The women are in no mood to back off. Mothers with babies, domestic workers and schoolgirls among them are on the streets. “We’ve organised protests before, but nothing on this scale,” says Hina Kausar, a research scholar.
“Muslim women don’t come out on the street easily,” says Sakina Parveen, a social worker who lives near Shaheen Bagh. “But they understand this issue and this is why they are here in such large numbers.”
Headlines have been eloquent about this “women-led” protest. But women have always protested, perhaps because few men understand oppression the way most women do. They were at the forefront of the Independence movement. They marched against dowry and sati. And they came out in large numbers when protests broke out after the December 2012 gang-rape and murder of a physiotherapy student in Delhi. But, says Akhtarista, “Women tend to speak up only when it involves women’s issues. The time has come for women to speak up on all issues.”
In a world dominated by men, where male actors and athletes are paid far more and given more media attention than women; where men lead corporations and politics; where one gender dominates science and research, women tend to be invisible. In such a world, finding role models can be hard for young women.
The photographs emerging from the protest — not just the iconic video featuring the four but also women breaking stereotypes in all— women protests, offering roses to police, giving clear soundbytes, or just claiming their place on the streets — show courage and tenacity, clarity and commitment. More important, they tell us that women belong and, yes, they can lead.
Published in Hindustan Times on December 27, 2019