The Fumbling King of Palestine: Palestinians are Defeating the Oslo Culture
The political discourse of Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, is similar to that of an ineffectual king who has been isolated in his…
Patriarchy
The Agency of ‘Left-Behind Women’ in Bihar
The prevailing perception about Bihari women in a sub-urban/ rural setting reduces the different dimensions of their persona into fossilised gender identities like ‘left-behind women’. In other words, they are…
Male child sexual abuse: A feminist agenda for research and action
Though child sexual abuse has been recognised and widely discussed as a social problem for more than last three decades, little is known about male child sexual abuse in India.…
Strengthening our Struggles through Zero Tolerance to Patriarchal Violence
Public Statement on the Sexual Assault and Abduction of a Young Woman Activist at Tikri Border We deeply mourn the death of a 26-year old activist from APDR (Sreerampur) in…
Motherhood is a Choice Not compulsion
Mothers are most important person of everyone’s life. To appreciate her efforts and love, Mother’s Day is celebrated throughout the world on second Sunday of May. On this day, we …
A Taste of Patriarchy in Speech: Language and Gender
"Language is the road map of a culture. It tells you where its people come from and where they are going." Rita Mae Brown The words that we weave each…
Human Trafficking & Violence Against Naga Tribal Girls and Women in South India
Introduction Human trafficking is not only a modern day slavery but it is a gender-based violence which requires interventions from civil society, local community and law enforcement agency to address…
Protests against Pakistan Prime Minister’s comment linking rape to how women dress
Pakistan rights campaigners have accused the country’s Prime Minister Imran Khan of "baffling ignorance" after the former cricketer linked how women dress to cause a rise in rape cases. In…
Social Media & Women!
Of late, a new importance is being accorded to “social media.” The so-called “social media” is allegedly playing an extremely negative role in spread of “socially-approved” abuses targeting weaker sections,…
Turkey quits treaty on violence against women and transgender religious school opens in Pakistan
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has pulled Turkey out of an international accord designed to protect women, according to an official notice. The Council of Europe accord, better known as the…
Neoliberal Education and Free-market Feminism in India
In The German Ideology, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels stated: “The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling…
Dowry, the Curse of Indian Society
Written by Dr Md Afroz, Md Tabrez Alam Dowry in marriages is a curse for Indian society that has been haunting for a long time. This is a social curse,…
Promoting Gender Equality and Rights of Women in India: A Study of CEDAW, MDGs and SDGs
Introduction Though India had a distinction of electing a woman Prime Minister in 1966 (Mrs. Indira Gandhi) and an Indian (Mrs. Vijay Laxmi Pandit) became the first woman President of…
Status of Women in Islam
In order to understand the edicts of a religion in an objective fashion, one has to look at the norms of the times the religion was offered. Islam was…
Feminist Week of Resistance: Gender & Livelihoods: Farm & Labour Sectors
8th March, 2021: Through the Feminist Week of Resistance and Reflections (7th to 14th March), marking International Women’s Day and remembering Savitribai Phule, National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) is…
His Master’s Voice or His Mistress’s Voice- An Essay on Dog
On the occasion of Women’s Day, it might appear surprising to see an essay on Dog.…
The Horrible Dowry System and Its Wider Manifestation in India
Nearly 60 years have passed since the dowry abolition system legislation was passed in India but we still have the cruel reality of 20 dowry deaths a day in the…
Your Honour/ My Lord – Women are Humans Too
‘Enough is enough. Your words, scandalise and lower the authority of the Court…..Propriety demands that you step down from the post of CJI without a moment of delay” – An…
I Choose to challenge: Say No to Dowry
As we celebrate women's Day every year with different themes this year theme is #chooseTochallenge so I #chooseTochallenge If marriage is a vehicle, where male and female are two equal…
To Be Empowered Is A Choice Than Fait Accompli….
Adam and Eve descended together on this planet. They coexisted and evolved through time, struggling for domination and power constantly. Then why, after thousands of years of cohabitation women are…
Violence against women in India has cultural aspect and need to be pondered over seriously
A man walks to the police station in Hardoi, Uttar Pradesh, with a severed head of his 17 years old daughter. He admitted openly that he disliked her relationship with…
CJI Bobde Must Step Down Now for Asking Rapist to Marry Victim, and Condoning Marital Rape!
