A Tale of Two Panels: Vrinda Marwah | Kafila
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media | politics | dissent Home Submissions About Comments policy A Tale of Two Panels: Vrinda Marwah S E A R C H F O L L O W @ K A F I L A O N T W I T T E R MARCH 9, 2013 type and press enter Follow @kafila by Shuddhabrata Sengupta tags: International Women's Day, Justice Verma Committee Report, Kafila 38K likes marital rape, Misogyny L A S T 1 5 P O S T S Guest Post by Vrinda Marwah Like Page On 6th March, in the run up to International Women’s Day, I was involved in two panel discussions on women’s rights, both adrenalin-raising but for entirely different reasons. As : Be the first of your friends someone who has been working in feminist organisations, and who, like so many others, is trying to like this to be active and simultaneously make sense of the agitations and conversations following the Whose Terror, Delhi gang rape, I decided to write about this experience because it was so revealing about how Whose power operates. Join 71,782 other followers Powerlessness? The second panel, which I will talk about first, was in the United Nations Information Center, Enter your email address Milind Wani from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM approx., organized by the New Delhi hub of the Global Shapers Enter your email address Community of the World Economic Forum, on issues of women’s safety in Delhi and practical Slow Rendering of measures that can be taken to address these. I don’t know much about this rather fancy sounding #Stand with an Ache & Mahesh group (in their correspondence with me they describe themselves thus: The Global Shapers JNU Verma’s Community is a network of hubs developed and led by young people who are exceptional in their #StandwithJNU Translation : Prasanta Chakravar potential, achievements and drive to make a contribution to their communities). I was contacted AAP AFSPA Afzal ty by a batch-mate from school and another from college about three weeks prior to the event. Both Guru Ambedkar of them are ‘Shapers’, and asked me to be the ‘youth voice’ on the panel. When they told me about Anna Hazare Civil War in Hindu the line-up (Law Minister, Former DG Police, BJP national secretary, etc), I balked. I told them Arvind Kejriwal Assam Society – Happy the line-up was so pro-establishment that it WAS the establishment, and advised them to bring in Bangladesh Binayak Independence Day! strong feminist voices that could take on and expose a panel as ‘luminous’ as this. I recommended Vrinda Grover, Madhu Mehra, Kavita Krishnan, Kamla Bhasin, amongst others, Sen BJP Capital A Nation for Men: and some young people who work directly with young people. I was assured that there would be punishment in India Kartik Maini a representative from the women’s movement, and that they would reach out to the people I had caste censorship What exactly suggested. I was still reluctant, because I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to, and wouldn’t be Chhattisgarh happened in Jamia allowed to, do justice to a feminist position, in all its strengths and complexities, at such a panel. Communalism Congress Millia Islamia on corruption CPI(M) CPI My colleagues encouraged me to participate, highlighting the need to engage newer, 13th August? Jamia ‘unconverted’ audiences. I agreed also because I felt encouraged that I would have another (Maoist) CPM Dalits Millia feminist ally. But when I was sent the final email invite to the event, the panel was as follows: Delhi Delhi Islamia Students Dr. Ashwani Kumar: Union Minister for Law & Justice Gang Rape Delhi The Mahmood Mr. Prakash Singh: IPS, Former DG police Delhi Farooqui Rape Ms. Vani Tripathi: National Secretary, Bhartiya Janata Party University Conviction – A Ms. Geeta Luthra: Senior Supreme Court Advocate democracy Landmark Verdict: Ms. Madhu Kishwar: Founder Editor of Women’s Journal Manushi Freedom of Speech J Devika & And me (bottom-most in the Order of the Illustrious) and Expression Nivedita Menon Gujarat Gujarat However, nothing prepared me for how extremely one-sided, regressive, and farcical this panel Open Letter against 2002 actually would be. Hindutva Raids in Jamia human rights India The format of the panel, as shared by the moderator, was that everybody would speak in turn Millia Islamia twice, for three minutes each, before the Q&A round. In the first round, panelists would speak on India-Pakistan University Hostels: their area of expertise (I was asked to cover ‘societal mindset’ on gender), and in the second, Indian Media Indian Protesting Students everybody would put forward three tangible short-term solutions. The moderator also decided Muslims Internet from Jamia converted by