Adivasi Women Collectives Busting Misinformation

Tribal women in Rajasthan’s Ujala Samooh, including ASHA workers, lead efforts to dispel COVID-19 myths, ensure healthcare access, and advocate for welfare in rural India.


COVID-19: Intra-State Migrants Marooned Too

Thousands of families of intra-state migrants are stranded on the margins of Guntur’s world-renowned chilli farms, scrambling to live on a meagre supply of grains and […]


Women Continue To Be Underrepresented in Delhi Assembly

Delhi Vidhan Sabha, the elected body of the National Capital Territory of Delhi, has a dismal representation of women. Only 9% of the elected MLAs in […]


Why A Feminist Engagment With Constitution Is Necessary

Seventy years ago, on 26th January 1950, India’s constitution came into force. The constituent assembly which started its debates on 9th December 1946, took 2 years […]


Women Resist Against India’s Citizenship Laws

‘Jamia ki ladkiyon ne raasta dikhaya hai, toh Jamia ki ladkiyon ko Inqualab Zindabad’ [ Jamia’s women have shown us the way, so revolutionary greetings to […]


NRC-CAA : More Legal Feet required on the Ground

India is seeing a massive countrywide resistance against discriminatory citizenship measures and women are leading it. Women across states have been resisting on the streets, inside […]


Why are Politically Inactive Students Like Me On The Streets?

Debsmita Chaudhury (24) has no regrets. On the contrary, she is quite proud of herself for using the most important platform of her life to stage […]


“Women Of AMU Will Keep The Resistance Alive” Tazeen Junaid

Tazeen Junaid (18) believes she has a duty to keep the resistance against the discriminatory and exclusionary citizenship laws alive in Aligarh Muslim University.  On 15th […]


Women of Shaheen Bagh Are Fighting For The Soul of this Country

Saima Khan (33) is heartbroken and angry.  “ I cannot explain in words my pain when I am asked as a Muslim to prove my citizenship […]


Where Are The Equal Rights For Adivasi Women?

For Bitiya Murmu (40), a Santhal Adivasi woman leader in Jharkhand, personal has become political. For the last ten years, she has been fighting a long […]


Women’s Political Participation Sees A Steady Increase In Jharkhand

Women’s political representation in Jharkhand has seen a constant upward surge since the state came into existence in 2000. The proportion of women Members of Legislative […]


Haryana’s Women Carve a Larger Role in The State’s Politics

In Haryana, a state with a skewed sex ratio (913 girls to 1000 boys, an improvement from 830 girls in 2011), there is one gender indicator […]


Women Hold Fewer Ministerial Positions In State Governments

Telangana, the newest state in Southern India, finally has women ministers in the state’s council of ministers for the first time in its history. In a […]


Krishnaveni’s Story And The Era Of Women Panchayat Presidents

P Krishnaveni remembers the night of 13 June, 2011, clear as day. Barely 200 m from her home of 15 years, in front of a local […]


First Time Adivasi MP Hopes To Be The Voice Of People

Goddeti Madhavi (26), the first time Member of Parliament (MP) from Araku in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh (AP) knows the trust that her constituents […]


The Triumph Of Sharmila Devi And Tamil Nadu’s Women Leaders

Sharmila Devi (39), the youngest dalit sarpanch of Thirumanvayal panchayat in southern Tamil Nadu’s Sivagangai district, has pulled off what none of her upper-caste, male predecessors […]


Meagre Funds, No Salary: How Tamil Nadu’s Women Leaders Still Succeed

What is it like to do a full-time job without a salary? Especially if you are a dalit or an adivasi woman and your daily earnings […]


Why Muthukanni, A Dalit, Had To Build Her Own Panchayat Office

It wasn’t personal ambition that drove K Muthukanni to stand for election as panchayat president from Madhavakurichi in Mannur block of southern Tamil Nadu’s Tirunelveli district. […]


Tamil Nadu’s Women Leaders Live, Work In The Shadow Of Violence

Even by normal standards of violence in Tamil Nadu’s panchayat politics, the events of March 29, 2001, were troubling. Menaka, 35, the feisty dalit president of […]


Why 277,160 Women Leaders Remain Invisible To Tamil Nadu’s Political Parties

Salma (50), the deputy secretary of the women’s wing of Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), is among the few women to have made the transition from rural […]


Why Ashubi Khan’s Pioneering Run Ends Today

Ashubi Khan, 51, is distraught. A decade of trailblazing work done by this tall, soft-spoken sarpanch (village chief) and her team of seven illiterate women–and three literate […]


When I step into the Parliament, I carry the voices of 10 lakh people of Araku: Madhavi Goddeti

Madhavi Goddeti may be a first time Member of Parliament (MP) in the newly elected Lok Sabha but she is no stranger to politics. The 26 […]


Illiterate, Married at 11, Mother At 12: Panchayat President Now Changes Fates

Despite limited resources and social resistance, Sidhamallamma Kanchappa, a panchayat leader from Tamil Nadu, has become a champion for women’s health.


In A Sylvan Valley, One Woman Reveals, Changes Lives Obscured By Beauty

Nestled in a sylvan valley in northwestern Tamil Nadu and surrounded by forests, the village council, or panchayat, of Sittilinghi struggled to bring to state attention […]


The Woman Who Brought Drinking Water, Toilets To A Lost Panchayat

Mazharkodi Dhanasekar has a radiant smile and is keen to talk about her achievements, which, as it emerges, are considerable: Building 650 toilets and making her […]


In Bihar’s Political Realignment, Women Suffer

As a first-time member of the legislative assembly (MLA) in Bihar, Jyothi Devi, 46, did well over her five-year term: She had 10 bridges—some of which were demanded […]


From Proxies To Politicians: Bihar’s Female MLAs

Thirty five years ago, Bhagirathi Devi was a sweeper in the block development office in Narkatiyaganj, a town in Bihar’s West Champaran district. Today, she is a third-term […]