I. Toward a Feminist Reading of the Constitution (A Review of the Founding Mothers of the Indian Republic by Achyut Chetan)
To understand the Founding Mothers of the Indian republic — and how their authorial intentions animate the Constitution as a living document — we must situate their efforts within a layered moral imaginary and gendered politics of transformation.
Though not exhaustive of India’s diversity, these women arrived at constitutional authorship through deeply political engagements with the All India Women’s Conference (AIWC). Through the AIWC, figures like Amrit Kaur, Hansa Mehta, and Aizaz Rasul sharpened their capacity to translate women’s demands into legal discourse.
To hear the voice of our founding mothers, we must listen not only to their speeches but to their writing. Their dissent notes, memoranda, charters of rights, and subcommittee work form a constitutional poetics of transformation.
II. Writing as Politics: Beyond the Assembly Floor
History privileges speech. But feminist politics recognises the subversive act of writing, especially in a space where women were far outnumbered.
Texts like Women’s Role in the Planned Economy, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Women’s Charter reveal the broader discursive field that gave rise to their vision of liberty, equality, and secularism.
These framers conceptualised women as a minority with disabilities, stemming from socio-economic structures rather than biology — an early articulation of what we might now call intersectional structural justice.
This historical understanding of the condition of women in Indian society informed their principles of humanist rationality, secular thinking, and constitutional liberty.
III. Constructive Citizenship: A Vision Rooted in Justice
Amrit Kaur envisioned a constructive citizenship — one that reimagines the individual as both the subject and agent of constitutional morality. “This radical departure from conservative framers who wanted to root Indian society in the village or the family gave rise to a profound redefinition of the political. To them, Fundamental Rights were not merely protections against the State, but recoveries of inherent freedom curtailed by religion and family – private institutions historically insulated from political scrutiny.”
This marked one of the earliest rehearsals of feminist refusal to distinguish the personal from the political — a legacy often obscured but foundational.
IV. Feminist Futures: In Solidarity with Ambedkar
The women framers shared a deep alignment with Dr. B.R. Ambedkar’s dream of democracy — a dream that centered the individual, not the community, as the bearer of rights.
They challenged the patriarchal impulse that cloaked itself in the rhetoric of “civilizational ethos” and rejected calls to make the family or village the primary social unit. By insisting on the individual as the base unit of society, they argued for a justice aligned with the future — not the exclusionary shadows of the past.
Their work around Directive Principles, the inclusion of sex in non-discrimination clauses, opposition to military conscription, and a non-communal understanding of the Uniform Civil Code shows their expansive constitutional labour
V. Constitutional Morality and Radical Pedagogies.
Framers like Dikshayani Veludhyan envisioned a feminist, anti-caste, anti-class pedagogy of transformation. Education, to them, was not just technical literacy — but a moral awakening to constitutional values that could dismantle capitalism and caste hierarchies alike.
Our Collective Reading at our feminist leisure space, Extra Odinari
“To Ask for the Sun & Moon”
I. The Constitution as Absence
Many of us at Extra Odinari reflected on how the Constitution was a near-absent presence in our lives—read as rote in school, stripped of its lived meaning.
“Understanding its feminist voices, as someone said, felt like asking for the sun and moon.”
There was a deep sense of loss—a civic grief—about never having had a meaningful encounter with the text. Our educational spaces had failed to cultivate us as citizen-readers.
II. Fear and the Law
A persistent theme was fear. The Law, in its everyday application, seemed alien, punitive, and inaccessible—especially to women and gender non-conforming people. The specter of bureaucracy, victim-blaming, and moral policing haunted the Constitution’s promises.
We asked: How could one be moved by a text that had become a tool of our silencing?
III. Pedagogies of Power: Toward Constitutional Literacy
There was a collective yearning for new ways of engaging with the Constitution—through stories, comics, and creative expression.
We need a pedagogy not of the State, but of citizenship—where teaching law is not about technicalities but about building moral, political, and imaginative capacities.
“To learn the Constitution is to reclaim the right to imagine a just society. One that includes us—not as victims or exceptions, but as rightful architects.”
IV. Against Political Apathy: Reclaiming the Right to Be Political
Many shared the alienation produced by a school system that delegitimizes politics and upholds STEM success as the only viable future. The popular framing of politics as dirty, criminal, and distant feeds into a profound civic detachment—one that invisibilizes caste, gender, and class structures.
