Hidden Figures

The Unsung Stories of Women and the LGBTQUI+ Community in the Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has destroyed economies and fundamentally altered human relationships across the globe. The humanitarian crisis that it triggered has left the marginalised communities more vulnerable than ever before. Women and the LGBTQUI+ community continue to fight daily battles for their right to love and dignity in the family; as workers, for equal rights and equal pay; for personal safety and security. Theirs is an ongoing struggle, not to be treated as second class citizens. While their exertions were magnified during the pandemic, the mainstream media reduced them to a mere statistic, underreporting and thus effacing their struggles. Yet, despite their challenges, women and the LGBTQUI+ members have been at the frontline of the COVID-19 fight, caring, supporting, protecting each other, and performing essential tasks to keep societies going.

The Invisible Pandemic – The Burden Of Patriarchy

*Women and the LGBTQUI+ community faced the double impact of the pandemic and the patriarchy during the lockdown.*

The pandemic added a new dimension to the existing burden on women and the LGBTQUI+ community. Safe spaces of freedom that they fought to build gradually over years were taken away overnight. Their comfort zones in schools, play, informal spaces, shopping routines, political engagements, and work - which allowed them to make vital social connections, were suddenly gone. They found themselves locked in their homes, back under the constant surveillance and controlling gaze of their male counterparts (or other overbearing patriarchal settings), making them vulnerable to sexual violence, domestic abuse, and unjust power play.

Further, the frontline women workers, whose jobs required them to carry out essential medical or municipal services, often came back home to face the disapproval of their work. For women living in militarised zones like Kashmir (which has been under lockdown for more than a year), the pandemic accentuated their daily trauma. The burden of grief and care was especially hard on the women, in families where male members had either disappeared or were killed in conflict with the Indian Armed Forces.

Queer people, forced to move back with their families, struggled to find spaces to cope. Many were forced into marriages and compelled to hide their ‘queerness’, their very identity. Trans people, especially trans-sex-workers, beggars, and migrant workers, became unemployed, left on the streets, unable to feed themselves or even find shelter to survive. Many succumbed to hate crimes and suicide. To continue living in circumstances of such insecurities was itself an act of resistance.

Gendered violence and abuse cut across the rural, urban, socio-economic, and age divide, with many calling it the ‘invisible pandemic’. Out of the total cases of violence that were registered during the lockdown, 80% were attributed to domestic violence, while 20% were caste-based violence. The police often refused to lodge FIRs of domestic abuse survivors. Sex-workers were jailed on the suspicion of re-starting their work because our institutions do not recognise sex work as ‘work’. Moreover, sex workers, due to the stigma attached to their work, did not have access to ration cards, JhanDhan accounts, and valid identity documents, and basic needs like food and rations were therefore denied to them. Many women had to take private loans with exorbitant interest rates ranging as high as 120%. This further pushed them into the cycle of poverty, and their children, into exploitative labour to work off the debt. With parents struggling to make ends meet, young girls, often treated as a financial liability, were either forced to drop out of schools to help with chores or were forced into marriages. Within the first two months of the lockdown, child helplines across the country received 92,000 calls out of which 54,000 calls were on forced marriages (as shared by Meena, a grassroots worker from Sahjani Shiksha Kendra). Keep in mind, that less than one-third of internet users in India are female. It points to the alarming gender disparities that exist, even in access to digital gadgets amongst boys and girls.

In rural areas, many refused to take loans from their self-help groups despite nominal interest rates, fearing an inability to repay. Salaries of most garment factory workers were delayed, and the financial incentives (Employee State Insurance and Provident Fund) they were entitled to, were suddenly taken away. In both rural and urban cases, there have been no economic safety nets for women and the LGBTQUI+ community to fall back on. Sitting safely at home wasn't an option for single women, widows, women in single-parent households, or whose husbands had lost their jobs because of the lockdown. They had to step out every day to do their jobs, even though it meant putting their lives at risk. As a result, grassroots workers, sanitation workers, women collectives, nurses, domestic workers, sex workers, and many others performing essential services were all targeted as carriers of the virus.

