People's Democracy

(Weekly Organ of the Communist Party of India (Marxist)

Vol. XXXI

No. 37

September 16, 2007

AIDWA Delhi State Conference Held

 

Maimoona Mollah

 

THE ninth conference of Delhi JMS was held on August 7-9, 2007. The venue was named as Kanak Mukherjee Nagar. The conference was attended by over 250 delegates, besides delegates from fraternal organisations and invitees from other women’s organisations in Delhi.

 

The conference started with flag hoisting, saluting the martyrs and passing a condolence resolution in memory of Kanak Mukherjee, Eva Mehta and all those who lost their lives in the democratic movement.

 

The conference was inaugurated by vice president of AIDWA and Rajya Sabha MP, Brinda Karat. Brinda spoke about growth of the organisation in the last 25 years and said it was good that the guilty in the Bombay bomb blasts case were being punished but talked of the government’s double standards in not implementing the SriKrishna commission’s report.

 

REPORT

 

The general secretary of Delhi JMS, Ashalata was injured in a demonstration against the killing of CPI(M) activists in the land movement in Andhra Pradesh. Therefore, three secretariat members – Ashalata, Sehba Farooqui and Asha Sharma, shared the placing of the report.

 

The report noted with concern the increasing violence on women in Delhi and the near collapsing public distribution system. The report also emphasised the need to strengthen the organisation by focusing on expanding membership, setting up more units and developing young activists.

 

After the report was placed, the delegates spoke on the report. Most of the discussion centred on violence on women, PDS, condition of schools in the resettlement colonies and local issues in the colonies. The delegates also spoke of gender-selection at birth and the immense pressure on women to give birth to a male child. The delegates said dowry system has devalued women as commodities.

 

RESOLUTIONS AND COMMISSIONS

 

Several resolutions were passed in the conference – on price rise, against imperialism and on local issues. Three commissions were set up to discuss issues in depth – on Violence against women, public distribution system and self help groups.

 

The commission on public distribution system discussed the issues like the difficulty in procuring a ration card, dwindling number of fair price shops, the fair price shops do not open often enough, not supplying full ration, taking bribe even to make an entry in the ration card, abusing women, asking for identity proof even when you produce the ration card, no ration for APL card holders etc. All the delegates were against the targeted PDS.

 

The discussion in the commission on violence against women centred round domestic violence and violence at workplace, dowry harassment, rape, gender-selection at birth in favour of boys.

 

The commission on self help groups emphasised on expanding the Himmat base in Delhi. The discussants also were concerned about the nationalised banks’ lack of sensitivity to the whole concept of self-help even in opening an account in the bank.

 

There were lively songs and dances presented by the delegates. On the second day, Jan Sanskirti performed a mime show and there were street plays by Jana Natya Manch.

 

AIDWA all India general secretary, Sudha Sundararaman commended the Delhi committee for their cooperation and support to the centre. She also spoke of class discrimination in Delhi’s residential areas and the facilities available.
AIDWA vice president, Kalindi Deshpande recalled how the organisation in Delhi started with a mere eleven members. She exhorted the conference to now cross the one lakh mark.

 

AIDWA assistant secretary, Jagmati talked about honour killings in Haryana, which she said were an attack on women’s right of choice.

 

CREDENTIAL REPORT

 

The delegation was a mix of new and old membership (there were 55 delegates who have joined the organisation in the last three years). Most of the delegates were office bearers at the unit level (87). While most of the delegates to the conference belonged to working class families, (106), there were very few working women as delegates. Most of the delegates (142) were in the age group of 31-55. There were two delegates who were 16 years of age. The oldest delegates were Shanti Bua (78) and Aparna Roy (79). While there were three scholar delegates (who had PhD degrees) and many who were postgraduates, there were as many as 73 delegates who were non-literate. This was an issue of concern.Most of the delegates were married (166).Muslim delegates numbered 27 and dalits 13.
Greetings were extended to the conference by fraternal organisations and several women’s organisations in Delhi – Lalitha Balakrishnan from AIWC, Sarah Mehdi from JWP, Kalpana David from YWCA, and Gauri Chaudhury from Action India.

 

FUTURE TASKS

 

Following are some of the future tasks the conference has set for the organisation:

 

The conference elected a 45- member state committee. A 17-member secretariat was also elected. Sehba Farooqui was elected the new general secretary and Sonia Verma the new president.