Yet, in our gathering, we remembered that the personal has always been political. We live at the intersection of these forces—feeling the weight of what is erased in the name of neutrality or apathy.
“The apolitical stance itself is a privilege—a refusal only afforded to those protected by caste and class.”
Conclusion: Toward a Radical Reading of Justice
Our conversation taught us that the Constitution is not merely a legal text but a living archive of feminist hope. The women who helped write it did so with fire, reason, and foresight. Their commitment to liberty, equality, and justice continues to illuminate what it means to be a citizen—especially a feminist one.
“When we read the Constitution through the eyes of our Founding Mothers, we are not merely reading the past—we are scripting the future.”
Author – Akankshya Mahapatra is a freelance writer and researcher with a Master’s in biotechnology. She is interested in exploring the intersections of gender, history & law while aiming to pursue a PhD in climate change & gender. She curates conversations at Safe Odisha For Her.
Comedy by definition can have multiple connotations – some referring to the textual comedy of literature & theatre, while others refer to the relatively modern art form of stand-up where people use the spotlight to create experiences of laughter – At our feminist leisure space, ExtraOdinari, our voices unfurled into spontaneous discussions that went from the serious business of comedy to the funny business of oppressive systems on 25th May 2025.
Given women’s relation to art – one where they are constantly used or evoked as muses – it is surprising to see them mostly unacknowledged in comedy. This is despite their representation in other forms of artistic cultural practices such as dance, music, singing, acting & modelling. So while women as citizens find the public sphere inaccessible, we find them in the spotlight relatively more often through the public consumption of artistic performances.
While thinking of women’s relation to the public sphere, we all dwelled on the needless pressure to perform virtue for the ‘public’s’ moral imagination – whether it’s smiling a certain way, walking in a certain fashion, acting feminine according to the societal notions of gender – the need to perform our gender is never ending. Many participants shared their exasperation of working in environments where they are expected to smile or laugh even when they dont want to; in the face of such absurd demands, their approach has been to proudly hold their glares & resist performing gender roles expected of them.
Some of us threaded back this pressure of gender performance to the comedic arena & wanted to address the misogyny in humour in mainstream spaces, including standup. Whether it’s insanely cliche husband-wife WhatsApp forward jokes on social media, the one family uncle making fun of women’s habits or school kids passing comments on women’s bodies – what people tend to find funny is often constructed by cultural contexts.
And in these cultural contexts, women are always presented as overtly emotional, shallow, materialistic, nagging & lacking intelligence, etc. We also rooted all of this to the moral casteist landscapes that shape such comedy – where colorism & racism play a distinctive role in defining beauty; thereby offering casteist constructs of what kinds of bodies are considered worthy of ridicule within the Indian society.
When we reflected on such offensive humour collectively at our feminist leisure space, multiple conversations opened up; it was an unburdening of painful memories, casual dismissals & the daily oppression we have all learnt to live with. Some women reminded us of how much more regimented & surveilled women’s lives are in rural contexts as opposed to the liberty urban women might experience. Despite this, women seem to practice empathy & compassion in their lives & work with far more curiosity than their male counterparts.
Young girls from the city felt the border between control & liberty to be far more blurred than we can think. Living in cities has not empowered us to live more freely & perhaps has only invisibilised the many ways in which we are oppressed – from what women wear, to what makeup we use, to the many ways we are undermined in our work environment & made fun of for our physical appearances – cityscapes offer their own brand of offensive humour & everyday oppression.
Before we could get to laughter, we ended up moving through the maze of pent-up emotions we have been holding around our bodies, around the larger socio-political body of silence & shame in our culture & what would freedom mean along these terms.
As we immersed ourselves in these rich conversations, I kept dwelling on what it means to hold curiosity. What feminist practices build critical thinking?
And once again, I felt the answer lies with humour as much as asking questions directly.
Here, one may interject & say that humour, just like art, is subjective & comedy by its very nature always toes the line between offence, subversion & dissent. But that is looking at half the picture. Like art, in humour we are entering an intersubjective ground – a concept that is created in a shared sense with multiple layers of cultural, historical, socio-political & evolutionary codes – and therefore while we cannot firmly say we can find a single idea that is universally funny to everyone on the planet, we can form educated opinions on what themes can form the crux of humour for people around us – there’s objective features to comedy like timing, punchlines, irony, sarcasm, exaggeration, mimicry etc & subjective responses to the styles that accompany them – there is a lot of humour that can be found in the suffering of human beings such as disability but who is making these jokes & with which kind of sensitivity & wit in place is important. We are not suggesting defanging humour of its power to make fun of the absurd & unjust. We are thinking if it’s possible to use the power of laughter to dismantle dangerous power structures that deserve to be erased & remade.
