Feminist Theology

http://fth.sagepub.com Gender, Justice and Poverty in Rural RajasthanMoving beyond the Silence
Mary Grey Feminist Theology 2000; 9; 33 DOI: 10.1177/096673500000002504 The online version of this article can be found at: http://fth.sagepub.com

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Gender, Justice and Poverty in Rural

Rajasthan—Moving beyond the Silence

Mary Grey
This is
to reflect theologically on my experience in the desert of north-west India as part of the NGO (NonGovernmental Organization) Wells for India. I first tell the story of this involvement, then analyse the situation of women in this area, and test the Gandhian solution as a way forward.
an

attempt

Rajasthan

Story Wells for India was founded in 1987 by my husband Nicholas Grey, myself and a follower of Gandhi, Ramsahai Purohit. Ramsahai was also a direct disciple of Vinoba Bhave, an ascetic and himself a Gandhian disciple, who walked the length and breadth of India persuading rich landowners to return their land to the poor people. This was the Land-gift or Bhoodan movement. The founding of the NGO Wells for India was a response to the drought of 1987, when 60 million animals
died, wells dried up and women were forced to walk still further into
the desert in search of water. Since then we have expanded into three regions of Rajasthan loosely grouped near the cities of Jaipur, Jodhpur and Udaipur, and in each case working in partnership with Gandhian NGOs. The target has always been the poorest and most marginalized people, and the method has been that of empowerment. Increasingly, once water provision is secure (or semi-secure, since the situation is now increasingly fragile), the focus has moved to health, education and gender issues.

1. The

working One question that has to be faced in the case of foreign involvement in
another country is: Is it another form of neo-colonialism? The response, in the case of Wells for India, is that it works at the invitation of the groups themselves within a partnership /empowerment model,

2. Method of Wells for Indias

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34

Feminist

Theology

where decisions are made by the communities themselves. Secondly, the severity of problem should be stressed. Rajasthan is the second poorest state in India. The vastness of it, the difficulty surrounding government initiatives, the fact that many villages are off the official map, the fact of seasonal migration and flight to cities, which is worsening because of the drought, all call for some desperate measures. The way &dquo;&dquo;Wells for India works is to attempt to get the government to take its own responsibilities, especially in watershed development. At the moment we face new drought conditions. The Thar desert is particularly hard hit--one tenth of the cattle and other animals have already been let loose, to conserve water. Already people are having to bring water tractors and tankers to severely affected areas and poor people are forced to pay for drinking water. And yet we cannot get media attention, either in the UK or in India. It is not yet a disaster on the scale of Orissa, we are told. Disaster 1 prevention is not newsworthy. Thirdly, my own intuition is that here is another specific liberation theology emerging, demanding responses, resources and sources of inspiration from other parts of the world. There are special factors in this case, which include pluralism in India (4% Christianity, in Rajasthan this is even lower-about 2%), persecution of Christians fomented by the nationalism of the BJP party, the new globalized context, middle-class Indias love of material goods, Western standards, the use of the dowry/marriage system to attain goods like All these combine in a washing machines, scooters and so on. 2 situation of complex deepening poverty. A dramatic example of this combination can be seen in the desperate position of women in Rajasthan. Never have I seen a situation where factors from tradition, religion, poverty, patriarchy and the effects of global capitalism come together to make the lives of women so trapped in degrading poverty.

Rajasthan I cite now from a recent Government report (Jaipui, Rajasthan, 1999). The report begins by stating that:

3. Women in

1. Since the article was written, the drought increased in severity, millions of animals have died and the catastrophe has achieved brief media attention in the UK. The rains have begun to arrive (July 20th 2000). 2. See Mark Tully, No Full-stops for India (London: Viking, 1991).

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Grey Gender, Justice and Poverty in Rural Rajasthan

The status of women in

35

discriminatory customs and values, caste-based discrimination, illiteracy and high rates of poverty seem pervasive.

