Abstract
A Watershed Report
‘Towards Equality’ (TE), the Report of the Committee on the Status of Women in India (CSWI), symbolises a moment in history which not only provided a fresh perspective and insights on issues of gender equality but a challenge to social science scholarship that had so far been devoid of any serious discussion and analysis of women’s issues in the post-independence period. It marked the beginning of a journey that was both rewarding and challenging as it explored the nation-building process and the dynamics of women’s status within a diverse, plural, hierarchic society in transition.
Forcing a reconceptualisation of the discourse on women’s issues, the landmark report has been described as a ‘founding text’, a watershed report and a historic benchmark by various scholars. It flagged off concerns such as the declining sex ratio in India’s population, economic exclusion and marginalisation of women in agriculture and in the informal sector; negligible representation of women in elected bodies and social and economic barriers in attaining goals of gender equality (GOI, 1974). 1
The Report was a severe indictment of the first two decades of independent India’s policy initiatives for promoting gender equality and gave relentless details of systemic discrimination and structural constraints for women in the development process. Vina Mazumdar, a late comer to CSWI, soon became the chief architect of the Report. The authors of TE described themselves as ‘the first generation beneficiaries of the equality clauses of the Constitution and felt that the grim findings of the report created “a crisis of conscience’’. Over the next few decades these findings led to critical engagement with issues of gender inequalities.
Constituted in 1971, CSWI was a response to the request made in the UN General Assembly to all member states to prepare a report on the status of women. The submission of TE coincided with International Women’s Year and the 1st UN Decade for Women—the beginning of the global engagement on issues of gender equality and development.
Vina Mazumdar (V.M.), a pioneer in the field of Women’s Studies, played a distinctive role as an academic, educationist and an activist in shaping the early agenda of this new area of interest. She acknowledged that the Report of CSWI changed the direction, beliefs and goals of her professional life. Women’s issues became a lifelong commitment for her which had nothing to do with her professional life as a university teacher of political science. Critical of social science research that was devoid of any serious analysis of women’s perspectives, she argued that an ‘intellectual purdah’ excluded a majority of Indian women’s lives, labour and contribution from scrutiny by social scientists.
TE had no predesigned or predetermined framework of enquiry. V.M. pointed out,
we realized, we did not have clear concepts, language and theoretical perspectives to articulate an analytical framework. It was not a preconceived, predesigned research framework. I am in very good company—Leela Dube was confused, Lotika Sarkar’s approach was narrow, and mine was a blank to start with. The Approach Chapter was later on added as a post-facto rationalization of what the Report contained. (IJGS, 1998, p. 100)
The title of the Report itself became a contentious issue. Some of the members had strong reservations as they believed that the issue of gender equality has already been settled by the Indian Constitution: ‘In fact some of the pioneer women activists had so much faith in the general acceptance of the principle of equality that it led them to not to accept reservation for women as an instrument of political participation’ (Desai, Mazumdar, & Bhansali, 2003, p. 55). J.P. Naik, then Member Secretary of the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR), who provided unstinted support to CSWI, suggested to the members to reopen the debate on gender equality. V.M. later acknowledged that their understanding of political dynamics and structures of inequality (caste, class, ethnicity, gender and religion) was appallingly weak. According to her, ‘identification of culture with patriotism and cultural parochialism prevented a debate on equality’ (Mazumdar, 1986, p. 23). The Report had failed to make specific references to caste, class and other disparities as well as the effect of structural changes and process of development and modernisation on the status of women. She stated that though there was a difference between diversity and inequality, however, the diversity issue was neglected.
V.M., who taught political science for decades, felt that ‘CSWI’s Terms of Reference (ToR) clearly indicated the loss of a political perspective on the issue of gender equality, as the word “political” was missing from the ToR and the emphasis was on social, economic, educational legal, and employment aspects’. Interestingly, the Committee had a heated debate on the issue of ‘political representation’ of women and the need for reservation/political quota for women in legislative bodies. Serious disagreements among the members forced two of them (V.M. and Lotika Sarkar) to write a dissent note communicating their strong sense of outrage at the low political representation of women even two and a half decades after Independence.