We are hoping to explore how humour brings alive a sense of justice in us all – towards what’s unfair, towards what’s outrageous, towards what deserves to change for us all.
Within this reflection, I am reminded of a childhood memory which was probably one of the first instances when, I came alive to the possibilities of using humour as a tool of subversion. Bullied by my brother for my weight, I decided to give him a taste of his own medicine!
Knowing my body is the butt of all his jokes, I began deflecting his taunts with my own funny commentary on his actions – the cringe way he talked to girls, the predictable guitar-boy aesthetic he used to impress large crowds & how secretly he enjoyed watching romantic teenage drama like Twilight but pretended otherwise in front of everyone else.
Needless to say, my jokes were relentless & unsparing but never cruel. They also seemed to be more entertaining for whoever was listening on! For the first time, I felt people pay attention to what I was going to say. They waited with bated breath to laugh. They wanted to be around me talking about funny family stories. They didn’t seem to care about the cruel jokes around my body as much as the stream of consciousness humour I was doing.
That is the first time I realised humour is also how I reclaim my own space. It brings a certain lightness to my heart & builds an inner resilience for me in times of suffering.
Since then, I understand humour as the expression of the human spirit that transcends its circumstances. In an increasingly authoritarian society with widespread suffering, it’s not just a way to resist & dissent; it’s a tool to reclaim subjectivity & elevate the heaviness of daily life. For many people, humour is how they reject social norms, reclaim their space & imagine alternate possibilities of life – to be funny is a powerful way to dismantle power structures as much as it can be a way to reinforce hierarchies.
Which is why we should see comedy as a tool within the feminist practice to dismantle social hierarchies. When we use our wit to highlight the projection of patriarchal attitudes on women, we create spaces of dialogue for more women to speak up & claim their space. This, of course, means more than just telling jokes – though that is the start!
Every step of comedic storytelling needs to come into dialogue with intersectional feminist principles. When we open up about our stories, no matter how unsure we are of ourselves, the practice of speaking up opens us up to new possibilities of what we can do & the kind of storytellers we can be.
A question worth dwelling on – When we consider the role of humour in societies, how can we use humour to redraw power structures? Who/What deserves to be the critical sites of comedy?
Humour is also how we diffuse suffering & offer hope; I think its brilliance comes alive when we realise it’s one of the most powerful forms of storytelling available to us, & its appeal is almost universal when it comes from a place of rage, criticism, despair, sorrow & authenticity.
When women talk about their own lived experiences – with their bodies, their relations, the absurdity of expectations placed on them, the ableism pervading our current world, the bigotry of people threatened by women & queer people’s liberation, etc – there is a lot of laughter to be found!
Odisha, like the rest of India, has witnessed a sharp rise in cybercrimes, particularly those targeting women and queer individuals. From the non-consensual circulation of intimate images to deep fake pornographic content, such violations are increasingly common on university campuses, public social media, and private online spaces. In fact, according to 2022 NCRB data Odisha emerges as the top state with the highest number of recorded cybercrimes against women.
On April 26, 2025, a citizen-led discussion took place in Bhubaneswar under the banner of Speak Against Violence, a collective fighting against gender based violence targeting women and queer people in Odisha. The discussion was centred around an analysis of the Odisha State Govt. budget to address cyber violence against women in Odisha. Participants in the gathering addressed pressing questions about Odisha’s budgetary priorities, structural inadequacies in handling cybercrime, and the deep-rooted cultural challenges survivors face in their search for justice. The event took the form of a collaborative discussion without any hierarchical or organisational control. Citizens, students, researchers, survivors, activists, and lawyers came together to discuss, listen, and imagine collective solutions.
This report synthesises the outcomes of the event, supported by recent budget analyses, NCRB data, and lived experiences shared by participants. It seeks to document emerging public concerns around cybersecurity and offer actionable recommendations for systemic reform.