The crisis resulted in severe health issues for women and non binary people, where beyond COVID-19 and malnutrition, mental health issues like depression and suicidal tendencies were at an all-time high. With a dearth of mental health professionals, it became difficult to reach everyone. In the state of Manipur alone, there were a total of 30 mental health professionals for a population of 30 lakhs.

In the first 2-3 weeks, the lockdown triggered memories of captivity and hopelessness for survivors of sex trafficking, causing high levels of PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder).

Sex workers living with comorbidities like HIV, transgender individuals receiving gender-affirming surgeries and hormone interventions suddenly faced a shortage of medicines and were often denied treatment in hospitals. With primary healthcare centres and city hospitals choked with an overflow of COVID-19 patients, many pregnant women ended up giving birth at home or on the streets.

In the backdrop of the rampant propaganda against Muslims during the pandemic, Muslim women felt ostracised, and afraid for their family, since several community members were lynched or wrongfully jailed under false charges. In mainland India, being a migrant, queer or a woman from the North East invited hideous racial discrimination. Targeted for their East Asian looks, many were spat at, called 'Corona-virus’, and were asked to ‘go back to China’.

The intersectionality of class, caste, religion, and profession thus increased pre-existing vulnerabilities. And yet, they displayed tremendous resilience, courage, and leadership in the darkest of times. It is a wonder, how despite everything, they continue to persevere and show compassion, not just to themselves but to others as well.

Principal Pillars Of The Pandemic- Breaking Barriers, Healing Wounds

*Despite the hardships, women and the LGBTQUI+ community were at the frontlines performing the essential tasks of nourishing, nurturing, protecting, supporting, caring and providing for each other.*

When the pandemic arrived and lockdowns were imposed, women and the LGBTQUI+ community quickly mobilised and geared into collective action. They first responded to the immediate needs. Based on thorough surveys and strong relationships within their communities, campaigns and crowdfunding initiatives were kickstarted. They raised resources for ration kit distribution, which included grocery, sanitary pads, and general medicines (unlike government aid which forgot to include sanitary pads). Local community kitchens were set up to provide warm cooked meals. Guidelines and precautionary measures on COVID-19 were constantly shared through the internet, WhatsApp groups, and phone calls. In rural areas, women farmers painted walls or made door-to-door visits to carry out awareness campaigns. Many self-help groups ramped up to start stitching and distributing masks to meet the growing demand, and also to generate income. Grassroots activists took charge of various community issues concerning women - filing FIRs in local police stations against abuse and violence, and demanding work for women under MNREGA (Mahatma Gandhi Employment Guarantee Act 2005).

Women journalists risked their lives to report on COVID-19 and on-ground issues in cities and villages. Many fighting for democratic dissent went to jail for speaking up against the unjust treatment of marginalised communities. Young girls became community leaders and stood at par with their Panchayats (village council), often 'schooling them’ in alternative strategies to deal with local challenges. Women and queer folks in both organised and unorganised sectors mobilised, trained, and inspired others to actively help during the pandemic. Some offered free counselling while others lobbied for compassionate policies to create dignity of livelihood for those living on the peripheries of society.

Despite schools and their local centres being shut, Meera, a 19-year-old from Rambagh Khera village in Uttar Pradesh (UP), a peer educator with Breakthrough India, an organisation that works on gender violence, was unfettered by the pandemic. She organised rations for the marginalised families, appealed to the village Panchayat to get a local hospital made, accompanied ASHA (Accredited social health activist) and ANM (Auxiliary nurse midwife) workers to learn about on-ground health work. After calling the Block District Official directly, she managed to influence the village Pradhan (Head) to get sewage lines cleaned and sanitised in her village. She mobilised women and girls for a rally, where they made posters and shouted slogans for girls’ right to education across the village. Through this channel, she also inspired her reluctant parents to join her in relief efforts. She shared, “My father and brother who once used to scold me for talking to men and other strangers and almost got me married at 17, do not object now when someone comes to meet me at home. I am respected by my family. Today, I feel proud.”

