STAGE 1: Group reading of a story and presentation
Right at the outset, the students were divided into three groups and each group was given a story called ‘The Impossible Dream’. This story was accompanied by 11 questions, prompting the children to ponder over the issues raised. They were asked to relate the story to their personal experience and bring this experience in their discussion. At the end of approximately 20 minutes, representatives of each group made a presentation. Inspite of referring to their personal experience, they had a general belief that gender inequality as depicted happens mainly in villages. Anindita pointed out a city bias working in their psyche, which was also an extension of their unwillingness to introspect and be self-critical.
STAGE 2: Picture story on equality and discrimination
Anindita scrolled the picture story on her laptop that depicted a race between a fox and a stork. At the end of the track was kept a bowl of meat. In the story both reached the finish line together, but the stork could not eat the food for obvious reasons. The food and its presentation had completely ignored the stork’s basic needs. Anindita said that the equality depicted in this story was only a formal equality and not an equality of opportunity and access to the opportunity. Such an opportunity would be substantive opportunity. She pointed out the lack of substantive equality in our society and that most school dropouts were girls rather than boys because of this lack of substantive equality. Through this conditioning gender roles are defined and if men come out of their gender roles, they are perceived as sissy and weak. There is a need for a renewed social conditioning.
STAGE 3: Recommendations for change
At the summing up stage, the groups came up with the following recommendations:
• Explore a woman’s liberty instead of forcing an action.
• Do not depend on the women for everything. Make sure that they have some time to relax.
• Persuade the family members to share some of the household chores.
• At the place of work, there should not be discrimination on the basis of wages.
•A belief that they are weaker brings down their morale.
•Mass public awareness campaigns should be organized.
•Sati & Purdah should be uprooted at the grass root level.
•Fathers should set good examples for their sons. The final thought was, ‘Violence against women is not against women but against all of us’. Anindita asked them to take an oath and say ‘I do not want dowry’.
Comparison of Responses
•While the class IX students were more spontaneous with their responses, the older students were more vociferous in claiming that the situation presented in the story did not correspond with their family situation.
•The city bias—a belief that villages were the seat of all evils, was more deep- rooted in the older students
•One of the older students articulated that in a communist society a woman does not face discrimination.
The session with the older students was disturbed from the beginning due to a misunderstanding and were a little restless and would refute the premise of the discussions. Anindita and Sukanya got them focused by asking them pointed questions: ‘How many of you have a choice to think of a career and how many of your sisters have the same choice?’ ‘How many of you can move around safely in the city and how many of your sisters can be totally “bindaas”?’‘How many of you are whistled at on the streets?’ How many of you feel that reservation of seats for women in public transports is unfair?’
Interestingly, most of them felt reservation to be unfair. They explained the rationale behind the reservation, the need to create a safe space for women. The class XI students, in spite of their occasional diffidence, participated whole heartedly in the discussions and they felt sessions like this were specially relevant for boys and could hence make a long term difference.