In our research on looking at cybercrime in Odisha, we also found certain curious cases to put in context the magnitude of the issue of cybercrime at large in Odisha & compare it to the State Govt.’s response in terms of its budgetary priorities. We found that in 2024, a staggering ₹2.5 lakh crore was reported as the total amount swindled through cyber fraud in just Bhubaneswar and Cuttack. This figure nearly equals the state’s entire 2025-26 budget of ₹2.9 lakh crore. Despite this, only ₹30 crore has been earmarked for cybersecurity measures, including ₹10 crore for AI-driven predictive policing and ₹20 crore for a Centre of Excellence in Cybersecurity.
The discussion repeatedly returned to this disproportion. Of the 612 police stations in Odisha, only 15 are cybercrime units, and just 12 are currently functional. That is roughly one cyber station per 30 lakh people. Odisha’s digital enforcement system is thus woefully under-resourced and severely overstretched.
The researchers on the Odisha budget for the event were critical of the inaccessibility of Odisha’s budget documents, which often switch between crore and million without any coherence on the decimal or currency system employed. This inconsistency & lack of coherence make public scrutiny difficult. They noted that spending on predictive policing technologies (e.g., AI tools) appears prioritised over grassroots capacity-building, such as training personnel or opening more cybercrime units in vulnerable districts.
While there was consensus that sensitisation drives for law enforcement personnel & capacity building would be beneficial for addressing cybercrime & gendered violence against women & queer people, the group had a layered take on whether creating more cyber police stations in addition to blind investment in tech-based policing is how we address the disproportional magnitude of this problem in comparison to the state budget its allocated.
While the ratio of 1:30 (one police station per thirty lakh people) is a staggeringly skewed magnitude, indicating the sheer lack of resources allotted to this issue, many participants wondered whether an increase purely in terms of the number of police stations will be the most effective strategy to combat this issue.
Some participants shared personal stories where police officers refused to register FIRs against sexual violence perpetrated on them, either due to performance concerns, extra workload or the pervasive cultural stigma of society that is internalised in law enforcement personnel. They recalled traumatic experiences of being re-victimised by the apathy of a justice system that refuses to address crime beyond punitive measures often silencing or invisibilizing victim’s voices. One participant reflected, “Our institutions are not neutral. They carry the biases of society.
Tangentially, addressing the larger discourse of reparative justice as the more effective approach to mitigate & prevent crime including gender based violence against women & queer people, researchers also dwelled on the colonial origins of the institution of police in India; it administrative & rigid architecture taking shape post-1857 sepoy revolt in India to control & discipline the citizens rather than addressing matters of justice. Thus, relying solely on punitive justice without reforming these structures could never fully protect or empower victims.
Many argued that punishment does not deter crime, especially when victims are made to carry the burden of shame, silence, and social stigma. Some queer and trans participants shared how cyber harassment and blackmail on dating apps often go unreported because they fear further discrimination. The group advocated for a justice model that centres victims’ voices and enables healing. They discussed the need to move beyond the “victim-perpetrator” binary and create space for reform and rehabilitation of perpetrators while ensuring victim dignity and safety.
The event also explored how digital platforms are weaponised against LGBTQIA+ individuals. Cis-het men on dating apps often coerce queer people into sharing private media, which is then used for extortion. Participants emphasised the urgent need for NCRB data to start recognising crimes against queer people under relevant categories like sexual orientation and gender identity. The lack of data leads to a lack of policy.
Furthermore, media outlets have been guilty of airing or leaking sensitive/often derogatory clips that harm queer victims, perpetuating a cycle of violence and trauma. Such unethical practices of media within digital landscapes must also be addressed by the State & Law Enforcement with strict regulations to uphold the dignity of queer citizens of the country.
The campaign #EraseTheShame has been one initiative by ‘Safe Odisha For Her’ that has been created since December 2024 to address cybercrime against women that offers a hopeful instance of public mobilisation in this context. Introduced to address the growing trend of the viral spread of sexually explicit content online, particularly involving college students. The campaign demands include: Immediate removal of all non-consensual and violent videos from the internet and Stricter action by Odisha’s cybercrime department to investigate and prosecute digital violence to prevent future victim shaming
This petition is hosted on change.org platform www.change.org/erasetheshame & slowly gaining traction, calling on the Home Department to take swift, transparent, and victim-centred action. We hope with further citizen-led discussions, this campaign’s demands are heard & met by the State.
The discussion concluded with a clear set of demands aimed at transforming how Odisha addresses cybercrime, particularly against women and queer individuals. Participants strongly advocated for the expansion of cyber infrastructure, calling for an increase in the number of cyber police stations from the current 15 to at least 50, ensuring that each district has a dedicated cyber unit.