Rajasthan is an international issue. Patriarchy, high

social

(Despite all efforts towards perceived as burdens.

justice, women)... continue

to be

The reports mentions other key factors. One is the sex ratio. There are only 910 women for every 1000 males in the population. Regional differences show Dholpur and Jaisalmer districts to be the worst at 795 and 810 respectively. This is exacerbated by female infanticide and maternal mortality. At 558 maternal deaths per lakh (= 100,000) the maternal mortality rates are among the highest in the world. 80% of all women of child-bearing age suffer from anaemia. The State recognizes that women and girl-children are caught in a cycle of malnutrition. Sati and child marriage are age-old customs in Rajasthan. Incidences of sexual abuse and domestic violence are high and the State has one of the lowest rates for female literacy in India. Because of all this, the State has produced a new policy document based on the empowerment of women, recognizing that the greatest challenge is to reduce the hiatus between state policies and ground realities. Among these policies, the following are the most important:
1. A focus
on

the infant and

the girl-child

The girl-child and her education are the single most important issues on this

agenda.3

The average marriage age stays at 14.6 and girl children have to cope with household and marital responsibilities at an age when they are not ready for them. The report contains measures to reduce female discrimination and female feticide, eradicate unequal access to nourishment and heath care and provide access to education.
2. NGOs The state wants to co-operate with NGOs working with migrant and tribal communities as well as those struggling with domestic violence and women sold into prostitution. 3. Women living in oppressive conditions This addresses the abuse against women, disabled, handicapped mentally or physically in abused in institutions and social outcasts in their own communities.
3.

Government report, Jaipui, Rajasthan, 1999, pp. 8-9.

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Feminist

Theology

Methods of addressing these problems are suggested. These include ensuring access to credit institutions; encouragement to womens groups; increasing the bargaining power of women and boosting selfconfidence ; creating opportunities to increase their economic status; putting efforts into increasing the benefits of village/local level employment schemes for women; promoting greater access to education, well-being and training. Older women-after childbearing-should not be discouraged from education and training, and efforts should be focused on encouraging women to enter non-traditional and noncustomary fields of work. The contribution of women in the agricultural sector should be recognized and encouraged. Female entrepreneurs should be offered technical education and skills training and access to credit facilities. There are eight separate proposals for employment schemes to benefit
women.

There follow explicit measures for improving health care for women, to education, measures to ensure that incidents of domestic violence come to the courts and structures of implementation. Clearly this is a historic document for the women of Rajasthan, recognizing the deeply-rooted oppression of women and the girl-child and the enormous difficulties in moving forward. It also recognizes the many levelled nature of the degradation and poverty, and the action needed simultaneously on many fronts. It is also ready to support this action in the structures at both State and village level.
access

However, there are still questions to be posed:

.

The

Report credibly enable the participation and decision-making of women themselves? (According to our partners, most emphatically not). Does it recognize the issues which women themselves have identified as crucial and are already taking action? Examples would be the satyagraha movement initiated by Vandana Shiva and the National Alliance for Womens Food Rights which has produced a Womens Charter on Food Rights. There is no attempt to address the underlying misogyny/patriarchy which causes the suffering in the first place and continues to keep it in existence. There is no placing of the poverty and discrimination of women in the global context of rampant capitalism. question has to be asked: What do the women of Rajasthan
Does the

themselves want?

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Grey Gender, justice and Poverty in Rural Rajasthan