Just days before International Women’s Day, 4000+ eminent and concerned citizens, women’s rights and progressive groups raise a strong collective voice Deeply distressed by the regressive statements of the CJI asking…
2 years of India’s #MeToo movement and its outcomes: Realities of Power or Patriarchy
The court’s verdict in favour of Priya Ramani who was acquitted of defamation in #MeToo case must be acknowledged as a strong salutatory effect rather than a victory for India’s…
‘Have a seat but shut up please’: Whither equality?
'Dumb dolls' may soon be adorning board meetings of Japan's ruling party. As per a news report, in response to criticisms that its board is dominated by men, Japan's ruling…
Religions, Female Virginity and Fidelity
Violence against women has been a universal phenomenon in the East and the West. In the West measures have been taken against it. They have met a certain degree of…
Freedomwashing
We make equipment, we give it to our so-called allies[in the Middle East], who we don’t even know who the hell they are… 2,300 Humvees sent over. A couple of…
Encroaching Identity
During the hearing of the farmer movement, the Supreme Court expressed concern towards the elderly and women and asked them to withdraw from the movement which is revealing the court…
Honor Killing – An Overview
Of all the evils spawned by the tribal/feudal society, honor killing is arguably the most heinous. Apologists try to equate it with “crime of passion” but crimes of passion are…
Handling An Acid Attack
We discuss here the role of the victim and the people around IT IS VERY EASY TO MINIMISE THE DAMAGE! ALL THE INSTRUCTIONS GIVEN BELOW LOOK TOO MANY AND TOO…
Women’s Woe: Masking Insidious Domestic Abuse under Covid-19 Crisis
Written by Divya Sharma & Dr Anita Banerjee Engulfing the globe under its grim, the unprecedented Corona Virus (COVID-19) has surprisingly shown an upsurge in domestic violence cases worldwide. India…
Domestic Violence in India: Has anything changed?
While the entire nation went into a lockdown on March 25, 2020 in a fight against the novel coronavirus, not many could have foreseen that the lockdown would lead to…
Self-defense: A simple step towards ending violence against women
Violence against women: Violence against women (VAW) is one of the significant problems in the country. It is very underreported because of multiple personal and societal reasons like embarrassment,…
Burnt, battered, and berated…but not defeated
Written by Abhishek Sethi, Suganda Sharma and Kunal Pant Shanti was 14 years old when she got married. Despite being an income provider for the family, her husband continuously harassed her and…
Bollywood and the representation of Indian women in diaspora
The caricaturish representation of women through popular media have not only led to the lopsided knowledge production about women’s identity, it has also perpetuated and normalised their degraded representation, for…
Criminalize Marital Rape in India: Marriage is not a License to Rape
“When a stranger does it, he doesn't know me, I don't know him. He's not doing it to me as a person, personally. With your husband, it becomes personal. You…
Can Critical Pedagogy be a sustainable solution for sexual violence?
In 2012, the spirit of India was violently shaken by the heinous Delhi gang rape. People took to the streets demanding justice for the girl we named Nirbhaya - "the…
Marital rape- Why still not a crime in India
To Indian ladies above 15: ‘Think before you marry’ – By section 375 exception 2 of IPC When I searched for the status of marital rape in India, the first…
Analysis Of Backlashes Against Medical Termination Of Pregnancy Act 1971 – Can It Help Us Better Our MTP Act 2020?
Abstract- As we come closer to new Termination Of Pregnancy Act (MTP Act) 2020, a look at the MTP act 1971 can help us understand the importance of abortion laws…
Break the silence: Ending gender-based violence is a human rights imperative
"There is a global epidemic of violence against women - both within conflict zones and within societies at peace - and it is still treated as a lesser crime and…
HUMSAFAR: Liberating domestic violence survivors
While traveling through Lucknow, one is bound to come across e-rickshaws and autorickshaws driven by women. The picture of women driving e-rickshaws/autorickshaw across Uttar Pradesh, a state notorious for…
Despite Legislative Acts, Basic Healthcare Eludes the Transgender Community
Transgender health access has been widely neglected by governments and legislative bodies in India. While a bill is passed now and then to reaffirm action, the system has failed to…
Why does the transgender community consider the Trans Persons Act, 2019 as the extermination of Gender Justice?
