“THE basic Manuvadi ideology of the BJP and the Sangh parivar is very afraid of independent women. In one of his articles, UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has written, quoting the Manusmriti, that women should always be under the control of her father, her husband, or her son. He said that an uncontrolled woman is a daitya (demon). This Yogi with such regressive notions is the BJP’s star campaigner and the successor to Modi. It is necessary to uproot and throw out the Modi-Yogi governments in order to protect women’s freedom and our democracy”.

This was said on 1 December 2018 at a seminar organized by the All India Progressive Association (AIPWA) at the UP Press Club by the main speaker AIPWA National Secretary Kavita Krishnan. The topic for the seminar was: Women’s Rights and Increasing Attacks on Democracy: Challenges and Possibilities.

Com. Kavita Krishnan said that according to Ambedkar ‘Hindu Rashtra’ will be the biggest disaster for India, and this is most true for the women of India. Even in the Sabarimala issue, the BJP has proved that it will stand in support of discrimination against women and thumb its nose at even the Supreme Court. She said that in 2012-13 the anti-rape movement (the Delhi Nirbhaya movement) took place which held the incumbent Congress-UPA government accountable. In the present time, women who speak up against the BJP Central and State governments are termed anti-national by the government. She pointed out that recently 75 women holding a rally in Banaras for the right to livelihood were slapped with false cases against them.

AIPWA State President Krishna Adhikari said that the BJP left no stone unturned in protecting the rape-accused MLA in Unnao and till date they have not dissociated themselves from this MLA. The government is bent on burying justice and truth in the Deoria shelter home case also. An unbiased enquiry into the entire issue monitored by the Supreme Court is necessary to ascertain the veracity of the government’s claim that the children have been safely escorted home.

National Women’s Federation State President Asha Mishra said that people who raise their voice on issues related to women, workers, and the poor are either being arrested as ‘Urban Naxals’ or, like Gauri Lankesh, Govind Pansare and others, killed by Sanghi terrorists.
Social activist Naeesh Hasan said that she herself had been part of the movement against instant triple talaq for the past 15 years, and the victory in the Supreme Court was due to the struggles of Muslim women’s organizations. But the Ordinance brought by the Modi government will not benefit Muslim women in any way. If Muslim men divorce their wives illegally they will be jailed under the Ordinance—but there is no law to jail Hindu men who commit a similar offence. Why is the BJP opposing the Supreme Court verdict on Sabarimala with violence while it welcomes the SC ripple talaq verdict? Does the BJP not know that the entire human society is produced by the very same menstruation cycle in the name of which they are opposing the entry of women into Sabarimala?

Presiding over the seminar, journalist Kulsum Mustafa said that it was good to see men at the seminar standing with the women’s movement and supporting it. She expressed the hope that women as well as men who support the women’s movement would strengthen the fight against patriarchy.