It’s time we celebrate love as the purest emotion between two individuals. It’s time we celebrate our Constitution for promising equality for all At its core lies a clash between constitutional guarantees and societal morality (Amal KS/HT PHOTO) In a week when the Delhi High Court (HC) is hearing a clutch of petitions seeking legal recognition of same-sex marriage, it is telling that Dabur recalled an ad celebrating Karwa Chauth. The ad gave fresh offence to the usual suspects with its new twist to the old festival where instead of a wife fasting for her husband’s long life, two women fast…

Hello and welcome to Mind the Gap, a newsletter that adds perspective to the gender developments of the week. Only 268 of 2,839 Congress candidates — just 9.4% — who have contested a state election since 2017 were women (ANI) THE BIG STORY Priyanka’s great gamble Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s promise to field 40% women candidates in the Uttar Pradesh (UP) assembly election has sparked hope in a political landscape stubbornly dominated by men. Priyanka’s announcement goes against the grain of the Congress’s own shabby record, write Gilles Vernier and Avishek Jha. Only 268 of 2,839 Congress candidates —…

Justice in one case does not signal the end of crimes against Dalit women. But it does signal one tiny step forward in a longer march against caste hierarchy. Dalit women face sexual abuse daily, said Manjula Pradeep, convenor, National Council of Women Leaders. When rape survivors try to file police complaints, they are accused of filing false cases. “They don’t see us as human beings. The impunity is widespread,” she said. (PTI) At 16, she wanted to be a teacher like her father and left home to enroll in a training course — the first Dalit girl from her…

From regressive comments on modern women to an obvious — and widening — gulf between girls and boys, the gender divide at home and at work appears to be deepening in India and the world India is home to the world’s largest number of single women, but this is not a homogeneous group (Getty Images/iStockphoto) The Big Story: The dreaded modern woman “Modern Indian women want to stay single, are unwilling to give birth even after marriage and desire children by surrogacy.” With these remarks made on the occasion of World Mental Health Day, Karnataka’s health minister Sudhakar K, who holds a…

This week saw child marriage back in the news. This and the Bombay High Court’s new guidelines on sexual harassment at the workplace are worrying developments. Child marriage is India’s enduring shame and we are home to the largest number of child brides in the world, with 1.5 million girls under 18 married every year, according to Unicef. Representative Image. (Manoj Kumar/Hindustan Times) This week saw child marriage back in the news when Rajasthan governor, Kalraj Mishra, sent back a bill for the registration of such marriages for further legal examination, reports Sachin Saini. The bill was passed by the assembly on…

In India and parts of the world, women have had reason to celebrate this week. But systemic gender issues in a largely patriarchal society remain As of January 2019, women make up 3.8% of the Indian Army, billed as the second-largest in the world. (Hindustan Times) For 67 years, the National Defence Academy (NDA) has remained an all-boys military training ground for the Indian Army, Navy and Air Force. That’s about to change. Forward march This past week, the central government told the Supreme Court (SC) that the Pune-based military academy was ready to welcome its first batch of girls. But, it…

MeToo has a powerful message for women too, that of solidarity and a continuum. Feminist organising goes back to the reform movements of the 19th century. It has not always been united but we have seen its effectiveness through the anti-rape and anti-dowry movements of the 1970s and 1980s to the anti-rape upsurge in 2012. We know that we are linked with the past. We know that we are not alone. Was the movement flawed? Indeed, it was. In a country where over 90% of employed women work in the informal sector, where were the voices of the factory workers,…

Music was an act of resistance for the girls in Afghanistan’s first all-women orchestra. Some managed to leave the country, but others lie low, their future uncertain, as they await clarity from the Taliban Zohra, Afghan women’s orchestra, performs during the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit in New Delhi, in 2017. (HT Archive) When she came to India as part of the first all-female orchestra in the history of Afghanistan, Maram Ataee was just a girl of 15. The ensemble, Zohra, named after the Persian goddess of music, was performing at the 2017 Hindustan Times Leadership Summit and had already made…

A world that comprises diverse human beings across religion, caste, gender, class, geography, ideology, cannot be governed by a singular set of upper class, dominant caste, majority religion men The photograph also acknowledges a new generation of women who are aspirational, driven and, given the opportunity, as likely to succeed as men. We have just seen it in sport where women have returned from Tokyo with medals. (PTI) The photograph should be framed in every law school, preserved for history books and written about in inspirational tracts for children. It’s the one where four women judges — three freshly elevated,…

A world that comprises diverse human beings across religion, caste, gender, class, geography, ideology, cannot be governed by a singular set of upper class, dominant caste, majority religion men, I write in the Hindustan Times Making History: In 71 years, the Supreme Court has had only 8 women judges. Then, in a single day, three new appointments. Pic courtesy: Bar&Bench The photograph should be framed in every law school, preserved for history books and written about in inspirational tracts for children. It’s the one where four women judges — three freshly elevated, one of whom, BV Nagarathna is slated to…

When the State plans laws to punish parents who cross the two-child limit, let’s be clear about who pays the highest price. It’s women, the poorest and most marginalised PREMIUMRepresentational image. (Getty Images/iStockphoto) What’s not to love about a chota parivaar, that quintessential Indian family of parents and their two children? Fewer children mean better maternal health, more judicious use of family resources, improved nutrition, higher education outcomes, and a healthier planet, already groaning under the weight of 7.9 billion humans. And, yet, when the State plans laws to punish parents who cross the two-child limit, let’s be clear about…

Behind the glitter of the medals lies a story of personal grit. Poverty and marginalisation cut across gender, but women face special discrimination that ranges from fighting to be born to being allowed to play a sport Weightlifter Mirabai Chanu arrives at the airport in New Delhi, on July 26. (File photo) The first went to Saikhom Mirabai Chanu who set a new Olympic record with a successful 115 kg lift in clean and jerk. The second went to Lovlina Borgohain who, in her first Olympics, is now the third Indian boxer to ensure a podium finish, after Vijender Singh…