Like Meera, other teenage peer educators in UP like Jyoti, Hinaz Parveen from Bhasanda, and Anjali from Sundar Nagar, became agents of change in their villages. They created awareness on COVID-19 guidelines, stitched masks for distribution, and made videos to encourage women to speak out against domestic violence by calling the women’s helpline and filing FIRs. Beyond dry-ration, they also made quick visits to distribute vegetables. Their regular interactions and engagement with people in their community helped build trust and earned them respect.

Older Women and girls worked in teams for better results. Bindu, a teacher working with the PACE (a resource centre for gender and education) programme at Bal Umang Drishya (BUDS) with marginalised girls in Delhi, was heartbroken at the sight of unemployed rickshaw drivers and hawkers trudging back to their villages. She inspired her 10th grade students Pinki from Shastri Park slums and Geeta from Mori Gate terminal, to take action. The girls identified families in need, filled their e-ration forms, and were the main points of contact for distributing ration and cooked food which Bindu arranged with the help of her organisation. Many people from the community refused to co-operate or trust them in the initial days of relief work. The girls persisted in the face of resistance. They patiently explained the process, clarified their doubts, and got them their rations and entitlements. Bindu felt extremely proud of her students and the girls swore by Bindu, who gave them the courage to lead and make a difference in the community. Anita, another teacher working for the PACE programme was constantly glued to her phone, making sure that all the needs of the communities and the young girls who were helping her were met. She kept going despite the nagging of her husband and mother-in-law. They neither understood the value of her work nor gave her any personal space to work from home.

Understanding the plight of police women who stood in the heat all day with no access to toilets, Chhitra Subramaniam, a film producer in Mumbai, decided to provide them with vanity vans. After many attempts, she found an ally, who agreed to lease out the vanity vans free of cost for two months. Along with other women from Bombay, she also co-founded a national people’s movement called the Pad Squad, where men and women started distributing sanitary pads in the most impoverished areas across 26 cities in the country (and other countries like Nigeria, France, Canada, and Japan). This campaign was extremely important at a perilous time when pads were not ‘essential items’ in Government's relief kits. Chhitra also supported community kitchens that fed 10,000 people a day. She and Astha, another ‘Pad Squadder’, also encouraged men and boys to break gender roles by participating in sanitary-pad distribution drives. Astha singlehandedly crowdfunded a project to distribute more than 50,000 pads to slums in Kamathipura and Chembur in Mumbai, on the eve of Independence Day, 2020.

Dr. Sneha Rooh, a palliative care physician and founder of Orikalankini, an organisation started in 2017 to change narratives around gender, menstruation, and sexuality through art, theatre and dialogue, responded to the lack of sanitary napkins during the pandemic. She started a campaign #Padsthatlast, and with the help of the Quixy customer success team, she designed and built a platform to connect thousands of pad manufacturers, relief teams on the ground, citizens and organisations willing to donate towards the distribution of pads. She explains that in times of 'extreme isolation', the role of the medical community who've been responsible for providing 'dignity in death' to patients, has been nothing short of heroic. Through the pandemic, she has been conducting trainings with the medical community, to make healthcare inclusive and accessible to all. She says, "Despite article 377, LGBTQUI don’t have medical access, the medical textbooks have not changed. Is the medical staff trained to work with patients of all backgrounds? You have to plan for inclusivity".

