| Day
1 | 9 February
The public meeting on 9 February 2007 was without
doubt the highlight of the three-day 5th Annual
Meeting of the Network of Women, India, which
concluded in Bangalore on 11 February. The event,
which drew a large and diverse audience from the
city, was made extra special by the exceptional
and distinctive speeches by chief guest Gloria
Steinem and special guest Ruth Manorama, as
well as the poignant yet inspirational launch
of the Anupama Jayaraman Memorial Award for Young
Women Journalists, won in this inaugural year
by Smita Aggarwal.
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Ruth Manorama, a well-known activist promoting women’s
rights, particularly among the urban poor and dalits,
whose work over three decades was rewarded with
the prestigious Right Livelihood Award last year,
gave away the new media award. She highlighted several
home truths about the media in her characteristic,
inimitable style, which drew appreciative responses
from the audience. While acknowledging the media’s
service to society, she underlined the of reporting
the truth and nothing but the truth because “only
the truth shall set us free.”
Referring to media coverage of issues concerning
the urban poor, who constitute a sizeable proportion
of the country’s population, she pointed out
that while events like slum demolitions do sometimes
capture the imagination of the media, little attention
is paid to the multiple, valid, often preventable
reasons that drive poor people from rural areas
into urban slums or to the many ongoing efforts
to secure justice for them.
Casteless, classless and gender-equal society
On the question of caste and the media, she pointed
out that it was important to pay serious attention
to the scarce presence and skewed representation
of dalits in the media. She described the marginalisation
of Dr. Babasaheb R. Ambedkar, the main architect
of the Constitution of India, during the early
post-independence period and drew attention to
the way Kanshi Ram, founder of the Bahujan Samaj
Party, was written off as a casteist leader whose
death in 2006 did not merit front page coverage
in some leading newspapers.
She also made light
references to media responses to the news that
she had been conferred with what is often known
as the alternative Nobel Prize, pointing out that
the Kannada media paid far more attention to it
than the English media. According to her, despite
the fact that friends in national television channels
often call her for brief comments on various current
events and issues, none of the channels interviewed
her in any depth after she received the award:
“Maybe my colour is not suitable for TV,”
she said – only partly in jest.
In conclusion she called for more diversity in
the media so that it becomes accessible to dalits,
adivasis and minority communities and thereby
truly represents Indian society. She ended by
challenging the NWMI to help break stereotypes
and thereby contribute to the struggle towards
a “casteless, classless and gender-equal
society.”
The thought-provoking, applause-producing
and laughter-generating keynote address by internationally
renowned feminist writer and activist Gloria Steinem
covered a vast canvas. “The Current Campfire,”
the title of her talk, refers to the long tradition
of people gathering around campfires to sing and
dance, and to share stories and information.
Describing the media as “the current campfire”
she said the question of whether human beings
become “empathetic, peaceful and supportive
of each other’s welfare or narcissistic,
dominant and convinced that life is a zero sum
game” depends to a large extent on “the
kinds of campfires we, our families and our communities
grow up with.” In many cultures most women
and certain groups of men were relegated to the
task of keeping the fire going and restrained
from telling their stories at the campfire. However,
thanks to women and supportive men in the media,
the circle of those who speak has slowly been
enlarged and this has changed what is being learnt
by everyone.
“We are also beginning to learn that we
have a collective human history in which everyone
sat around the fire and everyone was heard, when
we told news and sang, and our voices were valued
for their usefulness to the whole group –
not just the group into which we were born,”
she said.
According to her, it is important to recall the
95 per cent of human history that predates patriarchy,
which has been in existence over the past five
to eight thousand years, so that it is clear that
things have not always been this way and need
not always be this way. We are finally beginning
to understand that there were other forms of human
organisation during 95 per cent of human history,
she said, pointing out that knowledge about these
“original cultures” is important not
only to the female half of the human race but
also to the races and classes of males who were
also suppressed and made to serve the so-called
superior groups.
