By SUMAN GUHA MOZUMDER
NEW DELHI: The Indian government has come under fire from nongovernmental Organizations (NCOs) for “ignoring the real issues” of women in its official document to be presented at the World Women’s Conference in Beijing.
Although the document, called the draft country paper, is awaiting the government’s final clearance, observers say no major change is expected to be made when it is published later this month.
The draft was prepared by the Department of Women and Child Development at the request of the 45-member United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. The commission had asked the governments of the member states to stimulate national debate and hold wide-ranging discussions with NCOs so that the drafts for the Platform of Action would reflect the real situation of women.
The draft has sparked angry reactions from women’s groups, which allege that no attempt was made to hold proper consultations with them before the paper was drafted or to circulate copies of the paper among NCOS to elicit their views.
“The country paper gives the views of only the bureaucrats and totally ignores the real issues and the problems and aspirations of the majority of women in the country,” Ranjana Kumari, director of the Center for Social Research (CSR), an NGO working for underprivileged women, said. “That way, it is misleading.”
Commented Ritambara Shastri, an activist who is going to Beijing as a media representative: “The Indian women’s struggle has not been projected properly in the draft country paper.”
Other women activists alleged that even the changes suggested by various NGOs to the draft paper have been almost ignored by the government.
The draft paper, they said, seeks to put the blame for most of the problems facing a majority of the 270 million Indian women on social attitudes, but it does not say what the government has done to bring about attitudinal changes. It gives a list of projects and plans of the government without any evaluation, they added. “The government report is full of rhetoric and tries to overplay it’s so- called achievements,Kumari said. Sarala Copalan, the recently appointed Secretary of the Department of Women and Child Development, however, declared that the document had focused on gender issues in areas as diverse as energy and rural development.
“A great deal of effort has been put into the making of the draft country paper. We have consulted experts and activists as well as academicians,” she said in a published interview.
S.K. Guha, joint secretary in the department, said India would certainly make efforts to raise a strong voice in favor of the developing countries. “But this has to be done within the G-77 framework,” he said.
But women’s groups apparently are skeptical about the government’s ability to voice the concerns of struggling women. Early this year, a group of seven major Indian women’s organizations held consultations in Delhi to put women’s issues in the “right perspective.” The group, known as the Seven Sisters, has prepared a perspective paper highlighting women’s struggles. The group, which is sending delegates separately, will circulate the paper at the conference. Brinda Karat of the All India Democratic Women’s Association, which is part of the group said this was necessary since the official country paper has totally ignored the basic issues of women.
The government is sending about 55 delegates, most of them women law- makers, to the conference, which will continue till Sept. 15. Besides the Seven Sisters, the Coordination Unit for the conference, an advocacy group that has done a lot of networking with women at the grass-roots level, is sending a 170-member delegation, several of whom are actual grass- roots workers.
The United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) held three key preparatory workshops and a national workshop for the participants early this month to brief them about the major issues that have emerged from the women’s movement in India. The National Work- shop will be held just before the beginning of the Beijing meeting where the NC: Os will get a chance to meet government officials face to face. Sources said that although the government is understood to have made some changes in the draft, it is delaying publishing the report to escape. flak from the NGOs since their major recommendations have not been accepted. Sheila Irani, a nominated member of the Lok Sabha or lower house of Parliament, said the country paper was expected to be tabled in the house next week. ‘We have not been shown the report and I have no idea about what it contains,” Irani, who is going to Beijing as part of the government delegation said.
Kumari said all the NCOs of South Asia will act untidily in Beijing to focus on issues that are peculiar to the women of the region.
But one leftist woman activist said requesting anonymity: “At best, it would be yet another elitist exercise where governments will mouth platitudes and make promises and the NGOS will have just a bystanders’ participation. In view of this, the prospect of achieving much from Beijing is dim.”(.A. 8/25/95).
Article extracted from this publication >> September 1, 1995