4. What Women Want The

37

gender/case analysis by Indian women themselves is now quite sophisticated. For example, the publications of the womens university in Bombay, Womens Studies in Delhi and so on. Also, the publication In Gods l~~a~~,4the writings of the women from the Asian
commission of the Ecumenical Association of Third World Theologians (EATWOT) are continually de-constructing Christian patriarchy in India and reconstructing what gender justice could mean in Indian Christianity-although their work is far less wellknown and promoted than many male Christian liberation theologians. Here I focus on rural women in Rajasthan and what their answer to the question is. One such answer is given by the journalist, Vimala Ramachandran, in her article, A Life of Dignity. Here, she writes, is what rural women themselves long for.It is a story told to illustrate both what women want, but also the obstacles to getting it and the obstacles to the implementation to what sounds an ambitious report promising justice at last. It has been a long time now, she writes, since our [Indian] politicians discussed issues that really matter. We are 50 years and 13 elections wiser, yet fundamental issues such as basic education, primary healthcare, drinking water, toilets, sanitation, housing and roads are yet to be addressed. Leave aside politicians and their parties, even the development community does not encourage debates on issues that matter. Given that we are now knee-deep into the election drama, it may be worthwhile to recapture what development means to the poor women of India. Almost 10 years ago, a group of Kol tribal women of Banda district of Uttar Pradesh had come together for a training workshop under the Governments women empowerment programme called Mahila Samakhya. Talking about their lives, the workshop facilitator asked them if there was anything that they really yearned for. The women were silent for some time. Suddenly, one landless woman answered:
I want to live in dignity, I do not want to be reduced to a state of helplessness where there is no respect for me as a human being-yes, thats what I want, I want to live in dignity.
4. A journal published by the Asian Womens Resource Centre for Culture and Theology, Seoul, Korea. 5. In The Hindu, 7 October 1999: Needed: A Life of Dignity, by Vimala Ramachandran.

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38

Feminist Theology

This statement left us speechless and forced the group to talk about the essence of developments To come to grips with the essence of what development means to ordinary people, they played a game. They imagined that some divine power had given them 10 boons and they were supposed to prepare a wish-list in one hour. Barely half an hour later, this is what they asked:
To live in dignity; meet the basic needs such as clean water, toilets, fuel, food and a roof over our head; freedom from violence; justice-a society where right and wrong is recognised; equity between men and women and between people; not be dependent for essentials on the outside world―meaning our area; opportunity to know the world outsidemobility, exposure and information; society where every child experiences childhood, where children go to school; good health; a clean environment and a say in decisions which affect our lives.

On the top of the list was dignity. The daily struggle for water, fuel, minor forest produce, fodder and a small daily wage in addition to endless household chores, violence in the hands of a drunken husband, the fear of abuse and taunts of being a parasite, strip the ordinary citizens of this country of their dignity. Increasingly, even privacy for defecation is a problem. The poor are made to cringe even for basic necessities that should be theirs by right. Women face the added indignity of discrimination, physical abuse and rape. Their contribution to the familys survival is not recognized and they are seen as parasites. At every stage in their life, they are forced to fight with their back to the wall. Is there no value for a womans life/ they asked. This gut level response of poor women tells more than all the books and theories of development. It also tells us that we, as a nation, have lost sight of basic issues. When we are in a situation of national crisis, it is these poor men and women who stand by. Yet, we as a nation have lost sight of fundamental issues. What is worse, even people who are in the business of development care little about the peoples basic need for a life of dignity. In the last 50 years foreign aid amounting to millions of rupees and dollars has been disbursed in the name of development. Primary healthcare centres, schools, roads, wells, hand-pumps and a hundred other necessities have been provided over and over again. In Rajasthan, millions of dollars have been invested in the health and family welfare infrastructure in the last 15 years. Even a casual traveller cannot but notice the abysmal state of our PHCs (Primary Health Centres and subcentres). We have heard about the water pipeline story in Gujarat-where successive governments apparently overturned each others decisions to make a political point. During
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Grey Gender, Justice and Poverty in Rural Rajasthan

