Carry Forward the Struggle against Patriarchy and oppression based on Class, Caste, Nationality, and Religion

It was not governments or the UN which first celebrated ‘Women’s Day’. The idea of an International Women’s Day arose from the struggles of women workers against extremely harsh and inhuman working conditions, for franchise and for peace. 8th March is celebrated as International Women’s Day (IWD), as a day to mark women’s collective efforts over the years to attain justice and equality for themselves and their children, and to re-assert their struggles for a world free of oppression, exploitation and injustice.

We want decisive government action against price rise

Prices of essentials, including food and fuel, are breaking all records. The UPA Government, instead of checking price rise, is using it as a pretext to speed up the corporate takeover of the retail sector. We do not accept Mr Manmohan Singh telling us to tighten our belts. We cannot allow food production to be sabotaged by promising bio-diesel to the US or floriculture or for that matter giving land for speculative SEZs. We do not believe that the government is just a mute spectator to rising prices. It is doing all to cause selective inflation in items essential to the poor while it is giving booties to its own employees and favouring big corporations. We do not accept the Prime minister’s cool assurance that food prices will settle at international level when income hovers at Rs 20/- per day per person for 80% of Indians. We oppose free purchase of Indian produce by foreign companies. We oppose speculation and hoarding of essential items legalized by the government. We object to lop sided subsidies being given directly or through duty exemptions for luxury consumption while the majority is on the verge of starvation. We are angered by raising of bus fares by the government.

Already in women’s health and survival, India ranks the last among 134 countries, i.e. Indian women suffer worse hunger and malnutrition than women in the poorest of the world’s countries. More than half of India’s women are anaemic. What will be the impact of this steep rise in food prices on women who are already hungry and under-nourished?

Instead of ensuring food the UPA Government is now planning a ‘Right to Food Bill’ that plans to push out large numbers of the poor from the BPL lists ! Even today BPL covers only 1/4th of rural people and only 10% of the urban people. Already Dal, vegetables sugar and milk are out of the reach of the people and now they will be deprived of rice and wheat also.

We are for right to health care

Charging user fee in government facilities and giving freedom to Pharma companies has made medical expenses a major cause of indebtedness and lack of access. Last year it pushed 39 million Indians below the poverty line. It is six years since the UPA promised progressively to raise health expenditure to 3% of GDP but the promise is forgotten. In fact over the years it has privatized many health services and wants insurance companies to profit at the cost of the masses. For reproductive health a paltry sum of Rs 20 is spent per woman per year.

Equal Rights and Opportunities

Close to 245 million Indian women lack the basic capability to read and write. Almost twice as many girls as boys are pulled out of school or never sent to school. Government schools are bereft of teachers and buildings and now the government has lowered its norms to make shortages appear normal. Education is also being increasingly privatized and is going out of reach of girls.

Women won the 8-hour work day a century ago – but today, again, the 8-hour work law is being openly violated. Women’s labour force participation in India, is less than half that of men. They earn less than a third of men. Conditions of work do not cater to women’s specific needs, such as toilets, childcare, maternity benefits etc. Women are forced to take up casual labour where there is no legal protection. They face discrimination and sexual harassment at the workplace. Women from adivasi communities and backward areas are vulnerable to trafficking. Even today, dalit women, deprived of alternate dignified employment, are forced to work as manual scavengers.

The Government itself follows a policy of exploiting the under-paid labour of women by forcing voluntary work on the most marginalized sections. Lakhs of women throughout the country are hired by the government for less than minimum wages as ASHAs, Anganwadi workers and helpers, teachers in adult education and ironically for programmes ostensibly being carrying out women’s empowerment.

Our Freedom is under Attack

Organised violence against women’s freedom to choose their way of life has also increased. The Sangh Parivar and other self-appointed custodians of ‘culture’ beat up women is they wear jeans, go to college with men, visit pubs or celebrate Valentine’s Day. In the same breath they also insist that Muslim women ought to shed their veils. And khaap panchayats in Haryana and Western UP openly organise the murder of young couples who love or marry in defiance of caste norms – and governments take no action against them. Thus emboldened now they want to officially override the family laws and further subjugate women. These patriarchal forces are thus pushing women back in the confines of feudal tradition.

Violence against us has to end

India has among the worst sex ratios at birth in the world – in spite of laws, governments show little political will to end prenatal sex determination and subsequent abortion of female feotuses or infanticide. The practice of public humiliation of women (usually dalit women) branded as ‘witches’ also continues. Women are harassed and burnt for dowry every day.

Violence against women grows because governments and police often protect the perpetrators and blame the victims. When women from the North East are targeted in Delhi, the police blame their lifestyle and clothes. There is an alarming increase in cases of acid-throwing and murderous attacks on girls when they spurn undesirable advances from men.