They demanded a significant budgetary allocation of ₹500 crores for cybercrime response, noting that the current allocation amounts to a mere 0.002% of the state budget and is grossly inadequate to meet the scale of the crisis. Emphasis was placed on creating victim-centric justice models that include free legal aid, therapy, and social support, recognising that survivors often face institutional apathy and trauma without adequate redress.
The need for mandatory gender and digital violence sensitisation training for law enforcement and the judiciary was underscored as essential for systemic change. A critical demand was the inclusion of LGBTQIA+ identities in crime categorisation, so that digital violence against queer people is acknowledged and addressed in official crime statistics and policies. Participants also called for greater transparency in budgeting processes, urging the government to make financial documents publicly accessible and understandable to facilitate citizen oversight.
In addition to state-led efforts, the group emphasised the importance of community-led mechanisms—civil forums where victims can share their experiences and seek redress safely and without fear. Finally, they demanded an end to the criminalisation and shaming of survivors, insisting that justice systems stop treating victims as accomplices or silencing them through social stigma. These eight demands together represent a comprehensive and urgent call for both structural and cultural reform in the state’s approach to cybercrime and gender justice.
In an increasingly online world, where social media becomes both a space of expression and a violation, this report serves as a public document of urgency. Odisha must act not just with policy, but with vision, compassion, and courage.
‘Speak Against Violence’ is not a seminar, it is a collective act of public resistance, empathy, and knowledge-sharing. It revealed how state silence, budgetary apathy, and institutional violence intersect in the realm of digital harm. The event’s strength lay in its structure: collaborative, leaderless, and intersectional. By centring lived experiences and calling out structural gaps, participants demanded more than just reform. They demanded a complete rethinking of how justice is imagined and delivered in the digital age. It is a monthly circle happen last Saturday of every month from 4pm onwards in Bhubaneswar. To be part of it, email at safeodishaforher@gmail.com
1) Akankshya Mahapatra is a freelance writer and researcher with a Master’s in biotechnology. She is interested in exploring the intersections of gender, history & law while aiming to pursue a PhD in climate change & gender.
2) Rajlaxmi is pursuing her undergraduate degree in English Literature from Ravenshaw University.
We remain committed to amplifying these critical conversations and pushing for structural changes to make the digital space safer for all genders.
https://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2025/05/cybercrime-against-women-and-queer-communities-in-odisha
As per the Building and Other Construction Workers (BOCW) Welfare Cess Act, 1996, any construction project costing beyond Rs 10 lakh must give up to 1% of construction cost to the BOCW welfare boards for the welfare of construction workers. BOCW boards are state government controlled. So, rules of cess collections, benefits, schemes for workers, eligibility criteria to be a registered member vary drastically from state to state.
When most of these state boards are functional, why are the funds underutilised or lying unutilised? The documentation process is not labourer-friendly like any other welfare scheme and there is usually no local support. Language barrier (imagine an Odia worker registering the form in Kannada in Bengaluru) is another issue. Overall, it is a very tedious process to qualify for the eligibility of welfare schemes under the board.
Many times, the contractor receives the cards of the construction workers who registered with the BOCW board after they leave the site. So the workers are also not aware that they are registered. What use is the card when it is given to the contractor after workers leave the site and, in most instances, even the registered state?
As per media reports, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman confirmed that 3.5 crore workers have registered with BOCW boards. But, as per the Government of India’s official Invest India website, the total number of workers in the construction sector is 5.1 crore. Labour unions claim to have 6 crore construction workers in the country. Going by the 12th five-year plan report that had estimated 4.1 crore workers in 2011, today’s figure as per labour unions data – 6 crore – is highly plausible. In such a case, 2.5 crore construction workers are denied any kind of benefit declared by the central or state governments.
Every state has a different waiting period for a construction worker to be eligible to apply for the benefits. As they frequently change cities/states, workers end up registering again under a new state BOCW board after waiting for the required window period. This is a double-edged sword; on one hand a migrant can be registered multiple times but still not be able to avail any of the benefits offered to them. No wonder, 2.5 crore workers are still not registered and hence not eligible to get such cash benefits. As these migrants are not the voter population at cities, they don’t get any local support too. They also face other kinds of challenges, unlike local workers. They are abused or mistreated by the police and other authorities, and even locals in many cases.