also hear
women

39

elections, we hear about innumerable scandals across the country. We

ordinary people
areas

from rural

talk about issues that concern them= from every corner of our vast country speak

the same language. Water, toilets, schools, healthcare, roads, electricity and access to and protection of common property resources such as forests and village commons. It is quite ironical that political parties compete with one another to attract the votes of women. Why are we in this situation? Since the mid 1970s, a significant proportion of development aid has been spent on womens development, womens empowerment and mainstreaming gender issues. Scanning the country, it is quite distressing to note that only a small proportion of these valuable resources has actually benefited poor women. With the exception of some pockets, there is little evidence of change. Where have all the development funds gone? Apart from glossy reports and booklets, high profile campaigns and conferences, balloons and advertisements, well-endowed organizations and activists-we have little to show by way of concrete achievement. In the last five years, the entire population control lobby that was running after women to meet sterilization targets are today doing almost the same thing under a new name-reproductive health. It is, indeed, painful that development projects in operation for the 10 to 15 years have had little impact. we seem to be going around in circles, reinvesting and rediscovering old programmes and giving them new names. Are the agents of development accountable to anyone? Is there any mechanism to demand answers from those who mobilize funds in the name of the poor and in the name of women? In Rajasthan, we have a business house that has established an NGO (under the guise of a charitable trust) and a research and training institution. Having mastered the art of extracting contracts from the Government, they have jumped into the development business. These new sub-contractors today employ retired officers to get projects and contracts from the government and also from donors. In the last 10 years, the number of retired officials setting up NGOs is steadily increasing. This is significant because this period has witnessed increased pressure on the Government to involve NGOs in the implementation of donor assisted projects. Almost every social sector programme today has an NGO component, especially in the name of social mobilization and womens participation. Most programmes provide for the creation of womens groups to empower women and training of administrators and service providers to become more gender sensitive. Training of women panchayat members is also popular. So much is being done today in the name of

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40

Feminist

Theology

women-yet even a cursory look at institutions and agencies involved

in the business of

development shows that very few women or gender-sensitive people actually run these programmes. People who have been watching these programmes closely tell us that there is no significant change in the situation on the ground. Why is there such a glaring schism between the rhetoric of development and ground realities? Isnt it time we brought such stories, good and bad, to public view? Maybe the time has come for concerned citizens and the media to systematically inquire into how development funds are used what
is it meant for, on whose behalf are the funds accessed and who benefits. Who are becoming rich and powerful in the name of the
Poor?

What is actually being done in the name of womens participation and community involvement? Maybe the Rajasthan Movement for the Right to Information could show us how to go about creating transparency and enabling people to negotiate from a position of strength. Maybe it is the only way to truly empower women to realize their dreams of a life of dignity. Does the development community have the courage to open itself to scrutiny? (Vimalu Ramachandran, Co-ordinator of Health Watch).
5. Visions of Flourishing

major aim of this article is to stress the point that dreams for a life of dignity suggest more than the attainment of basic human rights. What is yearned for is more akin to the economist Amartya Sen and philosopher Martha Nussbaum~s proposal of capacity fulfilment within a vision of flourishing. This is actually what efforts should be directed toward. Flourishing=the old Aristotelian notion of eudaimonia-(see also its use by Grace Jantzen in her book Becoming Divine)-might seem an unrealistic goal, given the severity of the problems faced in the
Thar desert, and the obstacles described above. But in this context we are seeing a dynamic relation between the Christian flourishing of the kingdom and the Gandhian notion of the dignity of the most vulnerable person. Sen and Nussbaums book begins with a story of poor widows in Rajasthan seeking economic independence.

One

They would measure capacity fulfilment within a vision of flourishing by being able to:
6. Grace Jantzen, Becoming Divine: Towards (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998).
a

Feminist

Philosophy of Religion

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Grey Gender, Justice and Poverty in Rural Rajasthan

. .

41

. .

Live to the end of a human life of normal length. Have good health, be adequately nourished, have adequate shelter, opportunities for sexual satisfaction, choice in reproduction. Avoid unnecessary and non-beneficial pain. Use the senses, imagine, think, ...use imagination and thought in connection with experiencing and producing spirituality enriching material. Have attachments to things and persons outside ourselves; love those who love and care for us; grieve at their absence. Form a concept of the good and engage in a critical reflection on the planning of ones own life

. .

Live for and to others, recognize and show concern for other human beings, engage in various forms of social action; be able to imagine the situation of another and to have compassion for that situation; have the capacity for both justice and friendship. Live with concern for and in relation to animals, plants and the world of nature. Laugh, play and enjoy relational activity. Live ones life and no one elses. 7 Live ones own life in ones own surroundings and context.