Delivering the 1993 Durgabai Deshmukh Memorial Lecture at the Council for Social Development, Delhi, V.M. confessed that
those who have known me closely over the last two decades will understand the degree of shifts in my own ideas and perspectives … As a trained political scientist, I did not identify with some of these issues. But the process of unlearning, new learning and redefining that began with CSWI, has continued with the rebirth of the women’s movement. (Mazumdar, 1993, p. 5)
In her introduction to Symbols of Power, she stated that
a situation in which the right of representation came to symbolize access to political power in the same way as money and property symbolized economic power—the exclusion of women from both these spheres was bound to influence the perception of both men and women regarding the status of women and role of sexes in the society. (Mazumdar, 1979, p. x)
The following sections present V.M.’s professional engagement with the women’s question in the post-CSWI period and the transformative politics of women’s studies and the women’s movement.
II The Emergence of Women’s Studies
The mid-1970s and 1980s were significant for the emergence of women’s studies (WS) and a reenergised women’s movement. Both these developments shaped research issues and agendas. V.M. straddled both the worlds and called WS ‘the intellectual arm of the women’s movement’. For her, production of a counter ideology was as much part of a struggle for change as critiquing social science concepts, theories and methods (Mazumdar, 2012, pp. xi–xv ).
WS found an institutional foothold in the mid-1970s (SNDT University, Bombay; ICSSR’s Programme of Women’s Studies and Institute of Social Studies Trust, Delhi). The promotional role played by ICSSR (both in CSWI’s work and later in supporting Centre for Women’s Development Studies (CWDS)), contributed to the growing debate on women’s issues at national and international levels. 4 Institutionalisation gave WS a new identity within the system of higher education. Women’s studies centres also came up initially within a few universities in the 1980s and were expected to play multiple roles in promoting research, teaching and social development. Though the academic terrain within the universities was inhospitable, WS continued to engage the academic world. The involvement of agencies like ICSSR and University Grants Commission (UGC) did contribute to involvement of social scientists in research on women.
Women’s studies’ location within the higher education system raised many questions. Was institutionalisation of WS an academic intervention? Did it facilitate critical engagement with institutions and knowledge systems? Has it succeeded in undermining traditional academic boundaries? The larger space within academia is already constructed by disciplinary boundaries and intellectual conventions (Sharma, 2005, p. 72). The strategic dilemma of WS has been the need for mainstreaming gender issues within disciplines as well as maintaining active links with the women’s movement. The questions of legitimation, form and content of WS have been continuously debated; however, early pioneers, including V.M., clearly articulated the role of educational institutions and researchers in setting research agendas to keep WS rooted in the movement. She was instrumental in the inclusion of a section on ‘Education for Women’s Equality’ in the new policy on education. The National Policy on Education (1986) reiterated that WS would be encouraged within existing institutions, disciplines and courses. 5
In 2005, the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India, appointed a Standing Committee under the chairpersonship of V.M. to look into ‘the working of WS Centres and to assess the role it has played in consistency with the objectives of the National Policy of Education’. The review brought out a host of concerns including paucity of staff and resources, cumbersome procedures and too many expectations from the centres; it also pointed out that changing trends in UGC policy towards WS meant that it never became a full-fledged academic programme. The Committee was of the view that WS has emerged as a discipline and as a new area of knowledge, it draws from its own studies and field action (UGC Standing Committee, 2007). 6
As a founder director of CWDS, V.M. stated that the new institution had a dual loyalty to social sciences and to the women’s movement. In the editorial of CWDS’ first in-house journal she wrote, ‘We want WS to grow on a broad base, and do not want to impose any ideological boundaries to constrict its development’ (Samya Shakti, 1983, p. 1). The fact remains that today WS represents a vast and heterogeneous field continuously fed by feminist politics and the agenda of the women’s movement. The production of knowledge is not confined to structures of higher education alone as many autonomous research centres and women’s groups have contributed to the debate on women’s issues.
Another trajectory which is important in understanding certain trends within early scholarship on women, was the availability of funds from international and national agencies for research on ‘women and development’ (WAD). The literature in this field is vast and varied, critiquing various premises of developmental approaches, interrogating policies and institutions of governance. Within the liberal rights’ discourse on WAD, ideas of democracy, gender equity and justice and women’s rights and entitlements became an integral part of the political discourse on ‘state, gender and governance’. Gender mainstreaming appeared in the international context after the UN Conference in Nairobi (1985) and acquired wide usage after the Beijing Conference on Women and Platform for Action (1995) as a main strategy for achieving gender equality. 7
The Committee tried to reframe questions of WAD and analyse and seek answers to questions of inequalities, exclusion and marginalisation of women in the development process. WS and the women’s movement’s engagement with state policies and development interventions resulted in a discursive shift that cut across a wide range of institutional contexts and development theories and practices. The politics of engagement with state institutions remains the key terrain of women’s struggle. Larger debates within the women’s movement were dominated by the metaphor of the state and included a variety of issues like violence against women, dowry-related deaths, declining sex ratios, sex-selective abortions and low political representation of women.