In the last week of the third lockdown, due to the intervention of citizens, civil society, non-government organisations and reporting by a few independent media outlets, the whole country is witnessing the inhumane conditions that our worker community is going through. They don’t have shelter, food nor transportation services to return to their native places, and face many other challenges. Now, people are sympathising with them. But this wasn’t the case during the first lockdown. Apart from strengthening the implementation of different policies for the rural economy, the central and state governments must work together on making systematic changes to augment the functionality of the BOCW welfare boards in the following aspects:
- Standardise the registration process for all state boards
- Make applications available in all regional languages, irrespective of which board a worker is registering under
- Make registrations valid to receive all benefits from their current state (irrespective of which board they are registered under)
- Create a structure to ensure every registered worker receives their card and is made aware about their rights
- Create policies for children of migrant workers to continue their school education by introducing mobility trackers
The frequent migration from one project to another, one city to another and from one state to another makes our country’s construction workers vulnerable in many ways. It restricts/prevents access to PDS benefits, basic healthcare facilities and enrolling their children in local schools. They lack sanitation facilities and are constantly exposed to pollution and hazardous site conditions. They face unhygienic and unsafe shelters, particularly for women, and lack social security, etc. They also lack emotional support and have no space for relaxation. No one in the city knows about their existence except the project team as they are highly controlled/monitored by the contractor’s security team.
Another important factor which I observed is that most of these unskilled/semi-skilled workers are also illiterate and unaware about their rights, such as getting financial support from the BOCW welfare board for constructing their own house, daughter’s marriage, higher education of their children and many other needs. As they come from other states, they can’t read the instructions written in the local language on labour welfare and rights by the Labour department.
It is not rocket science for us to understand that a lot of these workers are unregistered. As found in a report by Gayatri Sahgal and Harsh Mander: “This exclusion from membership to welfare boards denied them their rights to pension benefits, accident insurance, financial assistance in the form of loans and advances for funding the education of children or other such expenses.” (Sahgal & Mander, 2010). The report had also found that family members (often old parents and women) go through emotional emptiness from being away from their sons/husbands. It forces them to migrate with the entire family resulting in less or no access to children’s education and safety, women’s health and safety, amid long working hours.
With the outbreak of the coronavirus disease across the country, we are witnessing reverse migration from cities to villages by millions of such migrant workers. These consist of construction workers, textile workers, other factory workers, daily wage labourers, domestic workers, street vendors, etc. But there is no clarity on data about who is returning where. In this scenario, I wonder how the governments will ensure that the required help reaches the actual beneficiary, but so far there has been no satisfactory explanation from any of the governments.
In this two-part series, Pranay Manjari Samal gives us a sneak peek into the lives of construction workers who are part of what is probably the largest humanitarian crisis we have seen since India got its independence.
They build our dream homes, but live in temporary sheds. They build schools for our children, but their children don’t go to school. They build hospitals for us, but can’t afford basic healthcare. They build our roads, but can’t afford to commute. They build our cities, but they are called outsiders. They build food factories, but they die because of hunger. They build offices, commercial chambers where policy makers draft policies of ‘Make in India’. But the policy makers forget to include them in those policies, the very people who are making India, quite literally. Yes, you guessed it right, we are talking about construction workers who are mostly inter-state migrants.
“What’s your name? Name of your village? Name of post office/district?” The labour manager who was making note of the details given by the worker looked at him and asked, “Don’t you know the name of your village and district? Tell me, who is your thekedar (a commonly used term to describe a middle man who hired them)?”
It was 2015. I was sitting beside the labour manager inside the site office of an under-construction residential project in Bengaluru. This was the field immersion project as part of my master’s course at Azim Premji University. The construction workers, mostly migrants, came in one by one during the lunch break to give their details at the designated window of the site office that functioned as a counter.
The labour manager filled the form with the thekedar’s address, and kept asking questions like age, parents’ name, married or not, if married – name of the spouse. Then he looked at me and said, “They don’t even know their full address.”
I asked him why he needed to know marital details. He said it was to fill in the nominee’s name in the form, someone who can be contacted and given financial help in case of any major accident/death of the worker. I asked him if it was necessary to nominate only a spouse. He just looked at me for a few seconds without any expression and continued his work. I asked him again if the workers knew what they were giving these details for.
