The Struggles of Women: A Personal and Social Journey (International Women's Day celebration)

International Women's Day is celebrated every year on March 8. On this day, gender equality, women's rights and women's achievements in various fields are celebrated all over the world.

Why International Women's day celebration?

From the perspective of history, International Women's Day was celebrated for the first time in 1909 by the Socialist Party in America. Its main objective was to give women the right to vote, and they were successful in this. Since then women got the right to vote and they started being recognized as a citizen. All these things are also included in our curriculum. What is the relation of this curriculum with our life? To understand this, the students of Community Partnership Club (CPC) decided to connect Women's Day with the society.

For this, we held a meeting of students and teachers, in which the idea came up that if we celebrate the program of 8th March in the college, then only students will come to our college. Women from the village will not be able to come and we keep organizing many programs in the college. We should organize this program in a village. When we started thinking that the program should be celebrated in a village, then which village should be chosen for it in which women from all other villages can also come easily. Then everyone suggested that why not Badavad village be chosen. Women from six villages around Badavad village will come easily.

When we went to the Deputy Pradhan of that village that we are thinking of organizing the program of 8th March in your village, we need a place for it. The Deputy Chief said, "We will provide space, but it is a women's program, it is very difficult for women to come because they do not come out of their homes. Women come with great difficulty even when they have to vote or when there is a government camp. And some women of this village can come, but women from nearby villages will not come." Listening to him, it seemed that what should we do so that at least 100 women come to our program. How to gather women from such a far away place? Then the teachers and students held a meeting to solve that problem. In which Aditya said that if we provide free rickshaw facility for women in every village, then women can come. Even if 10 women come from each village, then 50 women from five villages will come.

On which some students started saying that why would anyone sit in our rickshaw? How will people know why this rickshaw has come? Then everyone understood that no matter how many plans we make sitting in the college, but until we do not go to the villages, we will not be able to understand what is the real condition of women? How will they come? We all go to the villages. It came out that we should go to each house and tell them that we are organizing a program for 8th March in Badavad village. In which some women are still struggling. They will share their experiences with you people.

We made three groups. In which each group went to one village for four days. In this way we spread the information to twelve villages. Each of our groups would go to the villages and tell about 8th March International Women's Day and invite women to Badavad village. Similarly, a group went to Gurana village. In Gurana village, it started going to people's houses. There, no one would listen to them, no one would even listen to the whole thing and would refuse even before that. Some people would think that they have come from the school to get admission. So they would tell people that we have not come from the school. We have come to invite you for Women's Day.

While roaming in the village, there was a story of the life of women in every house. Sharing the story of one house in Gurana village. Which completely shook us that even today women are living such a suffocating life. As soon as we knocked on the gate of that house, the voice of two men came from inside saying come in, they welcomed us with a stern voice. As soon as we went inside the house, we found two men sitting on a charpai whose age must be around 65-70 years. They were staring at us as if we had snatched something from them.

Student- Namaskar Tauji!

Uncle- Namaskar!

Student- We want to meet the women of your house. We need your permission.

Uncle- What permission? You go inside, one of them must be sleeping here in the verandah.

(As soon as we went inside the house, a mother said)

Mother- (Said laughingly) Daughter! What will you do by meeting me? We are not of the age to go to school now.

Student- You come down once and listen to us.

She came down and woke up her sister-in-law who was sleeping. We started talking to them. When we assured them that we are not from outside. We are like your own daughter. Then she started telling us her story.

Mother- dear, how will we be able to go to Badavad village with you? You can see the two old men sitting on the cot in front. One of them is mine and the other is my sister's husband. They do not let us go anywhere. They only take us with them to work in the fields. And if someone in our neighborhood dies, we cannot even go to see them. If they are sleeping, then we can go stealthily. And if we ever talk to anyone, if any one of these two brothers comes to know about it, then the other one tells him. Then we get beaten up.

(The place where we were sitting and talking was near the rooms of those women's daughters-in-law. Hearing our conversation, they also came out.)