Broad alliances were formed between academics, activists and researchers (an alliance of seven national women’s organisations including CWDS called the ‘Seven Sisters’, Dahej Virodhi Chetna Manch, Forum Against Oppression of Women and so on), in several major cities.
The first demonstration of the convergence of social and academic conscience, was the widespread agitation against the Supreme Court’s verdict, acquitting the two policemen accused in the Mathura rape case. The visible dynamism of WS attracted people who were concerned with revitalizing university education. It became another dimension of penetrating the ivory tower isolation of universities. (Desai et al., 2003, pp. 60–61)
One of the former members of CSWI along with three law teachers wrote an open letter to the Chief Justice of India after the judgment, criticising the inadequacy of existing laws, the insensitivity of the law enforcement machinery and the legal system to the victims’ personal trauma and social stigma suffered by them. (The Open Letter was written by Upendra Baxi, Lotika Sarkar and Raghunath Kelkar from the Law Faculty of Delhi University and Vasudha Dhagamwar from Pune University in 1979. The Prime Minister asked the Law Commission to undertake an urgent review of the Rape Laws).
The engagement of the women’s movement with the state and its institutional politics has shifted the boundaries of political discourse. Efforts at mainstreaming gender concerns within complex systems of governance saw the setting up of various mechanisms within the government to play a catalytic role. Committee on the status of women in India did recommend setting up of a National Commission for Women to act as a watchdog body—to initiate action on violation of women’s rights and review policies. However, the mechanisms set up by the government in the last few decades remain weak and under resourced.
Between 1977 and 1980 (before the birth of CWDS), several working groups were set up by Planning Commission and Ministries of Agriculture and Rural Development to look into effective strategies for employment generation for rural women through their organisations. V.M. participated in a number of policy reviews and working groups, which accepted the need for employment generation for poor rural women through their organisations, but the strategic links between the two were never clearly understood. Frustrated at the planners’ refusal to abandon the ‘household approach’ in poverty alleviation programmes, V.M. took the agenda to CWDS to develop a general approach to the issues of rural women’s development. CWDS’ own history indicates its engagement with several worlds—those of academe, planning, policies and governance; and research, action and advocacy.
III CWDS and the Genesis of its Action Research Project
It is extremely difficult to encapsulate 36 years of CWDS’ rich history and its action research (AR) in a few pages. What is attempted here is to present a few snapshots of the institution’s unique foray into AR. V.M. very succinctly puts the idea behind the creation of CWDS as a research institution:
Established in 1980, it carried the legacy of the traumatic experiences shared by most of the CSWI members (1971–74); five years of compensatory research (the ICSSR’S WS Programme) on the majority of Indian women whose life experiences had remained invisible to policy planners and social analysts alike; and three years of frantic search of new development strategies and policies in collaboration with the Planning Commission and a few allies within the bureaucracy. (Mazumdar, 2002, p. 1)
It is these broad alliances that she built—both within the bureaucracy and with women’s organisations—that strengthened her belief and determination in using research as a tool for action. 8 There are considerable variations in the conceptualisation of what constitutes AR or production of knowledge through participatory action research (PAR). 9 The origins of linking research and action are complex as community-based research was greatly influenced by the third world development movements of the 1960s particularly those originating from Latin America, India and Africa. The global rise of the women’s movement and women’s scholarship brought in another development or stream of research—feminist action-oriented research with a focus on marginalised women questioning theories of patriarchy, power, privileges and exclusions.
A significant development in the 1980s within development practice was a debate on ‘participatory research’ and the involvement of socially and economically marginalised people in the decision-making process. As PAR began to evolve in field practices, spurred by international funding agencies, many action researchers debated the process of knowledge creation by grassroots’ groups and its significance in analysing and seeking solutions to complex social and economic issues.