Web2PDFConvert.com later to allow for responses from panelists to each other in round one. The eventual plan was that Censorship in India Millia Islamia the Shapers would own and take up at least one recommendation from the day, and work Israel JNU jnusu dedicatedly towards it. Noble enough, you say? Kanhaiya Kumar This is how the evening panned out: About 100 people, pre-registered as it was a closed-door ‘by Kashmir Kashmir azadi Kashmir invite only’ event, gathered at the UNIC’s Lodi Estate office. The panel began as expected- with the law minister’s three minutes. I have to give it to the man- his act was a lesson in conflict Kashmir appropriation, evasion, and false appearances. He was calm and composed, and assured the human rights Not Pakistan, but audience that women’s safety was of the ‘highest concern’ to the Prime Minister. He commended Kerala labour the protestors whose ‘voices found expression like in the Arab Spring’, and pointed out that in the Modi has pushed Maoists may awati spirit of deliberation his government, through the ordinance and the latest Criminal Law Kashmir on the media Modi Mumbai Amendment Bill 2013, had demonstrated commitment, and had accepted most of the Brink : Ashok Swain Muslims Nandigram recommendations of the Justice Verma Committee that were ‘reasonable’. When probed by the Statement against moderator, he mentioned that marital rape was too grey an area, comprising views too Narendra RSS attack on nationalism divergent, to be included ‘as of now’. Madhu Kishwar responded to Ashwini Kumar by agreeing Modi journalist Neha wholeheartedly about the non-inclusion of marital rape. She insisted that it could not be proved nepal Pakistan Dixit and (‘will we put CCTV cameras in bedrooms’), that existing laws already covered it (‘we already have Palestine Partition press freedom the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act and others’), and that women could simply rape Rohith walk out of troubled marriages. She expended most of her energies talking about the ‘many, many’ false cases of rape (‘What do you do when a woman, like in Madhur Bhandarkar’s case, is Vemula RSS sleeping with a man for three years because he’s promised her a role, but when things don’t work Section 37 7 secularism : out, she slaps a false rape case’). She would continue to bolster this argument later, including sedition Smriti Irani once by cautioning the audience that all women are not ‘angelic’. sri lanka Democratic I asked to be allowed to respond, and I was I’m afraid every bit the stereotype of the ranting terrorism Umar centralism – feminist. After countering Madhu as best I could, I dismissed the law minister’s speech as ‘cheap Khalid Uttar Pradesh ‘freedom of thought talk’, saying he was trying to make women’s rights something of an empty signifier. I mentioned violence against (sic.) and unity in that while the government had recognized new crimes against women, expanded definitions and women We Are All action’? quantum of punishment in cases of rape, it was most telling that the bastions of public and private Seditious Now West Rajinder Chaudhar patriarchy: immunity against marital rape and rape by security forces, had been left out. I spoke Bengal y about the spirit of the JVC report, which took sexual assault out of a framework of honour and March 2013 shame and put it squarely within a framework of consent, bodily integrity and women’s Cow-Gangs of M T W T F S S autonomy. I spoke on consent a little more, saying that a Yes once is not a Yes forever, and a Akhand Bharat and woman- married, in a relationship, or selling sex- should always have the right to say No. 1 2 3 the Dalit Revolt – 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Hindutva Unravels From then on, it was daggers drawn. Geeta Luthra spoke next, and attacked me for getting my 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 facts wrong (‘consent has long been a framework in our law, JVC is not saying anything new’ and A response to 1819 2021 2223 24 ‘it is not true that all advanced western countries recognize marital rape as a crime, many do not, “Kashmir is including (gasp!) a Nordic country’) She emphasized that India has numerous pro-women laws, 252627 28293031 Feminist Issue” by and is in fact the only country to have an anti-dowry law. Both Madhu and Geeta warned against « Feb Apr » Sonam Mittal: being emotive and rash, speaking indirectly about me, and also against being knee-jerk, speaking Tupur Chatterjee RSS - Posts directly about certain provisions of the JVC report. As the moderator went around, Prakash Singh spoke about the colonial legacy of the police RSS - Comments L A S T 1 5 C O M M E N T S system and the urgent need for its structural overhaul.