© Reuters A trans individual's fight for survival begins from their adolescence. Majority of them are relinquished by their families, denied formal schooling, and have severely confined access to…
Critical Feminist Pedagogy: A Magic Bullet to End Patriarchy
Across ages, we have seen a persistent gender-based discrimination in India. This discrimination manifests in the form of gender-based violence (40% of women have experienced domestic violence), trafficking of women,…
The Transgender Community During The Pandemic: Outcomes Of Lack Of Policy, Inclusion And Affirmative Action
The Covid-19 pandemic has caused hardships among people, and even more so, for the most marginalised groups in the society. At a time when even the more privileged groups began…
Two Years after the abrogation of section 377: a sneak-peak into the Ground reality
Touted as one of the biggest milestones in the movement by the LGBTQA community for equal rights, the abrogation of section 377 of the Indian penal code in 2018 by…
The Shadow Pandemic- Violence against women during COVID-19
One in three women worldwide experience physical or sexual violence. Most of this violence is perpetrated by either their intimate partner or a relative. Due to the Coronavirus pandemic outbreak…
The Case of 23 years old Pikumoni: Who failed her?
As the author penned down his thoughts on a very recent case of death on account of severe domestic violence of a twenty-three years old girl who was newly married…
Women huddle over strategy to prevent sexual violence
Historian Uma Chakravarti said there was cause for hope, as more young women were getting together and organizing, and the state apparatus appears to be reacting in some panic when…
Patriarchy’s Engines: Toxic Masculinity, Desire, Sexual Violence
Prefatory Note Before I begin with the issues that are properly the concern of this article, I would like to make some clarifications. Firstly, with this article, I would like…
Marriage is no child’s play
According to a report by UNICEF, India is home to the largest number of child brides in the world, accounting for more than one third of the global total of…
Widowhood revisited in a television drama
During recent Durga Puja celebrations, RTV drama special titled Shada Megher Mon (A silver lining in the cloud), revisited the widowhood of a young woman in the context of Bangladesh…
Women Are Vulnerably ‘Locked Down’ Amid The Pandemonium Of Global Pandemic
Domestic Violence- the term is definitely not a new thing for any of us. Domestic violence is apparently defined as any form of violence or assault suffered by a person…
Menstrual Hygiene – Talk about what’s not comfortable!
“When I first got my periods, I felt I was about to die. I didn’t know what it was,” Says Sonam, a resident of Nalhar village in Mewat district of…
Phenomenal Surge of Domestic Violence/Gender Violence: The Shadow Pandemic of Humanity
The impact of domestic violence, sexual and physical abuse on woman and young girls have been devastating for years. With the ongoing lockdown measures following the Covid-19 pandemic, complications have…
A Priest in Cassock and the Santal Girl
Recently, when a 17-year-old Santal girl from an indigenous tribe in Rajshahi, Bangladesh went to cut grass for her family’s cattle in the pasture, she had no idea that danger…
Rape, the Shadow Pandemic in the time of Covid-19
What is wrong with some men that in the time of Covid-19 they are raping women of all ages? Rape, the most intimate of crimes is happening every day, everywhere…
‘May you be the mother of many sons…’
...so goes an old common blessing given to an Indian bride, talks of gender equality notwithstanding. While the small family norm slogan of 'hum do, hamare do' (we two, ours…
Rape Raj: Shrouded in Shadow
A frenzied attack or bouts of insanity; “rape is rape”! Every 30 minutes one rape is crafted in India. A woman or a child…they are all prey of the rape…
Period Leaves: Yay or Nay?
The concept of period leave, like the #Metoo movement is not new. What really happens is people talk about it and then forget it, as some other issue gathers momentum.…
Gender Literacy
Literacy is a social fact. The term which is introduced here with ‘gender literacy’ is not a new mere concept but something which needs expression politically and socially. A society…
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