Nussbaum-admitting that such a proposal is universal and essentialist argues that a concept of the good, or the good functioning of the human being, should underlie development policy. Are people
put
mere subsistence with respect to their functionhave been enable to live well? (Nussbaum p. 87). It may they ing, look like a pipe-dream with regard to Rajasthan, for whom at the moment, mere survival is the issue, but remember that the woman reported in the story put dignity higher than anything. Sen and Nussbuam tell a story about rose-growers: an Oxfam project reported that a group of women, among other choices open to them had chosen to grow roses. (The economic gain was the same for all projects.) When asked to explain their choice, they replied, After we had finished, the smell of roses remained on our clothes. And anyway, we just like working with roses. We ourselves have also heard the children from our Asha project talking about their future in

in conditions of
or

rosy terms.
7. Martha C. Nussbaum, Human Capabilities in Nussbaum and Glover (eds.), Women, Culture and Development (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995), pp. 83-85.

8.

The Asha

project is a home for the children of prostitutes from one project

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42
Within Wells

Feminist

Theology

for Indias experience with its partners, the particular of flourishing is within a Gandhian praxis. Yet, Gandhian thought in India today seems to be at a particularly low ebb: Lets face it: Gandhi and his philosophy are all but forgotten in the
notion

country of his birth. Gujarat ranks third in crimes against Dalits, Harijans, Adivasis and women; and organised attacks against Christians and Muslims have brought shame to the State whose most famous son taught the world tolerance and brotherhood.
Gandhian institutions have fallen into the wrong hands... No tribal leader or harijan leader of stature has emerged in institutions like Sabamarti Ashram... Lack of a leadership instinct among these traditionally disadvantaged groups and the iron-fisted hold of Brahmins and Patels over these institutions is responsible for the very people for whom Gandhiji lived and died continuing to rot at the bottom of the social ladder (The Dismantling of the Mahatma, The Sunday Times of India, 3 October 1999).

All this sounds fairly negative. Two questions now emerge: why do the Gandhian groups believe that despite a worsening global and national context his philosophy offers the way forward, and what could Gandhian philosophy offer women-especially rural women? A recent book by a Gandhian scholar, Vivek Pinto, Gandhis Vision and Values,9 argues that the vision of swaraj is the only way forward for India. Gandhis text Hind Swaraj (1909), written on board the Caledonian Castle, en route from London to South Africa, has been neglected-the author writes, as to its prophetic and visionary character and potential for solving the catastrophic poverty of Indias rural poor. This explores Swaraj (self-rule or self-restraint) within a critique of western civilization as a model for free India. Swaraj, which, even though a political / economic concept has, like swadeshiself-reliance-been understood as close to the Christian ideal of the Kingdom of Heaven, is rooted in a religious vision. Truth and God were synonymous for Gandhi and true civilization must support individuals in their search for moral virtues. Thus, attaining swaraj meant the rejection of violence-a conviction which arose from Gandhis experiences with satyagraha (the power of truth, or resistance in love). Violence, he thought, was the answer neither to Indias political problems, nor for landless labourers in their struggle for

justice.
Asha is the Hindi word for hope and the children are full of hope for their future. 9. Vivek Pinto, Gandhis Visions and Values: the Moral Quest for Change in Indian
area.

Agriculture (Delhi: Sage Publications, 1998).

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Grey Gender, Justice and Poverty in Rural Rajasthan

43

Since ancient times India had relied on the small farmer for her food and 80% of Indians still live in villages. While checks and balances had guaranteed food for the hungry (bonds of harmony, mutual help and stress on manual labour), British imperialism put an end to this. Though the British departed, the influence of the West did
not.

But how could the agricultural basis of society have a spiritual meaning? What Gandhi achieved in his agricultural community experiments in South Africa and later at the ashram Sevagram, was to demonstrate agriculture as the living lung of India, and the moral nature of economic growth. Though Gandhi hoped that the Sevagram experiment would be multiplied all over India, at his death Nehrus strategy of industrialization hit agriculture hard. After three successive Five Year Plans, only the fourth (from 1966) addressed agriculture directly through the Green

Revolution. We now know how disastrous this was for poor farmers. Since only those who could afford irrigation, machinery, fertilizers and political connections benefited, the result was an increased flight to the city for the poor, a worsening diet for the rural poor, increased mortality rate and decline in literacy-especially for girls. Another consequence was the horrifying rise in child labour-we have seen how this was such a factor in the recent debacle at Seattle. When checked against Gandhian principles Pintos critique is that the Green Revolution failed because it separated morality and ethics. Citing Robert Kaplan, he argues that Gandhis approach must be re-rooted,
since
India
as a