A number of grassroots’ interventions emerged, seeking solutions to top-down development practices. Important ideological positions from grassroots’ movements on strategic issues like ecology (as in the Chipko movement in the Himalaya), livelihood and food security, and access to productive resources (land, water and forest), formed the basis for several struggles. There was a lively debate on the critical nature of such organisations in building the capacities of women as a pressure group, and as mechanisms for (re)negotiating women’s exclusions. There were already a few examples like Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA, Ahmedabad), Working Women’s Forum (WWF Tamil Nadu) and Annapurna Mahila Mandal (AMM, Bombay). None of these experiments was initiated by an academic institution. There were other initiatives too like Mahila Samakhya Programme (Ministry of Education, Government of India); micro-credit through self-help groups; women’s user groups formed around natural resources, which relied on mobilisation of poor women’s groups. Women’s community-based activism did contribute to the reconceptualisation of concepts and categories as women defied stereotypes and notions of passivity. These were attempts to create spaces for an alternative understanding of ‘gender and development’ issues with strong concerns for equity and justice. AR became a legitimate tool in poverty eradication strategies.
Though there are many unanswered questions and unresolved debates within AR, it gave new meanings to metaphors like women’s voice, agency, representation and empowerment. Empowerment of women became an important goal of development interventions for both government and NGOs. The rhetoric of ‘participatory development’ got embellished with expressions like ‘empowerment’; however, it glossed over the inequalities of caste, class and gender and conflicts and contestations.
Coming back to the issue of knowledge-creation by grassroots’ action, the diverse research practices produced knowledge that reaches beyond universities, to enter into dialogues with those who are outside academia. Most of the social science disciplines and feminist research are disengaged from AR which remains the world of hybrids, heretics and activists like V.M., who questioned academic traditions and their claim to neutrality. She believed in experimentations and straying into new areas of enquiry.
Reviewing CWDS’ role in the first six years, she wrote,
CWDS was founded by a group who did not accept the prevalent idea about limited role of academic institutions or the theory of academic neutrality. Our intention was to work for change, using all the skills and tools that we had acquired during our years within educational institutions—research, communication and persuasion, with hard data. In the process we used new tools and techniques, to become entrepreneurs, and forms of activism that involved participation from micro to macro levels of the development process. (CWDS, 1987, p. 2)
Though CWDS’ ‘interventionist’ role and using research for social transformation were not clearly delineated or articulated, there is no doubt that V.M. was an ardent advocate of ‘academic interventionism’. She tried to reframe discussions on linkages between research and praxis and argued that given multiple locations and socio-cultural contexts, there cannot be one model of grassroots’ intervention as women often experienced their oppression differently. VM. also believed that CWDS’ involvement in AR represents both its search for new knowledge and a better understanding of social processes which impact women’s lives and consciousness. Intervention in policy dialogues or advocacy needs research-based understanding as well as active participation in development strategies (Mazumdar, 1998, p. 19).
In 1981 V.M. took a plunge to launch the AR project in the Bankura district of West Bengal. Despite initial resistance from within CWDS’ Executive Committee and doubts of its own credentials to play an ‘interventionist role’, its inadequacy and inexperience in grassroots’ mobilisation and managing local power structures and bureaucracy from a distance of over a thousand kilometres, she remained unfazed and determined to take on the role of a mobiliser. For her, AR was an effective tool for addressing critical issues faced by women and helping them negotiate the ideological arena and power relations through their organisations.
IV The Bankura Story
This is not an analytical reflection on CWDS’ action research project, but just a flashback of a few turning points as they unfolded and shaped the implicit belief that grassroots’ organisations of poor women demonstrated far more dynamism than middle-class women’s organisations. According to V.M.,
[the] Bankura story is set in the backdrop of a democratic upsurge in India after the National Emergency (1975–77); a new phase of the women’s movement (with its Siamese twin-women’s studies) and the international decade for women when dreams of transforming dominant development paradigm and complex social systems were still seeking articulation in concrete terms … A small group of scholars/activist with allies within the government, trying to formulate alternative development strategy, were inspired by indigenous models (SEWA, WWF AND AMM mentioned earlier) of women workers. (Mazumdar, 2000, p. 2)
The Bankura project began its journey in 1980 as an experiment to generate employment opportunities for poor women. The West Bengal government invited V.M. to attend a ‘Reorientation Camp for migrant women agricultural labourers in Ranibandh block of Bankura district. 10 Writing about her experience at the camp she recalled, ‘I assumed that women would speak of their problems and aspirations—their dreams, their common experiences of powerlessness and a desire to change their situation for the better by acting collectively.’ Soon, she realised that overcoming their shyness or ‘the culture of silence’ was not easy. Their lives were controlled by ‘Panchbhuta (the five elements—of class, caste, community/religion, family and kinship … To play the catalyst’s role we had to know something about the local situation, social and political crosscurrents and certain feasible alternatives for employment generation’. (Mazumdar, 2002, pp. 3–4)
A group of 35 women who attended the first camp were mainly from the Santhal tribe: assetless, illiterate and poor. The loss of land and forest, which was the integral part of their lives, drove them to ‘Namal’ (seasonal migration) which took a heavy toll of infants and their health.