He replied, “They don’t even know the name of their village/taluka/district. Our job is to fill the form and submit it to the Construction Welfare Board. But the labour officers want us to submit 2,000 forms in a short time. What to do? If I add the question ‘whom do you want to nominate’, it will take another extra minute to finish my work. And I have to do this for more than 2,000 workers.”
I must admit he was sincere about his job and wanted to finish it on time. Asking the workers for their consent to nominate someone when they didn’t know the full address of their native village seemed too much to consider.
Being a student of education, I wanted to understand the issues and concerns of construction workers that arise due to lack of education. I interacted with more than 700 migrant workers, who were mostly from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Assam, in those two months. I collected data on their education status, their aspirations in life, why they migrated, and their challenges in the labour colony. I also talked to project managers, contractors, safety managers, labour colony staff and others to understand more.
One worker from Uttar Pradesh said, “We work from morning to late evening. Where is the time to gossip and know each other? We just know that the workers from our neighbouring shed are from Odisha. But we never interact with them. And there is no need also. All of us from the same village and district live as a group, our thekedar brings all the things we need; there is no chance of interaction with others.”
Another worker from Odisha shared that the role of the thekedar was just loading and unloading (people, not material). All the migrants are dependent on the thekedar, as they are from a remote place and don’t know whom to contact or take help from if they are in trouble. A safety manager said, “These workers don’t have anything else to do. Just eat and work. But it is their fate as they don’t have any opportunity in their village that gives them a regular income; at least here they eat three meals a day and send enough money back home for their family to survive.”
The answers were quite predictable: to save money for dowry during sister’s wedding, social obligations, to buy a two-wheeler, save some amount to start a shop or business in their village after a few years.
During an interview, a project manager whom I had invited to join us at the inauguration of a learning centre that we had started for the workers said, “If you educate all the workers, from where will we get labourers to build this infrastructure?”
Poverty is man-made. It is our collective apathy (that of the government and us, the privileged class) that prevents such workers from accessing education facilities that will enable them to question the status quo. As they are not educated enough, it becomes easier for us to exploit them. We want them to remain poor forever.
I have worked in the construction industry for 20 years now, in different capacities: as a project manager, as a student of sociology of education, and as an implementer of different educational programmes. One of the major questions to which I haven’t found an answer is: why are the construction workers almost always inter-state migrants? These migrant workers are hired through middlemen. They aren’t directly employed by the main contractor, which adds to their vulnerability.
During my master’s course and as a project manager/ development professional, I have seen many of their challenges – they are not aware of the details of their new work location or who are they working for, they keep moving to new places frequently as construction activities (brick work/ plastering/ scaffolding/ flooring/ painting, etc.) are short tenure jobs, particularly due to the technological developments in this industry.
I had brought a ‘kinder joy’ chocolate for my niece. But she didn’t like it and threw it away. I knew she always liked it. Without giving me seconds to think and ask, she yelled at me, “Don’t you know, it’s for boys. Why didn’t you bring a pink one?” Then, I realized that she likes ‘kinder joy’ not particularly for the taste, but for the gift inside. But what made me wonder is how did she know that ‘pink’ is for girls and ‘blue’ is for boys.
I always knew that mass media influences markets and customers in big ways. That’s why corporate spent millions in creating and repeatedly broadcasting commercials in national media. But that was the day I realized how powerful it is.
This incident made me aware as a consumer and as an informed citizen. I started observing commercials from different perspectives such as how they influence children, family structures, and division of work as per gender etc. I was watching a commercial on a national TV channel by Max Life Insurance. The commercial was showcasing the real people (not the actors) who were their agents and how they were guiding people to buy the right kind of insurance plans for a secure and better future.
The agent was proudly sharing how it’s important to be prepared for your son’s education and daughter’s wedding as these two are the most crucial responsibilities of parents apart from securing their retiring life by buying pension plans.
I watched thrice, to assure myself about what I was thinking is not overly sensitive. It’s the reality of the world around us. Parents give importance to their son’s studies and are always worried about the daughter’s marriage. Their son’s education matters as they would be the future caretaker of parents in their old age, whereas daughters (as per the age-old saying “beti paraya dhan hoti he”) will leave parents and go to another family.
Our culture also shames those parents who expect anything in return from their daughters. It’s popularly told by many that ‘drinking water from daughter’s marital home is also prohibited in our culture.’ So it’s obvious for parents to invest more in their sons’ future than daughters.’