Sadam Hanjabam, a queer activist with a lived experience of conflict and the founder of Ya_All (an organisation working to empower adolescents, youth and queer people in health, livelihood, and education), lives in Imphal, Manipur. Sadam recognised the acute shortage of mental health professionals in his hometown. He started a helpline to provide psychosocial support to queer people and others with a team of 120 volunteers. Inspired by his efforts, the Manipur Directorate of Health decided to train a larger group of mental health professionals and assigned them districts to follow up with patients in the Quarantine centres. Sadam and his team also supplied rations, medicines, and college fees for poor students. He often provided a listening ear to troubled people through the night. Trans activist Rachana Mudraboyina, part of the Telangana Hijra Transgender Samiti and founder of Transvision, raised funds and coordinated with the state government to ensure cash and ration for members of the trans community in Hyderabad. Rachana also introduced long-term assistance and skilling, as most trans people lost their means of sustenance which had predominantly been begging, sex work, and informal labour. Bappaditya Mukherjee, a queer member and founder of Prantakatha (an organisation working for youth leadership development in Bengal) had been working with more than thirty-five grandmothers, who were 60+ and living alone on the street, in a national park in South Kolkata. He rented a two-storied accommodation to provide shelter to the grandmothers and ensured they got ration and medical help and were kept safe during the pandemic. The team also started a ‘Rainbow Kitchen’ in collaboration with Goonj (an NGO that undertakes disaster relief, humanitarian aid, and community development across India) to feed the starving, unemployed trans, and queer youth across Bengal, especially those who got no support from their families. Bappaditya believes that compassion comes from understanding our limitations and vulnerabilities. “A lot of slums, residential complexes became hotbeds for COVID-19. They would have not survived had they not helped each other out. Young volunteers would get the infected families whatever they needed; the municipality would clean out the garbage coming out of the infected household. If the household members required anything, they would put it in the residential WhatsApp groups. This is when people realised that they are alive because there is compassion being shown by others.”

Lekhni Kaushik from Narharpur District, Chhattisgarh, was no stranger to rural struggles. She grew up with parents who worked on others’ lands to sustain the family. She was married off at the age of 17, but joining the women’s collective enabled her to experience freedom in mobility and decision-making. She started a small fruit shop of her own. She braved the pandemic to talk to villagers on COVID-19 safety protocols and helped them start farming initiatives. She says, “Koi bhi kaam to karna padega. Is mein takat ki baat nahi hai, bus ye kaam hai. Apne parivar ke liye, bachon ke liye, kaam kar rahi hoon, to prerna to wahin hai. Kaam karte karte knowledge badh gayi hai, yehi meri takat hai." (One has to do some work. It's not about strength, it's just work. My family and kids are the reason I work and are my inspiration. While working, my knowledge grew, that is my strength). In rural areas, women from self-help groups of Pradan, an organisation that focuses on grassroots women’s collectives, went door-to-door to spread the information on the virus through innovative tools like the soundbox. Monika Sahu from Daspur, Odisha; Hemlata Kashyap from Rajpur, Bihar; Ahilya Kunjan and Maina Krishani from Kangarapada, Odisha, displayed their leadership by keeping an eye on the quarantine centres and ensuring that the rules were followed. Despite being threatened and often abused, they held meetings to encourage women to grow fruits and vegetables in their backyard (baadi) encouraging sustainable food security in communities. Kits, priced at Rs. 150, filled with 9 varieties of locally acceptable, nutritious, and indigenous seeds were packed and sold to the communities. Machli Palan (Fish farming) was also encouraged. In many cases when villagers found it difficult to travel to the bank and draw out cash, Bank Sakhis (local co-operatives) came to their rescue.

Sahajani Shiksha Kendra, an organization in Lalitpur, UP, that empowers women and adolescent girls through education, created ‘Jan Adhikar Samiti’, a platform of Dalit and Adivasi women. They travel across villages to build awareness on rights and entitlements, addressing lost livelihood issues and domestic or caste-based violence. At a time of rampant unemployment, they successfully negotiated with the village Pradhan (Head) to get MGNREGA work re-started and managed to get compensation and land allotments for many poor families. Mahila Shakti Sangathan, a collective made up of rural Dalit and Muslim women gathered huge utensils to cook and distribute khichdi (polenta/stew) to migrant workers and stayed united in the face of communal polarisation. Another Dalit women’s collective in Raichur, Jagrata Mahila Sangathan (JMS), led by Narasamma and Chinnamma, helped more than 2,000 Dalit households across 50 remote villages sustain themselves, by ensuring jobs for them under MGNREGA.