Delhi High Court verdict on Section 377 decriminalize adult consensual gay sex is welcome. But the government has to now act decisively to support this judgement to ensure an end to discrimination based on their sexual orientation and gender identity, so that lesbian and bisexual women do not live in constant fear of humiliation of ostricization marriage or suicide

Justice against Violence by Dominant Social Groups

Rapes and violence against Dalit women are on the rise – and rarely are FIRs filed and SC/ST Act cases registered. A Dalit woman and her daughter were gang-raped and massacred along with their entire family at Khairlanji. Ironically, the Court in its verdict in this matter failed to regard this case as an atrocity under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. Dalit women Sarpanchs are routinely subjected to humiliation and violence making a mockery of the Constitution. There can be no denying that this violence is institutional because rapes statistics for Dalit and tribal women are disproportionately high.

Muslim women raped by Hindu mobs sponsored by the BJP state government in 2002 are yet to receive justice and continue to face such violence even today. Women like Ishrat Jehan and Kauser Bi have been killed by Gujarat police and branded as ‘terrorists.’ As late as December 2009 the police attacked and molested Muslim women in Godhra in the guise of searching for a suspect of cow theft. Sikh riot victims of 1984 are yet to get justice. Communal differences are being actively encouraged to prevent unity of the oppressed people in their struggles.

Government’s shrinking responsibility and growing repression will not be tolerated

For two decades we find that regardless of the party in power, the government has progressively abdicated responsibility in respect of people but has been distributing largesse to domestic and foreign capital. Meant to be a custodian of our land, our natural resources, our rivers and our minerals it has grabbed every opportunity to sell these assets for a song to large corporations. The level of corruption is such that Swiss banks holdings of Indian money, where the stolen wealth stashed away, are the largest in the world. We have witnessed the government engaging in large scale land grab and deploying private armies like Salwa Judum to drive people out of the state in Chhattisgarh. Lakhs of tribals have been turned into refugees in their own country. Any one protesting this is leveled anti-national thrown in jail. There is unabashed collusion among the government, corporates and criminals, in and out of uniform making women’s lives increasingly insecure.

Despite tall claims of government programmes for empowering women the neglect, deprivation and violence against the vast majority of women is unmitigated.

For nearly two decades we are tired of watching structural adjustment with ‘human face’ where the face of Delhi is being given a lift for games while night shelters are snatched from people and they are left to die in bitter cold.

The only part of the government which seems to work is that of repression. After sixty years of denying the people of Chhattisgarh any basic facilities Mr. Chidambarm wants us to believe that it is the Maoists who are holding up the development process and the security forces will clear the land of the Maoists and establish schools and dispensaries. We are not impressed. Neglect of people is rampant in large parts of the country like Madhya Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Rajasthan, Orissa and other places where there are no extremists or Maoists or insurgents.

According to the Home Ministry at the peak of insurgency, Kashmir had 3000 insurgents. When the Indian Army started its operations there a much larger number fell victim - thousands disappeared and thousands of women were raped and widowed. But in two decades the army has not quelled insurgency and is better known for killings, disappearances, torture and rape. Situation is no better in the North Eastern states. Manipur simmers despite armed forces outnumbering civilians – forty security forces for every Manipur resident. But the government is refusing to learn any lessons and wants to extend the war into many more states.

We oppose this futile and inhuman deployment of armed forces against Indian citizens in a country which prides itself on being the largest democracy. Such power to the army, we feel will further endanger the fragile democracy in the country. Laws which give impunity to irresponsible para-military and military personnel will never bring peace. We support Irom Sharmila who has now been on hunger strike for ten years for the repeal of AFSPA.

Democratic rights have been severely curtailed with black laws enacted in the name of extremists. While these laws fail to bring extremists in their net they have been used extensively to crush popular mass movements.

We resolve to struggle for end violence and deprivation. We resolve to fulfil our vision of peace and equality.

Women’s Movements in India

India too has a rich history of women organizing and raising many issues during the social reform and nationalist movements. Women were also active in workers and peasant movements, and in revolutionary organizations. As we in India celebrate the centenary of International Women’s Day, we recall the legacy of the last hundred years. We remember and salute the legacy of Savitri Bai Phule who pioneered education for women, defying the feudal forces who would throw cow-dung on her; of Tarabai Shinde who challenged the double standards towards women; of Rakhmabai who preferred to go to jail rather than live with the man to whom she was married as a child; of the women of Telengana who were at the forefront of the militant struggle of the 1940s for land and freedom Women’s organizations were formed during the Srikakulam movement for the rights of adivasi people on land and forests in 1970s in Andhra Pradesh, and Panchadri Nirmala, Ankamma and Saraswathi were among the women who played a major role. Throughout the country women started organizing on their own, and also as part of other movements. In the 1980s women raised the issue of environmental degradation, through Chipko and Appiko movement. Rights for landed property was demanded in Bodhgaya movement,. Anti liquor movements, anti-price rise movements, issues of land alienation and wife beating were taken up in Shahada. Chhattisgarh Mines Shramik Sangh and POW took on the issues of equal wages and retrenchment of women, of sexual division of labour and questioning the culture that rationalizes it. Links between caste oppression and women’s oppression were raised by Purogami Stree Sangathan and Mahila Samta Sainik Dal.

