[Reader-list] India: StreeNet - a five- month course on women's rights

[Harsh Kapoor]

The Times of India
October 16, 2003

Women's movements use mouse pad as launch pad
MEENAKSHI SHEDDE
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ MONDAY, JUNE 02, 2003 10:52:03 PM ]
MUMBAI: The Internet is lending wings to activist movements around 
the world. Indian women's activists are speeding past their jholawala 
days, getting Net-savvy, and employing the Web to create faster and 
greater impact.
 
In fact, Akshara, a city-based women's resource centre, has gone one 
step further. In February, it launched StreeNet, a five- month course 
on women's rights and issues, conducted over the Internet. About 50 
women from organisations in Mumbai, Pune, Delhi and Kerala have 
enrolled in the programme.
 
"The course aims to provide women activists a chance to learn about 
women's rights and issues" said Nandita Gandhi of Akshara.
 
"It encourages them to shed their resistance to technology while 
building solidarity." The course is being held in collaboration with 
other NGOs Jagori in New Delhi, Aalochana in Pune and Sakhi in 
Thiruvananthapuram.
 
The students,who have been learning, chatting and writing assignments 
on the Net, met in person in the city last fortnight.
 
"Access to information is the key to women's empowerment," said 
Shabana Azmi, actress-activist-MP, at a recent StreeNet meeting.
 
"It is the revolution we need. When the women's reservation bill came 
up in Parliament, there was not even a proper discussion on it. The 
bill was scuttled by sheer lung power. So, it is important to look at 
alternative means of addressing the issue. Women's groups should 
consider posting Internet sites to help women MPs participate through 
well- informed debates and take the discussions forward. Women can 
then cut across party lines not only on the women's reservation bill, 
but other issues as well."
 
The Internet has considerably boosted activism, connecting people and 
helping petitions to snowball rapidly, largely circumventing physical 
meetings, with enormous savings in time, money and effort.
 
Said journalist and author Kalpana Sharma, "A number of recent 
signature campaigns have been largely e-mail driven. These include 
the campaigns on the bombing of Iraq and the related boycott of 
American goods, the Narmada dam campaign, as well as those on sexual 
harassment and the domestic violence bill. More importantly, during 
the Iraq war, while TV offered the dominant view, one relied on the 
Internet for alternative reports and views on the war."
 
According to Ajit Balakrishnan, chairman of Rediff.com, who made a 
presentation at the meeting, "India has 15-18 million e-mail users. 
Many Web- based e-mail accounts are free, and with the Internet being 
available in every Indian language, its potential in nurturing 
communities of interest is great. However, it is important to 
remember that it is services, not only information, that are true 
community builders."
 
Indeed, the Internet has been used to build and galvanise communities 
challenging global policies affecting women. As Kalpana Vishwanath of 
Jagori pointed out, "In the case of a recent anti-fertility vaccine 
that was deemed unsuitable, NGOs mobilised an Internet campaign and 
got the World Health Organisation to slow down the research for it, 
so that it cannot be marketed easily. During the Taliban occupation 
of Afghanistan, the Revolutionary Association of the Women of 
Afghanistan regularly put out information on ground realities, which 
lobby groups used to pressurise the US into action. During a campaign 
last November to reduce violence against women, joint protests were 
launched by a number of groups associated with the South Asian 
Network of Gender Activists and Trainers, in Islamabad, Karachi, 
Lahore, Mumbai, Baroda, Hyderabad, Calcutta, Colombo, Dhaka, 
Kathmandu and elsewhere."
 
E-mail and e-group-driven campaigns are finding an echo nearer home 
as well. Said Medha Kotwal of Aalochana, "Recently, when the local 
authorities in Nippani, Maharashtra, attacked and drove out the sex 
workers, NGOs used the Net to mobilise activists in Mumbai and 
Delhi,who went to Nippani to protest. Now the sex workers have 
returned. Similarly, following protests in the Baroda case of sexual 
harassment of a student by her academic guide, the case was converted 
into a public interest litigation by the Supreme Court."