When cyclone ‘Nisarga’ hit Mumbai, Seema Salunkhe from Belapur, Tata Nagar (a community member associated with non-profit YUVA - Youth for Unity and Voluntary Action and Ghar Haq Sangharsh Samiti, a community based organisation fighting for housing rights ), along with other women in their neighbourhood, helped people to tackle the pandemic effectively. For almost two months, to take precautions from COVID-19 and ensure no one enters from outside, they blocked all entrances to the community using bamboo sticks; men and women would patrol the entry points at night. These collectives and countless independent grassroots workers like Lalita Tai in Navi Mumbai from the Vadar community (a denotified nomadic tribe engaged in stone cutting, mining, and house construction) spent considerable time counselling families in the community. Their actions were heroic. Lalita, for example, helped women deal with violent husbands and rampant alcoholism by calling and checking on them three times a day.

The National Network of Sex-Workers managed to provide emergency relief kits, rations, medicines, and funds to more than 20,000 sex-workers across five states, often by intimidating uncooperative local officials with the fear of human rights petitions. With great grit and determination, they relentlessly lobbied to get sex-workers recognised as informal workers by National Human Rights Commission, making it a landmark judgment.

Katkatha, working with sex workers, lovingly called ‘didis’ (sisters) and their children in GB road, Delhi, introduced a skill center in addition to their school to generate livelihood for the sex workers. Didis would come in every day to learn stitching and make masks, along with other products. A handful of local girls and boys, labourers, women and their children from the community, made sure that all the families across 77 brothels were looked after. The community came together in service of each other and for the first time GB Road witnessed solidarity at a scale never experienced before.

Focusing on the children of migrant workers, Sumitra Mishra, Executive Director of Mobile Crèches made sure age-appropriate educational kits were prepared and distributed so that children could remain engaged at home. Sohini Bhattacharya, President and CEO of Breakthrough, reached out to teachers, principals and PRI (Panchayati Raj Institutions for village -level governance) members for capacity building sessions, and steps were taken to encourage young girls to come back to schools; their psychosocial needs were also redressed.

Didihood – The Communities Of Collective Care and Solidarity

*All these experiences of a shared struggle enabled strong bonds, friendships, and solidarity among women and the LGBTQUI+ community during the pandemic.*

From sharing food and medicines, to caring for children of COVID-19 infected women, starting a squad, providing sanitary pads, running queer support groups on WhatsApp, helping stranded people get home, sharing skills, starting kitchen gardens to feed themselves and neighbours, saving each other from violent relationships and abuse, helping widows and older women, building strategies to combat unemployment, abysmal health, and discrimination - all these experiences of a shared struggle enabled strong bonds, friendships, and solidarity among women and the LGBTQUI+ community during the pandemic. By virtue of engaging with communities, listening to their challenges, and co-creating solutions to survive and thrive, they were able to extend their compassion to anyone in need of kindness.

For Rohini Chhari, an activist based in Morena, Madhya Pradesh (MP), working with the Bedia community (a denotified tribe working as sex-workers), the plight of struggling people around her moved her so much that she shared her meagre provisions without a thought about her future. Having received three months’ worth of ration, Rohini shared that she could have easily locked herself in the house and survived comfortably. But, once she heard from her young volunteers that the children of migrants were starving for 2-3 days, she was troubled. She used her ration to make small bags of rice, daal (lentil), and salt for them. When she ran out of food for her family, the volunteers gave her food. Rohini continued to act in such a selfless manner even when she fell sick, or was blamed by the same community for spreading the virus. She was also instrumental in rescuing two sex workers, one with a baby, who were illegally detained by the police for ‘allegedly’ trying to restart their profession.