(120).~

functioning democracy will probably fall apart (in the future)

The Gandhian counter-culture is far stronger than this book gives it credit for. For example, in the anger over Monsantos patenting of seeds, numerous Gandhian groups have led resistance. There is another example in resistance over Indias nuclear testing in the Thar desert, which was not publicized in the Western media. Vandana Shiva has recently come to see how powerful their ideas and praxis are for India. My own hunch is that only with a consortium of Gandhian style NGOs to create a joint approach to the problems of Rajasthan is there a hope of a way forward. Only by creating a powerful alternative to the seemingly victorious capitalist systems are
10. The citation of Kaplan is from Robert D. Atlantic Monthly 273 (February 1994), p. 75. The

Kaplan,

Coming Anarchy,

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44

Feminist

Theology

people likely to believe in this possibility and find renewed courage for the regeneration of the villages. One of the issues is Why did
Gandhi fail?

Joseph Prabhu, Gandhis Economics of Peace argues that Gandhi was

not a
was

systems builder, and that Gandhis method of moral exhortation

inadequate and lacking a proper scientific method and an adequate theoretical analysis.
India is concerned, the most valuable idea of Gandhi was and his stress on a self-sufficient, relatively nonreconstruction village industrialised natural rural life characterised by compulsory bread labour for all, handicrafts and simple market and distribution
As far
as

1 structures.

village life; that he underestimated the level of the actual despotic content of the village and the deep class and hierarchical divisions of Indian society, 12 and of course the tyranny of caste-based oppression. The issue here, in a global context, is that, if greed for money and material goods-which have hijacked our desires and imaginations, our yearning, in fact-is the problem then a philosophy of simplicity and voluntary prosperity focused on the well-being and flourishing of the rural poor, within a vision of peace and harmony, must be the only way forward. This is the re-coupling of economics with spirituality. But how does it specifically help women?
It could be said that Gandhi idealized 6.

Key Elements from

Womens

Spirituality

The demand is liberation; the emphasis is connectedness; the corrective is suffering; the power is imagination; and the vocation is tikkun olam. 13

elements from contemporary womens spirituality include, among other dimensions, embodiment; embodied knowing; passion for justice; wisdom; and new images of the sacred. I suggest that there are links here with Gandhian ideas: specifically, in Gandhis insistence on the education of women, on celibacy as honouring of women; his concern for the most vulnerable; his enthusiasm for village culture and village crafts specifically as honouring the work of

Key

11. Joseph Prabhu, Gandhis Economics of Peace, in Renuka Sharma (ed.), The Other Revolution: NGO and Feminist Perspectives from S. Asia (Delhi: Shri Satguru Publications, 1999), pp. 182-93 (189). 12. Prabhu, Gandhis Economics of Peace, p. 191. 13. Maria Harris, Proclaim Jubilee! A Spiratuality for the 21st Century (Westminster : John Knox Press, 1996), p. 4 (italics original).

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Grey Gender, Justice and Poverty in Rural Rajasthan

women; and

45

especially

contemporary

in hi~ passion for peace which links with womens work for reconciliation. It seems to me that it

is not enough to focus on grassroots groups working for change and social transformation. Unless this is harnessed with a more global vision-such as Gandhis vision of non-violent social transformation, there will not be sufficient spiritual strength to counter the terrible effects of globalization.

Story In New Delhi a visionary Gandhian group-Sulabh-is committed to liberating the scavengers. These are the untouchables, the dalits, condemned by birth to dispose of night soil (= human excrement) on their heads. You will not be surprised to learn that the people who actually do the work are women. Not only does the group liberate the people, but it runs schools for Dalit children and disabled women, including teaching computing and technical training. Again, Gandhians focus on the most marginalized and socially outcast. Again, a Gandhian vision looks to dignity and flourishing. Surely, where the poorest of the poor flourish, there is hope for the rebirth of a just society?

A Concluding

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