The Government of Gujarat has taken many steps to improve the lives of women and children in the State. Excerpts
Third Curve
Author: Sandeep Singh
Publisher: Viva, Rs 595
One day in November 2011, I along with Dewang Nanavati and Vijay Chauthaiwale was off to Gandhinagar to meet Narendra Modi, the Chief Minister of Gujarat. It was a Sunday, and the man who had given a new dimension to development in India was working. The meeting started and the Chief Minister started sharing his development initiatives, the thought behind the initiatives, the results, the statistics, the future plans, etc. It was like listening to a dotting father explaining his kid’s achievements.
I have never met a Chief Minister or Minister so passionate about development. But what struck me most about Modi was his honesty. One thought that stands out in my mind is Modi’s example of a scheme for widows. Modi said: “The Government of Gujarat gives sewing machines and training to widows. One day I called the lAS officers, responsible for the programme, and asked them whether they were aware of the programme of giving sewing machine to widows. They all said yes. Then I gave them a piece of paper and asked them to write how a widow should get the machine.”
No one could answer the second question. The Chief Minster continued: “Then I called up ministers and asked them if they were aware of the programme of giving sewing machines to widows. They all said yes. Then I gave them a piece of paper and asked them to write how a women could get the sewing machine.” The Chief Minster said, “Sandeep bhai, you will be surprised, that, no one could answer it.”
The Chief Minister then confessed that even he didn’t know how to implement the programme. “I thought if lAS officers, ministers and the Chief Minister didn't know, then how would a widow know. When a women loses her husband she is in a miserable state of mind. She will have to pull herself up and look after herself and her family. The Government’ programmes being run for her benefit may not come to her mind almost up to a year of her widowhood.”
After this experience, the Chief Minister decided that a widow would not come to the Government; instead, the Government will go to the widow. Now this is how the scheme works in Gujarat. The widow scheme is promoted on a priority basis through meetings, pamphlets and word of mouth, to name a few.
One of the successful beneficiaries of the scheme is 29 year-old widow Amtulla Ikbalbhai Daudivohra, of Chuda, Surendranagar. When her husband died, she was not employed and had little formal education. She was helpless and desperate for work. Someone in her village told her about the widow training scheme. She has never looked back since.
Once the training was over she received financial support of Rs 5,000, with which she started a small shop in her village. She says, “It is a novelty item store, I earn about Rs 3,000 to Rs 5,000 per month. The practical knowledge imparted during the training proved to be very helpful.”
The shakti cult is an old phenomenon in India. In this form the women’s movement represents not merely an oppositional force fuelled by anger, a rather negative reaction to oppression, but also the development of a distinctive female culture, a positive creative force inspiring men and women alike.
Aradhana Sharma writes eloquently in ‘Paradoxes of Empowerment’, “First the government used (women) for votes (as vote-banks), and then it used us for sloganeering. Then NGOs used us for protests against alcohol, in the Sarvodaya movement, in forest protection movements. Once they have used us, they tell us to back off and go back (to our usual existence). This has always happened. When they needed shakti (female power), the gods created Kali. And when she did what she was supposed to do, she was told to sit in a temple.”
Fortunately we have exception in the form of Gujarat. Under Modi’s leadership, the literacy level has gone up by 12.93 per cent in a decade. Increase in female literacy is not a stand-alone phenomenon; it depends on various factors like women’s health, time-in-hand, etc. let me illustrate this with an example. The supply of tapped water has increased to 74 per cent from mere 4 per cent a few years ago. Now the time and energy saved in fetching water would have been used productively somewhere, and definitely literacy would have been one of them. I don’t have a study linking the two, but common sense makes one accept this.
Gujarat has also done well in looking after kids. The Times of India, on April 6, 2011, brought out a news report, ‘Ambaji temple takes up fight against child malnutrition’. “Ambaji temple will be providing fruits as part of its prasad distribution to malnourished children of Banaskantha district through the mid-day meal programme. These kids could number about four lakh,” said Banaskantha collector RJ Patel, who is also ex-officio chairman of the temple trust.
“According to the 2001 Census, around 70 per cent of children in the district are chronically malnourished in remote places of Danta, Amirgadh and western talukas of Banaskantha district. The Ambaji temple had, therefore, launched a project to check malnutrition... Prasad will comprise fruits such as mangoes, bananas, orange, pineapples and other condiments offered to the Goddess and will be supplied
to different talukas for distribution at mid-day meal centres,” Patel said. “Under the project, the devotees will offer prasad only in the form of fruits or milk, sweets and other nourishing condiments, but not cash,” he said.