Post-patriarchal, post-monotheistic,
post-nationalistic age
“I want to excite your curiosity about thinking
of the whole span of human history instead of
just 5000 years or so and to understand that patriarchy
and monotheism are very new,” she said.
“In fact, perhaps we should tonight declare
the past 5000 years of patriarchy, political forms
of religion… and nationalism as an experiment
that failed. And declare this as the first meeting
of the post-patriarchal, post-monotheistic, post-nationalistic
age!”
Returning to the concept of the media as “the
current campfire,” she reiterated the fact
that women and “wrong” groups of men
have been keeping the fire going but prevented
from speaking around it. Pointing out that a society
that is deprived of a large part – indeed
more than half -- of its wisdom is going to be
in trouble, she said: “We are now in big
trouble.”
Describing the status of women and coverage of
events and issues in the US media, she said the
gendered view of the world which has led to the
division of news into “hard” and “soft”
can be seen in the way Oprah, “arguably
the most influential media person in the US,”
is condescended to by “serious voices”
in the media who “talk with sorrow about
the Oprah-fication of the news.” According
to her, by that they just mean that she is discussing
most of human experience and that she dares to
use narrative – not just generalisations,
not just figures, not just two opposite poles
fighting over an issue: “She dares to take
seriously the subjects that affect most of our
lives.”
She also highlighted the many important stories
that remain unreported or incompletely covered
by the media because of this partial view of the
world. She called upon the media to recognise
that there are not just two sides to every question,
that everything is not about winners and losers,
that it is important to focus on solutions as
much as problems, and that narratives are just
as relevant – if not more – than statistics
and analysis even while tackling serious issues.
“Altogether, as you can see, we have a
big job in gathering the whole human family around
our various media campfires, with voices that
are not prejudged, not excluded, with all ears
open and with everybody tending the fire –
not just a particular set of groups,” she
said. “We are not doing this only because
of the great talent in this room, we are not doing
it only because of the female half of the human
population, we are not doing it only to free and
allow the full circle of human qualities to be
accessible to men as well as women, we are doing
it to save this fragile spaceship earth that we
love so much.”
WHO, WHAT, WHEN
The public meeting held in the evening was preceded
by an afternoon session featuring two sets of
films: excerpts from two films (July Boys and
The ‘M’ Way) from the “Coding
Culture” series focusing on Bangalore’s
software industry, directed by Gautam Sonti and
Carol Upadhya, and Suttaru Solloppadavaru (Burnt
not destroyed), on acid attacks against women,
directed by Sanjana C.B. and Usha B.N. The film-makers
were present to introduce their films and interact
with participants.
Earlier in the day participants took part in
an interactive introductory session. Nearly 100
women journalists from nine states (Andhra Pradesh,
Delhi, Gujarat, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra,
Manipur, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal) participated
in the NWMI meet – all but one of them paying
their own way to Bangalore. Among them were 20
women involved in community media – print,
radio and video – in Andhra Pradesh (Pastapur
and Chittoor). In addition, there were four South
Asian journalist participants (from the Maldives,
Pakistan and Sri Lanka), who also came on their
own steam. Ten media students and two international
observers from outside the region also attended
the meeting.
Day
2 | 10 February
Saturday morning saw participants benefiting from
two sessions that were specially tailored to address
health-related issues faced by professional women
in general and journalists in particular: one
through yoga (led by Vishalakshi of the Atmadarshan
Yogashram) and the other through an interactive
session on nutrition for women on the go (by Sheela
Krishnaswamy of Niche4Nutrition, a nutrition consultancy
firm).
The first working session of the day was a panel
discussion on “The Media, IT/ITES/ICTs and
Gender.” Social anthropologist Carol Upadhya,
who has been researching various aspects of the
IT industry and IT workforce in Bangalore, presented
an overview of gender issues in the Indian software
outsourcing industry. Psychologist Manika Ghosh,
who has been involved in counselling ITES sector
employees, provided a glimpse of the range of
issues faced by female call centre workers. Kavitha
Kadambi, a software professional, spoke from her
personal experience and observation of the role
and impact of women in the IT industry over various
stages of its development. Anita Gurumurthy, founding
member and executive director of IT for Change,
spoke of the need to look beyond the IT/ITES industries
to appreciate the potential of information and
communication technologies for women’s empowerment,
especially at the grassroots.