Women’s organizations have worked at different levels, from consciousness raising, to providing shelters, to law reform, to challenging traditional and religious notions of women’s roles and status, to opposing caste-communal violence, to drawing attention to the anti-women population policies, to issues of political participation, to critique of development, globalisation, Structural Adjustment Policies, and issues of displacement, migration, and impact of new technologies. Women have achieved major strides in redefining family and inheritance, gaining right to political participation, in drawing attention to domestic violence, dowry deaths, and adverse sex ratio. Today, women are in the forefront of people’s resistance against corporate land grab and displacement in Central India – and are bearing the brunt of violence by the ruling political parties and security forces.

Commemorating 100 years of IWD

The Centenary Committee is completing one year of existence on March 8, 2010. Beginning with jointly observing the International Women’s Day, during the year we undertook many activities to highlight the challenges before us. Among these were: the Dilli Chuppi Todo campaign, asking Delhi people to raise their voice on crimes against women. We also brought to Delhi the voices of women living under state repression in Orissa, Manipur, Jharkhand and Tami Nadu. Women from Kashipur, Chennai, Andhra Pradesh came to speak on the impact of liberalization on women. We held a Dharna against the efforts to suppress the Shopian rape and murder.

We Demand:

• Ration cards to be issued universally and ration provided at rates prevailing in january 2007. Closing down NCDEX and end to future trading in commodities.
• Equal wages for equal work for women and legislation for social security for unorganised sector workers including sex workers.
• People-centred and pro-women developmental policies; wherein microcredit- based self help groups (SHGs) cannot be the only and dominant intervention
• Food security.
• Livelihoods with fair wages and good working conditions.
• Land reform and women’s access to and control over productive resources.
• Freedom from sexual assault and harassment, domestic and public violence.
• Effective implementation of laws such as the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act and Scheduled Caste /Scheduled Tribe Prevention of Atrocities Act.
• Elimination of caste-based professions like manual scavenging that exploit Dalit women.
• Strengthening of institutions and mechanisms that were set up to address special needs of women, SC, ST, OBC and religious minorities.
• Repeal of Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, UAPA and Special Economic Zones (SEZ) Act.
• The government should demilitarize the whole country and ensure justice for victims of all excesses of the security forces including sexual violence against women.
• Rehabilitation of all internally displaced people.

The women’s movement in India recognizes that genuine emancipation of women is possible only in a society where other inequalities and injustices also cease to exist, and hence has always strived to link with the struggles of other sections oppressed by patriarchy, class, caste, and religion.

Centenary Committee to Celebrate International Women’s Day

Member organizations & individuals

Action India, All India Progressive Womens’ Association, All India Students Association, Ankur, CADAM, Centre for Struggling Women, Committee Against Violence on Women, Democratic Students Union, Delhi Forum, Disha Chhatra Sangathan, Forum for Democratic Struggle, Intercultural Resources, Jagori, Krantikari Lok Adhikari Sanghatan, Krantikari Yuv Sanghatan, Nari Mukti Sangh, New Trade Union Initiative, New Socialist Initiative, Peoples Union for Democratic Rights, Pragatisheel Mahila Manch, Progressive Students Union, Purogami Mahila Sagathan, Saheli, Saanjha Adhaar, Stree Adhikar Sangathan, Stree Mukti League, The Other Media and Anita Bharti, Dr. Ajita, Indira Chakravarthy, Jayasri, Nandini Rao and others.

Highlights of March 8th History

• In 1857, thousands of women working in the New York garment industry took to the streets against unfair wages, a 12-hour work day, and sexual harassment in the workplace.
• Women garment workers held a massive demonstration in New York in 1908, demanding fair treatment at work and end to child labour. Police firing led to the flag being coloured red with spilt blood.
• On March 8, 1908, women gathered in New York City the issue of women’s right to vote.
• In 1910, at the call of Clarazetkin at an International Conference of Socialist Women in Copenhagen, Denmark, 100 women representing 17 countries voted to establish an International Women’s Day.
• In 1911 International Women’s Day was observed on 19 March, in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland, More than a million women and men attended rallies. They demanded women’s right to work, to vocational training, end to discrimination on the job, right to vote, and to hold public office.
• On March 25, 1911, a fire in a sweatshop in New York killed 145 female garment workers. Many of the fire escapes were locked to prevent women from slipping out Eighty thousand workers marched through the streets to attend the mass funeral in solidarity.
• In 1912, 14,000 textile workers went on strike. With a rallying cry of "Better to starve fighting than starve working" it lasted nearly three months. Their courage inspired the song "Bread and Roses", now associated with International Women’s Day Bread symbolizes economic justice and roses represent quality of life.
• 1913-1914: International Women’s Day also became a day for protesting against the First World War. As part of the peace movement, Russian women took this initiative.