centre saw itself as a
‘super-community’ for women outside of an oppressive, patriarchal world, working since its
inception primarily against domestic violence, even while there was recognition that the workers
would not be ‘ experts’ in the areas of counseling or social work. The center located itself in a
middle class locality in the eastern suburbs of the city. The members of the group decided not to
work within a working class area in the city, even though their status was on poor and working
class community could be conceived as a challenge to the patriarchies present within such a
space. On the other hand, if an alternative space was provided for women that were
geographically located at a distance away from their own context, it could provide anonymity to
women using it.
The women’s centre has used non-legal and legal methods of resolving domestic
violence. Non- legal methods include public demonstrations outside the home of domestic
violence perpetrators, therefore shaming perpetrators, and creating social pressure on the
families. Women approaching the center are supported, whether or not they choose to go down
the legal route, and the normative nature of marriage is challenged, by presenting singleness as a
viable choice and a possibly enriching way of life. Activists in the women’s center also spend
much energy attempting to retrieve the property and dowry of women experiencing domestic
violence from their families. (Gangoli, Geetanjali 2007)
Social welfare groups: the women’s question in Annapurna Mahila Mandal
Annapurna Mahila Mandal in Bombay, that emerged from the need to mobilize
working class women and families in ways that differ from those adopted by Marxist Leninist
groups like Stree Jagruti Samiti, or self consciously feminist ones such as women’s centre or
FAOW.AMM was founded in 1975 by Prema Purao, a CPI trade unionist who was frustrated
by the marginalization of women within left-wing unions. The economic shifts during the 1970s
had led to the entrenchment of women workers from cotton mills, leading to the women seeking
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employment as khananwalis.as per folklore, Annapurna is a woman who takes charge of the
house hold and provides for the whole world after her husband deserts her. This image has a
powerful resonance in the lives of the khananwalis., many of whom are forced to support their
families due to absent, indifferent or unemployed husbands. Purao attempted to organized
khananwalis, who in spite of their close links with the cotton mills, have been treated as
insignificant by trade unions. the most glaring problems faced by such women is an inability to
get loans from nationalized banks, leading to dependence on private moneylenders, who charged
high interest on the loans. AMM has helped khananwali women to create a corpus of funds on
the basis of which they are able to get loans on rates of interest which are lower than those
charged by private money lenders. In addition to proving credit to working class women, AMM
also intervenes in situations of martial violence and discord, and encourage women to use family
planning methods as a means to improve their lives. The focus of the group is to draw out the
strength already present in women, but not to question the power relations within the family.
working with families and women involves in many cases, offering women advice in case of
martial discord to keep the family going by providing unconditional love and support. Therefore,
the aim if AMM is to make women economically independent, but not to challenge the
oppression of women within the family (Gangoli, Geetanjali 2007).
CONCLUSION
Till date, women have been not well aware of their rights. They have remained
contended with, what is given to them and tolerate all kind of atrocities by convincing
themselves that it was their fate and some divine justice will shine upon them one day and
they shall be free from all sufferings. The women of India fail to recognize their strengths
which need to be properly channelized to help them reach divine justice of their lives. They
must get used to disassociating their names from that of their fathers and husbands and look
at themselves as individuals who have the ability to touch the sky. a clarion call is needed
'women of the world unite, you have nothing to lose but yours fetters. Women movement
integrates the various aspects ie nature, objective, polices and attitude towards women
development in India. Starting from the pre independence period to post independence
period, from feminist to anti-patriarchal, from women reform movement to anti-dowry
agitation, from AIWC to kali for women. Many women actively participated in the
movement and their image as an activist had transcended all consideration of self that had
been long part of the political culture of India. Government polices for women must be
formulated to encourage women participation in their own development while projecting
their profiles themselves. Women welfare programmes gradually began to open possibilities
for women entrepreneurship in various government and corporate sectors. Organization for
professional growth of women needs to be active for granting advocacy and technical support
to the women. They should offer fellowships to young women graduates to pursue their
developmental training to mature women entrepreneurs to refine their skills. Legally
considering there is absolute equality between men and women in each sphere of life. But
law directs the society to promote the interests of women, to develop their personality, to
secure social justice, to provide humane working conditions and primarily it aims at making
women aware of their rights which they can exercise at the time of need.
177
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