For Women In India

(Guwahati) “I work in the social justice sector. I started my career in a women’s rights organisation and have continued to work there for the last 17 years. As of now I am responsible for different kinds of tasks in the organization including management-related work. My focus area is on gender-based discrimination and violence against women, especially, issues like domestic violence, witch hunting, and sexual harassment at the workplace. 
In the 1970s and early 1980s, everyone including women in our family, were volunteering for the Assam movement led by the student leaders. I was also taken for these “raasta roko” and “rail roko” protests to assert our rights. Also, I saw this culture of volunteering. In my family, my aunt, grandmother and my mother volunteered for women’s societies and gave vocational trainings on sewing and knitting or making of pickles and jams. I knew I wanted to work on women related issues beyond these vocational trainings.
When I was a student, I had to visit a…

(Shillong) “I have been working here for several years. Tourists from all over the world come here.”

(Guwahati) “I am the Executive Director of a non-profit organisation. A friend and I started this organisation in 1995 in Guwahati. Now we have six offices, two offices each in Assam, Meghalaya and Nagaland. Our organisation works on a few key themes.
One is gender-based discrimination and violence against women. We are astounded at the extent of domestic violence taking place in North-East. There is patriarchal functioning even in the matrilineal system. Men have decided that they rule the roost. All the idioms and phrases or any norm that is followed in the society is highly patriarchal in character. I talked to a lot of rural women and saw good leadership qualities in these women. So, my colleagues and I taught them how to research on issues related to domestic violence and the same women wrote a wonderful book called “Unheard” which compiled and noted all cultural references, idioms, phrases that are used in Assamese language, which look at women very negatively, because whenever d…

(Patna) “I own a boutique. While, I have been working for over 20 years, I have not had formal training in fashion designing. Nobody in the same business was keen to help out. I taught myself hands-on. Still I didn’t face too many problems when I started. My husband was also very supportive. I get a lot of satisfaction out of my work and I enjoy it.”