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Chat Social activist Aruna Roy on how she connects with rural women
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IN HARMONY Social activist Aruna Roy was recently given the Panna Dhai Award
“If you are literate you are only literate. It doesn’t mean you are empowered,” says social activist Aruna Roy.
The lady largely responsible for making the Right to Information Act and National Rural Employment Guarantee Act a reality was recently conferred the Panna Dhai award at the 28th Annual Awards Ceremony of the Maharana Mewar Foundation in Udaipur.
“This award means much more than the Magsaysay Award to me, because the people I work with understand its importance. They know Panna Dhai and what her sacrifice was.”
Organisation – the priority
Somebody who believes in recognising the organisation rather than the individual, Aruna, as usual, turned up with her comrades.
One of them was Sushila who once famously said, “If I send my son to the market with 10 rupees, I ask for the accounts. The Government spends billions of rupees in my name, should I not ask for accounts? Hamara paisa hai, hamara hisaab hai.” This eventually turned out to be the defining slogan of the right to information movement.
“I have learnt to lead a harmonised life working with these lower middle-class women. We middle-class women, have a fragmented mind. With them I learnt to fight and sing and dance,” says Aruna with the trademark glimmer in her eyes.
She continues, “Literacy is just a skill, empowerment requires certain ethics. When I decided to work in the villages of Rajasthan, people had a very bad opinion of educated people. They said: from patwari to block development officer, all are literate and all of them have cheated us.”
Nailing her point, Aruna asks how come the two most people-owned acts originated from Rajasthan, and not from Bengal and Tamil Nadu, which are considered to be more literate. “The place has a history. Be it Bhanwari Devi raising her voice against rape or ladies of Dilwara protesting against Sati.”
Talking of the RTI and NREG Acts, Aruna says both have been successful.
“Now at least 60 paisa out of one rupee is reaching the villages. Many have criticised the NREG Act as wastage of government money, but our research shows that poor people are spending the money on food, education and repayment of loans, in that order. So the money is coming to the market and is thus boosting the economy. Anyway, a poor man doesn’t turn his white money into black!”
Set to change
On the government empowering women from the top through reservation in Parliament, Aruna says there has always been a dialectic going between the top and the bottom.
“I agree, in Panchayats lots of women are just a front for their husbands and brothers. But we must appreciate this is the first generation. Things are bound to change.”
Having shunned the Indian Administrative Services, on the premise it is for people who want to maintain the status quo, Aruna feels women IAS officers haven’t done enough to change their image of being suited for soft ministries. “Still, female officers are invariably found languishing in the health and tourism ministries.”
ANUJ KUMAR
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