The pandemic and her own struggles of unemployment and financial distress couldn’t keep Halima Shaikh, a community member in Jogeshwari East Mumbai, indoors. She and five other women took responsibility for different neighbourhood lanes and would check up on each and every family who was struggling to survive. She, along with 80 other people in the community have been standing up to put pressure on the local schools to exempt fee payment, for parents who are struggling to pay full fees, due to lost livelihood.

Tejaram Mali, the founder of Manthan, works with marginalised and excluded communities in rural areas of Ajmer district in Rajasthan. He shared that the pandemic and the norm of social distancing were now being used as an excuse to practice ‘untouchability’ against the Bhagriyas, a tribal community that is dependent on the main village for their food and water. Tejaram realized that their biggest responsibility was to inform communities that social distancing was not about creating differences, but rather about listening to people’s pain, building knowledge, and resolving problems amicably. Kanchan, a 27-year old ward Panchayat from Bhadoon village, broke the shackles of ‘ghoonghat’ (face cover) and docility, to enter the ‘Harijan’ (Dalit) basti (ghetto) in the village. She made a list of their needs and ensured that the Panchayat included them in the relief list sent to the local MLAs. Like her, many Anganwadi workers, women ward panchayats, and teachers with Manthan visited each family from the marginalised tribal and Dalit communities to ensure that everyone was taken care of.

Meera Devi and other grassroots women journalists of Khabar Lahariya, were defiant in the face of threat. Documenting stories, dispelling facts, reporting a surge in positive cases in Bundelkhand, UP, where women are not allowed to speak their mind (or even venture out of their homes), was an act of courage. They responded to the pandemic with amplified resolve. And, they continued their work despite death threats and the reluctance of government officials to answer their questions. Meera draws inspiration from journalists like Gauri Lankesh, who died writing and fighting for the truth. She shares, “Mera kaam hi meri pehchaan hai; meri zindagi ka hissa ban chuka hai" (My work is my identity; it’s become a part of my life). For many like her, work became the road to achieve social justice for the marginalised.

For Rajni, an in-house nurse in Delhi who had faced hardship throughout her life, the lockdown brought on additional despair. As a result of her profession, she was stopped and harassed many times by the police for being a 'carrier' of the virus. Even her employers, contrary to going easy, made her do extra work without any breaks. They kept tight surveillance on her movements and she wasn’t allowed to use her phone. Yet, her identity as a mother, her desperation to feed her family (being the sole earning member), forced her to continue providing professional care services under debilitating conditions. Sapna, a crèche worker from Delhi, battled similar anxieties of income and hunger, like the migrants she worked with, and yet she couldn’t afford to quit her job. Even in times of difficulty, it was the sheer resourcefulness of the crèche workers and the goodwill they had built around them that led neighbours to offer help. With markets shut and no access to paper for example, they tore out the brown wrapping cover of children’s notebooks to write down essential items to be bought, and maintain records.

Uma Chatterjee, Director of Sanjog, Kolkata, works with survivors of sex trafficking. She talks about how, even in these times of adversities, the journeys of transformation from victims of stigma to inspiring survivors, and ultimately leaders, have been stimulating. “I remember, immediately after the Amphan cyclone, the government was providing relief for which an application form had to be filled online. Lilufa, one of the survivors mentored by Sanjog, got trained on how to fill up this digital format through her phone, availed this opportunity, and received the relief. And it seemed like almost the entire village then realised this as her power and requested her to fill the forms for them and their families to access these relief amounts. Lilufa would listen to their painful narrations of the destruction of their homes, sit with them, and patiently fill up their forms through her phone. Her pain of being the "the girl who brought shame" was erased in those weeks and it removed the 'lakshman rekha' (boundary wall) that people around had imposed, earlier. She broke free from these limits and shackles of labels”.