Daughter-in-law- Not only this, even if our child falls ill, we cannot go to get medicine. They say that the medicine for children is just an excuse to go out with their purse dangling. Mother has passed away in her whole life. Her son, with whom I am married, is also like this. If we fall ill, they touch us to see whether we are really ill or making an excuse.

Younger Daughter-in-law - I will tell you an incident. Nowadays people order everything online. One day I ordered sanitary pads. He did not trust until he entered our room and saw it. It did not end there. After that he scolded me very badly and made the whole house go haywire. He allowed you people to come in because he thought you had come to take the children to the school. If he had known that you had come to call us, he would not have even let you enter the gate. She started saying that it is an atrocity if a girl is born in this house.

When we started walking, those four women held our hands and said, sit for a little while longer, for the first time someone has come to listen to us.

Elder sister- We were unlucky that both of us got married on the same day. On one hand we see women who are going to Mount Everest. On the other hand women are confined to their homes. We see a gulf between the two.

Likewise, let us share with you another conversation from another village. We met a woman who got married as soon as she completed her B.Ed. After that she wanted to work. But her family members did not let her work. She said that after getting the degree, she was serving her family. She was saying that doing B.Ed. just seems like a distant dream to me.

In this way, everyone contacted women from a total of 12 villages, in which our teachers and students were going. We saw the condition of all the women. This was the condition of all those women. Who are currently imprisoned in their homes in some way or the other. But want to be free.

In this, we are sharing with you the experience of a woman. Who is a government doctor.

Doctor- I do work. But I cannot spend that money as per my wish. When I was pregnant, I used to feel like eating different things. When I was in my ninth month, I felt like eating an apple. I told my husband that I felt like eating an apple. My husband secretly brought me an apple. I did not get that too.

That doctor became very emotional while telling this. When we all went to the villages, we found many such incidents which we never even think about.

After roaming in the villages for a week, we reached Badavad village to organize a program on 8th March International Women's Day. When we had thought of celebrating Women's Day. At that time, the people we were going to, told us that women come out of their homes with great difficulty, so most of the women will not participate in your program. These words of those people forced us to think that our program may fail.

Because till 12:30 we were seeing only a few women. Sadness started appearing on our faces that even after so much hard work, we could not unite the women. But as soon as it was 1:00, we started seeing a crowd of women. Women started coming in buses from some villages and in rickshaws from others. And in no time, we had estimated that at least 150 women would come. 300 women, twice our estimate, came to participate in the program. We started the program with full enthusiasm in which we had three women who struggled in their lives and somehow reached here. In this way different women shared their struggles. No matter how many difficulties come and if women decide to make any work successful, then they can make it successful. Everyone was discussing with each other, what are the obstacles in our life, which stop us from flying. A new glow was visible on everyone's face. Seeing all those women like this, we got even more excited and then we all sang a song together with our female friends.

इस लिए राह संघर्ष की हम चुने।

जिन्दगी आसुओं में नहायी न हो।।

(That is why we choose the path of struggle.

Life should not be bathed in tears.)

With this song, the entire hall's voices rose and that day everyone took a step towards struggle and made the program successful. But we shared so many incidents that we came across during the program's campaign. In this way, we saw both types of women who are working. And also those women who are still at home after studying. From this, we understood that we can be completely free only then. The day every woman will be able to take her decision freely, every man will walk shoulder to shoulder with her. Women's Day will prove meaningful only then in the true sense.

During this entire program, students and teachers developed a deep understanding of women. Through this program, students became aware of the oppression and exploitation prevalent in the society, which reflects a horrific form of society. This evil of society is not visible on TV, Facebook, Instagram or any other social media platform. It is necessary for students to be familiar with these evils of society. Because the responsibility of social welfare and the creation of a new society in tomorrow's society is on these future teachers. The real upliftment of society will not be possible without being ignorant of these conditions of society. On behalf of Community Partnership Club (CPC), I am thankful to Pradeep Jain Sir, Secretary of Babu Kamta Prasad Jain Mahavidyalaya, who gave us an opportunity to understand the status of women in society in a new way.