When my mother passed away and my father became dependent on me, I realized that I had not saved enough to support him. I bought policies like accident/death insurance, pension plans for me. But I had never thought of buying pension plans for my parents. They spent all their savings on my education, wedding, and well-being. They never saved for their retiring life.
When I started working, they forced me to buy these policies, and I did. I realized that how these commercials I watched had subconsciously made me choose only these policies and no policies for my parents’ retiring lives. That incident made me understand the bias these commercials create and re-establish the hidden and untold gender norms of society.
So, I am going to review the most viewed insurance commercials by all companies regularly in my upcoming posts and would request everyone to keep an eye on my channel, to read the review of the commercials that you all are watching on different platforms. It’s important to know how these commercials are shaping our point of view in life and impacting our relationships with the women in our lives.
It was just my fifth day at my parents-in-law’s residence, when my mother-in-law came and sat with me for a conversation. It must have been the first time. She was sympathetic towards me and acknowledged that I must be missing my home and parents. That made me comfortable and made me want to listen to her.
But, she ended her conversation with me reminding that I’m no more a daughter to my parents. I must focus on the well-being of her family and son. I must learn to move on and start prioritising them. That my spouse’s siblings are more important than my siblings.
While I was taken aback by this advice, didn’t realise the depth of the issue then. I was overconfident about handling these issues. Slowly and steadily, I was trapped in these patriarchal values. Whenever I want to visit my parents, I have to negotiate with them about when I can visit them and for how long I can stay with them.
If I wanted to stay longer at my parents’ place and didn’t have the courage to talk to my mother-in-law; I would ask my spouse to help me. He conveniently chose not to be part of this process and left me to fight my own battle – just to meet my parents!
Most of the time, I would just follow their instructions without any further discussion. I felt miserable. I remember how my maternal grandfather used to do the exact same thing when he wanted his daughter to visit. He would come to our place to take permission from my paternal grandfather. A date would be decided and how many days my mother could stay at her home would also be decided.
Then again, on the decided date, he would come to take my mother and drop her. It was the rule not just for my mother, but for everyone including my grandmother. Only after my great grandmother’s permission could my grandmother visit her home and see her brother. But, I had never thought that I would also follow the same rules one day, to meet my parents after my marriage.
I feel disgusted and ridiculed when these negotiations happen. I feel suffocated. I felt less. I felt humiliated. I felt my parents dignity gets compromised by asking permission to take their daughter to her own home.
I strongly believe that this is a violation of my human rights. And this is the root cause of gender discrimination.
Gender discrimination starts even before a child is born. Parents and family members expecting a son, live an anxious life for nine months. Parents invest more in their sons than daughters. Let’s not dismiss the argument by saying, “Not all parents do it.” Our sex ratio is consistently declining.
One invests where a good return is expected. A daughter is considered ‘paraya dhan’(literally translates to ‘estranged wealth,’ but culturally refers to daughters never really being part of their family of birth, but rather possessions to be bought over). Not only metaphorically, but we literally behave as if women in our society are objects and commodities.
Parents don’t prefer to drink water at their married daughter’s place, forget about supporting them. Daughters aren’t even considered to be able to take care of parents at their old age, though our law clearly puts the responsibility on both son and daughter. Instead, society shames the daughter and parents who break this.
The same has happened to me. When my mother passed away, and I started taking care of my father, it became an issue. For every small thing, my in-laws accused my father for no reason. They blamed him for destroying my married life.
The truth was he was struggling with depression and needed emotional support. If I can’t take a stand for my father during his bad days and if society expects me to be a loving daughter-in-law in place of that, it’s highly laughable. If I can’t be a daughter, how will I be a daughter-in-law?
I had once started a campaign called #DaughterForever to start a public dialogue on this issue. I am still struggling to convince people that it’s an issue and a big one at that. It’s one of the most important factors that creates gender discrimination and is a reason for women’s suffering. As daughters aren’t allowed to take care of their birth parents, they become liability for them.
Through my campaign, I am asking insurance companies to create appreciative commercials that show daughters can be also primary caretakers of their parents, just like their brothers. You can read more about it here.
One of my tweet threads citing reasons, statistics, and pros and cons of the issue can be read below:
I strongly appeal to everyone to speak to their mothers, sisters and friends to find out their struggles and suffocation they go through just to meet their parents, in the initial years of their marriage . Don’t you think it’s a violation of my human rights as a daughter?
I hope someone will hear me out and acknowledge that this is a problem. A very big problem that causes gender discrimination at every level.