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In the next session, Sri Lankan journalists Dilrukshi
Handunnetti (Editor, Investigations Desk, The
Morning Leader) and Seetha Ranjani (senior journalist
and member of the Free Media Movement) spoke about
the long-standing and now escalating conflict
in the island nation and media coverage of it
both within the country and in neighbouring India.
While Dilrukshi provided background information
on the conflict and critiqued media coverage,
Seetha’s presentation focussed on her work
on the nearly 38,000 war widows in Sri Lanka belonging
to different communities, including widows of
the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and
the Sri Lankan armed forces.
There were two parallel sessions in the afternoon
– one exploring issues faced by women in
the Kannada media in times of globalisation, and
the other on the experiences of rural women working
in community media. The former had Dr. Vijaya,
senior journalist, in the chair and R. Poornima,
editor, Udayavani, in the role of moderator. Among
the other speakers were C.G. Manjula, Gayatri
Devi, Savitri, H.N. Arathi and Champavathi. The
latter featured print journalists involved in
bringing out Navodayam, a magazine for rural women
in Chittoor district, Andhra Pradesh, as well
as the radio and video women of the Community
Media Trust, Pastapur, AP. Two short films on
the work of the latter, The Sangham Shot and A
Radio of Their Own were screened during the session
An optional session with a woman artist and a woman
art collector took place in the evening at a city
art gallery.Artist Shanthamani, whose exhibition
was on at Gallerie Sumukha, made an audio-visual
presentation about her evolution as an artist and
the themes and media she has explored over time.
Well-known industrialist Kiran Mazumdar Shaw (chairperson
and managing director of Biocon Ltd.) talked about
her love of contemporary art and continuing efforts
to support and promote it.
Day
3 | 11 February
Sunday morning began with more yoga, followed
by an interactive session on ergonomics, focusing
particularly on lower back pain – a common
complaint among women to which journalists are
particularly vulnerable – led by Dr. Kalyan
of Manipal Hospital.
The rest of the morning was devoted to discussions
among participants on issues relating to the network
at the local and national levels, as well as plans
for the future. There were animated debates about
the network’s structure, systems, membership,
communication (including via e-groups and the
website) and activities.
The discussions included the possibility of working
towards a network of women media professionals
in South Asia (which had been mooted during the
2006 NWMI meeting in Kolkata when media women
from the region participated in a panel discussion).
Aminath Najib of the Maldives spoke about the
overall media situation in her country and the
importance of such linkages, while Seetha Ranjani
talked about the fledgling network of women journalists
in Sri Lanka and their eagerness to establish
contacts across the region. Sahar Ali, a journalist
currently working with Panos in Pakistan, described
the background to the proposal to facilitate a
coming together of women in media in South Asia.
Sunday afternoon witnessed two parallel sessions:
one titled “Production, Property, Propriety
and the Media,” and the other on emerging
opportunities and challenges in media professions.
The former, conceptualised and presented by the
Alternative Law Forum, featured presentations
by Lawrence Liang, Namita Malhotra and Siddharth
Narrain on different aspects of the interface
between the law and the media in a rapidly changing
media landscape. The latter had media professionals
from public and private broadcast media, new media,
as well as publishing, speaking about their respective
fields: Malavika Ganesan of Zee Kannada, Chandramouli
from Doordarshan, Padmavathi from All India Radio,
Jimmy Xavier of Radio Fever, Subbu Vincent of
India Together (e-journal), and Jamuna Rao of
Dronequill Publishers.
A final wrap-up session revisited decisions made
in the morning session, assigning specific tasks
and deadlines to different people. Thanks to the
enthusiasm of the sizeable contingent from Pune,
it was decided that the next annual meeting would
take place there in February 2008.
A more detailed report on the NWMI meet will
follow as will the texts of speeches and presentations
made available for posting.
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