For Laxmi Bhil (23), the Bhil Adivasi Sarpanch (President), Kabra Village Council, Bhilwara District, Rajasthan, contesting elections was both taxing and rewarding. A nursing student, Laxmi […]
In 15 of the 86 constituencies where the general elections will be held tomorrow, more than 30% of voters are impacted by the Forest Rights Act. We look at how the loss of forests impacts the lives and livelihoods of Adivasi women
For Lokamma (30), a Dalit woman leader, who won her seat in Hokarna Panchayat in Bidar district, in the Gram Panchayat elections in December 2020 in […]
When Mamta (26), was elected to Jayadara Gram Panchayat ( lowest tier in India’s 3 tier local governance system) in Sirohi district of Rajasthan in 2015, […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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. […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
Married against her wishes at 11 to her dead sister’s husband, Sidhamallamma Kanchappa gave birth to her first child at home when she was 12. It […]
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 […]
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 […]