In the initial stages, some doubts lingered in V.M.’s mind,
women-focussed research and action requires a high degree of specialization, close observation, conceptual and analytical skills … what began as a search for new knowledge and an attempt at constructive intervention, gradually evolved into a partnership with peasant women. We had to experiment with research as well as action methodology, feeding in lessons from one to the other. (Mazumdar, 2002, p. 2)
V.M. was also aware of CWDS’ inadequacy in terms of human and material resources and the problem of managing a project from a distance. In addition, inadequate support from International Labour Organization (ILO); 11 instability of official support from the state government; distrust of local power alignments/structures and doubts and fears within CWDS’ own management about the suitability of a research organisation to play an interventionist role in a politically charged area, posed formidable challenges. 12
However, there was no backtracking on the commitments already made. In a follow-up camp when the ice was broken, women posed their problems, thought of possible development solutions and identified that organisation is critical in bringing about change. The first samiti was born and following a general consensus, was named Gramin Mahila Shramik Unnayan Samiti or Rural Women Labourers’ Development Organisation. The members of the new samiti realised that organisation-building would bring conflicts and contestations and they would need external support. In such a situation, they argued, the ‘sarkar’ (government) which organised the camp should not be on the other side. More samitis were formed around wasteland donated by some family members. Women regenerated the land and revived an old industry of tussar (a textured beige-gold silk) cocoon production by planting tussar host plants. In 1986 as the network of organisations expanded a federation called Nari Bikash Sangh (NBS—Women’s Development Union) was formed.
Over the years, NBS women moved much faster and changed from being passive listeners to questioning, assertive and determined actors. The shift from despair to hope was achieved over a period of time through intensive discussions, living together to build trust among themselves and with the partner institution (CWDS). The journey was not easy. Women had to face initial resistance, ridicule, lack of support, even hostility from the local community and suspicion and distrust of local power structures. Their organisations helped them to fight back. Employment and income generation remained the magnet that drew them together. As organisations became stronger, other issues like child care, literacy, domestic violence, desertion by men, credit etc. gradually became part of their collective thinking. One of the women leaders told a visiting team from ILO that, ‘everybody thinks that this land is useless. We have worked hard to give this land a green cover and in return it has clothed us with authority. We are advancing together. The journey has just begun’ (Singh, 1988, p. 20).
It was women’s faith, trust and courage to fight local obstructionist impulses that provided the moral and mental strength to the partner institution which had set out to play the leadership role. Soon there was a role reversal. ‘Once women acquired a new collective identity, the project was transformed from an experiment to a model and from a model to a movement, with CWDS discovering a new role and responsibilities as an “intermediary” between women and structures of power, resources and knowledge’ (Mazumdar, 2000, p. 6). V.M. soon realised that unanticipated expansion within a year spoilt her original plan of playing an advisory role. Instead the entire responsibility of organisation building as well as mobilising resources for implementing the project fell on CWDS which was itself a fledgling organisation.
CWDS’ own assessment in the mid-1980s acknowledged the methodological and theoretical gains from this partnership in terms of creating new knowledge, policy advocacy and transformation of perspectives on wasteland development through women’s organisations (Mazumdar, 2000, Mimeo, p. 6). These debates were taken to international and national fora; the unfolding of the global environmental crisis heard these voices at UN Conferences. At United Nations Development Fund for Women’s (UNIFEM) request, CWDS organised a national summit of peasant women’s groups to discuss their role in natural resource management and agricultural development. The NBS leader represented her organisation at the Earth Summit at Rio (1992). 13 In ample measure, this was the recognition of peasant women as stakeholders in the development and management of natural resources. Repeated efforts were made by CWDS to organise interactions between peasant women’s groups, agro scientists and policy establishments. Their voices opened up the whole area of environmental concerns—forest, water, land degradation and indiscriminate felling of trees—and their own powerlessness in halting the destruction (CWDS, 1993, 1995).
Later, Asian Development Bank invited a few successful women farmers from Asia to share their experiences. The secretary of the NBS instead presented the story of her organisation and questioned the whole discussion on ‘mainstreaming women in policies of agricultural development’:
if by mainstreaming means that you will make some slots available for us, then we want no part in it … why can’t the agro scientists work with us as partners, so that we can jointly seek solutions. The social scientists of CWDS have no difficulty in playing that role. (Mazumdar, 2000, p. 11)
Soon, the Bankura experiment attracted several researchers and documentary film makers. In 1998, NBS got an award for promoting gender equity, from International Centre for Research on Women. V.M. called the tribal women her ‘gurus’ (teachers) as they continuously challenged her as a political scientist. She became an expert with a difference.
