Women

Kagad Kach Patra Kashtakari Panchayat (KKPKP), a union of scrap collectors started by Dr Baba Adhav in 1993, has now become a force much larger than just a collection of waste pickers, mostly women. It serves as a platform for voicing grievances and as a medium for pushing developmental programmes to this highly marginalised segment of the society. From financial support, education and insurance facilities to intangibles like dignity of labour and quality of life, read how a collective can change lives.

Savitribai Phule may not be as famous as Mahatma Gandhi or Swami Vivekananda. But her impact on the liberation of the Indian woman has been no less spectacular or significant. One of the earliest crusaders of education for girls, and dignity for the most vulnerable sections of society - dalits, women and widows, Savitribai broke all the traditional shackles of 19th century India to herald a new age of thinking. She can be legitimately hailed as the mother of Indian Feminism. Read about her remarkable life of courage and initiative.

Self-sufficient farming gives women in Alipurduar food, health and confidence! At a time when chemicals have virtually replaced nutrients in food, women in this tiny area of West Bengal are growing food in a natural way - a method that is not just organic but uses ways to combine nature's cycles and elements, creating a complementary ensemble. This is a way in which plants, animals, insects and all the elements of nature come together in harmony and leave little waste. Read more to know how they achieve this.

Women in rural as well as many urban parts of Rajasthan may not have much formal education, but the one skill they possess is sewing. With the help of an organization, many of these women now have the opportunity to put this skill to good use and generate additional household income. This is empowering them in ways unthinkable a few years ago, and changing the very fabric of their lives.

Sunitha has said time and again that the silence of the society towards human trafficking has to change. Let us become aware and appreciate her work.

Collecting fodder and firewood to keep the household running would once take four hours of Sunita Arya’s time in Almora district of Uttarakhand every day. Today, she spend just half-an-hour on the same chores. What brought about this almost magical turnaround? The systematic protection of the village forest, thanks to an effective 'van panchayat' (forest governance unit).

Amid all the depressing news we have been receiving of late on the state of the girl child in India, especially from the northern patriarchal states like Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh, here are a few stories that give us hope. These are women, and also some men, who have adopted and cared for abandoned little girls despite their own dire conditions, and many times against the wishes of their family. This is courage and compassion in its purest form.