People's Democracy

• Women for respect and equal citizenship, NOT for violence and discrimination.
• Women for fundamental social change, NOT for fundamentalist attacks on democracy and secularism.
• Women for structural transformation for equality, NOT for structural adjustment based on exploitation.
• Women for peace, security and national sovereignty, NOT for terror, war and national slavery.

THESE are the themes for the sixth national conference of the All India Democratic Women’s Association (AIDWA) being held in Vishakhapatnam from November 24 to 27. The 900 delegates who will attend the conference were elected through a process which involved thousands of women, from the unit to the state level throughout the country, who participated in conferences at different levels of the organisation. The national conference has a special significance because it marks 20 years of the formation of the AIDWA in Chennai in 1981. From a membership of about 8 lakhs in as many states, the membership has gone up to 59 lakhs in 22 states.

The inaugural address will be delivered by AIDWA patron and veteran leader Ahilya Rangnekar. The chief guest is Dr Vina Mazumdar, scholar, activist and author of the seminal Status of Women Report 1975. She had inaugurated the first conference of AIDWA, and it is only appropriate that she should be the chief guest at a conference marking two decades of the AIDWA’s work.

The inaugural session will have a special section entitled "Women as Agents of Social Change" when women activists from different social sections who symbolise specific struggles and issues, which AIDWA has been involved in for the last so many years, will speak of their experiences. They include Gondavi, a tribal activist from Tripura who has fought terrorism; Subhadra Basumatary from Assam who was declared a witch and who resisted and survived because of help by activists like Prajapati; a delegate from Midnapore (West Bengal) who fought against political violence; Ramrati, an agricultural worker from Bihar who has led land struggles; Aragamma from Tamilnadu, a brave Dalit woman who has fought practices of untouchablity; Pravin from Mumbai who fought against the communal forces and also stood for equal rights for all women; and Rani from Andhra Pradesh who bravely withstood police attacks in the historic struggle against electricity rate hikes.

These brave women will share the dais with a representative of the Revolutionary Association of Women of Afghanistan (RAWA), the courageous women’s group which has fought against the Taliban in Afghanistan. Provided that her travel is permitted by the respective governments, Samina Kabir of the RAWA will be an honoured guest at the conference and will address the delegates in the inaugural session.

The AIDWA has also been privileged by the generous donation of a brilliant exhibition of photographs by P Sainath, a well known journalist, whose writings on poverty and discrimination have been the most scathing indictment and exposure of the present system. The exhibition portrays the myriad forms of work done by rural women workers, both paid and unpaid. The exhibition will be inaugurated a day before the conference begins, on November 23, by an agricultural woman worker who herself is a subject in the exhibition. Sainath will also be present.

The conference will discuss two reports to be presented by the general secretary Brinda Karat, the first on women’s status in the context of international and national developments and the second on AIDWA’s work and organisation in the three years since the last conference. The reports have been made available to the delegates before the conference to enable their informed participation in the discussions. The reports are available in English, Hindi, Bengali, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu, Marathi and Kannada.

Following the adoption of the reports, the conference will hold seven commissions which will discuss a range of issues. These will include the experience of self-help groups in different states, struggles against violence in its various forms, communal politics and rights of minority community women, impact of liberalisation on women’s employment, issues of peasant women, impact of globalisation of culture on women and other issues.

Veteran leaders like Kanak Mukherjee, Mangaleshwari Deb Barma, Papa Umanath and Manjari Gupta will address the conference on November 26, as will leaders of fraternal organisations. The conference will greatly miss AIDWA president, inspiration and guide, Suseela Gopalan, who is unable to attend because of a grave illness.

Meanwhile, the reception committee headed by a veteran leader and heroine of the Telangana struggle, M Swarajyam, has been conducting a widespread campaign in the city and surrounding areas. Led by Swarajyam, groups of women are busy conducting a house to house campaign, holding street corner meetings and cultural shows to take the message of the conference to the people. These groups include hundreds of AIDWA activists along with AIDWA state president Punyavathi, general secretary Pavani and district secreteray Bhagyalaxmi. There has been tremendous public support for the campaign. The reception committee includes elected members from the city as well as well known personalities who have extended their support.

The conference will end on November 27 with a public meeting to be addressed by leaders of the organisation.