Instead of writing research papers, I formulated some questions and used my findings in my lectures and discussions as my own learning ground has shifted from documents, data and statistics to a living group of human beings, who were learning, growing and initiating new ideas. They were teaching me to question much of my earlier knowledge and belief. (Mazumdar, Martin, & Banerjee, 1995, p. 99)
There were other intended or unintended fallouts of this partnership. In 1985, Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India, issued a directive to all state governments that a minimum of 30 per cent beneficiaries under all anti-poverty programmes should be women. National Forest Policy Resolution (1988) had a plan for joint forest management by the state and people’s representatives. The Nari Bikash Sangha demanded 50 per cent membership in all forest protection committees as forests were their main source of livelihood. Centre for Women’s Development Studies was also asked by the government to develop ‘training modules’ for bureaucrats and field-level functionaries to sensitise them to women’s perspectives. Since CWDS was involved in the Task Force on Training and in the Core Group on Training Strategies, it was asked to organise experimental training workshops. 14 The Bankura women’s spearhead team functioned as trainers and resource persons at village-level training programmes for village women’s groups. Department of Personnel, Government of India, included a component on ‘women’s development’ in its training programme for civil servants.
The research and advocacy agenda was pursued through collaboration and network-building. A new partnership emerged between CWDS’ Bankura project and the teachers of Department of Anthropology at Vidyasagar University in the neighbouring district at Medinipur. A three-day interaction between 50 representatives of peasant women’s groups, Jadavpur University’s School of Women’s Studies and teachers from the Vidysagar University’s Department of Anthropology resulted in a collaborative project of documenting collective ‘histories of women of four older samitis’ (Mazumdar, 1998, p. 22).
How much of these debates and new insights emerging from grassroots’ action informed CWDS’ research agenda? V.M. argued that
as the project expanded, the collaboration with women shaped CWDS’ research agenda—such as deepening interest in issues of natural resource management, the legal framework of women’s rights, the role of science and technology and the unequal contest between indigenous/traditional knowledge and modern dominant knowledge systems. Women’s right to own land as a productive resource became a priority area in our research and advocacy programme. (Mazumdar, 1998, p. 19)
The critical terrain which grew with the quest for ‘research for social transformation’ was neither homogenous nor static. It was fluid and continuously negotiated. In view of the larger policy environment, the current socio-political context and changing generational and gender dynamics, are institutional spaces for such initiatives shrinking? It is true that with WS within the universities getting more academically oriented, the debate on AR and advocacy has receded to the background. On the other hand, the debate on the role of WS as an ‘instrument of change’ may be contentious but cannot be negated.
The journey from ‘Towards Equality’ to the present reflect the emergence of many pathways, many centres of research and advocacy and a heterogeneous knowledge base. Despite failures and disappointments, it has been a momentous journey. There is a generational shift within CWDS. How much is the younger generation clued into these debates? What are the issues they prioritise? These are some questions that would have engaged V.M. greatly.
Forty years on, Ministry of Women and Child Development (MWCD) appointed another High Level Committee on the Status of Women in India, through a resolution dated 27 February 2012. After initial glitches and the resignation of the chairperson and three members, the Committee was reconstituted. It was mandated to undertake a comprehensive review of the status of women for setting a new agenda for the advancement of women. In its report submitted in 2016, the Committee pointed out that while old concerns remain unresolved, fresh challenges confront us. The gender discourse increasingly uses the language of rights and entitlements, but the intersections of women’s rights as citizens and their everyday realities indicate that notions of gender equality get entangled in class, caste relations and cultural identities. Their march ‘Towards Equality’ continues to face conflicts and the contradictions of an unequal society.
In conclusion, what emerges from the above discussions is that within the domain of academic research, AR did make a shift in the debates on ‘alternatives in development’, as it embraces the notion of knowledge as socially constructed. V.M.’s detour from her chosen career path into unchartered territories, displays her abiding faith in grassroots’ initiatives, respect for people’s knowledge and the role of educational institutions in transforming academic spaces. It is critical for WS not only to create but sustain spaces within universities, research and training institutions. The question arises: Are we moving away from the political agenda of WS and AR? Those who were part of this history would like to keep these debates alive.