Empathy replaced the familiar display of competition amongst the sex-workers of GB road, Delhi. Founder of Kat-Katha, Gitanjali shares, “During the lockdown, Kat-Katha received an SOS call that one of the women in the neighbourhood had no ration and was going to sleep hungry. I promptly sent a message to our common WhatsApp group of all Didis (sisters) for help and was ready to hear the word ‘No’. But to my surprise, one of the Didis readily agreed to part with a small portion of her ration”.

Saba Bhat, a Kashmiri woman, worked tirelessly to provide food, shelter and transport to stranded citizens in Delhi. When a retired army officer from Gujarat was stuck in Delhi and couldn’t get back to his hometown, Saba helped him check into a guesthouse until the lockdown got over and also provided financial and food aid. Once he reached home, he called to tell her, “Whatever I have learnt about Kashmir and its people from the mainstream news is completely incorrect”.

While experiencing compassion for other beings is crucial for individual growth, compassion for oneself is equally important. Queer folks, especially from the North East, faced discrimination in mainland cities. Some who were forced to return home felt unwelcome and suffocated by their family’s apathy. Pavel Sagolsem, a Manipuri non-binary feminist social worker, found solace in cooking traditional Manipuri food with their friends during their quarantine. They shared, “Self-care and collective care were essential. Cleaning, cooking as a community, gardening, they all gave the sense of nurturing something. That was the saving grace for me. It saved me from severe anxiety. The self-care became a collective experience and a new space for engagement”.

Leading Us Towards A Compassionate Future

Imagining an equal, sustainable and compassionate post-pandemic world led by women and the LGBTQUI+ community.

Historically, issues of women, non binary people and their examples of sustainable community development models have been overlooked, devalued, and remain unacknowledged across societies. Their alternate compassionate ways of leading, collectivising and unique ways of working on the ground have not been amplified enough. Yet, from numerous stories during the pandemic, we know that where the government couldn’t reach, they have taken care of themselves and the communities who would otherwise have been crushed by the pandemic. Now more than ever, we need to examine their models of governance and development. As Raina Roy, a trans activist from Kolkata puts it, “Collectivization is important for survival”. Women and non binary people will be at the centre of paving that resilient, collectivized future, as they have not just effectively dealt with the local crisis, but have also shown us that their methods are viable.

The Kudumbashree Mission in Kerala has stood the test of time to illustrate a compassionate model that applies systems thinking in its design. Part of the Kerala government’s Poverty Alleviation Scheme (1989), it currently has over 45 lakh members in its grassroots collectives. It works on a 3-tier governance level to tackle issues of hunger, poverty, and livelihood. This Mission had the biggest hand in efficiently dealing with COVID-19 in the state. Members were among the first to spread awareness on COVID-19 and best practices for communities, through their group chats. They opened more than 1000 community kitchens and tied up with hotels, canteens, and health centres to feed families and young children with nutritious food. They made masks, sanitisers, and PPE kits in millions to be distributed to toiling health workers and implemented many helplines for women’s safety against domestic violence (for example, DISHA, a 24x7 helpline, offers psychosocial support to people in distress). They ensured services for the elderly who were isolated or in quarantine centres for their medical and mental health needs. They led initiatives for children from marginalised families, to help them cope with online education through material, smartphones, and online programmes. Kudumbshree is a living example of how decentralised, women-led models have compassion at the heart of their decision-making - ensuring no one is left behind. Would it be brazen to demand this model be set up in every state across the country?

The Deccan Development Society (DDS) led by Dalit and marginalised women in Telangana is another stellar example of a model where beyond responding to the crisis and immediate needs, women have been able to pave the way for a sustainable future. Over the last 3 decades, the DDS has brought about an agricultural revolution by establishing collectives and women’s committees in about 75 villages comprising of Dalit women (who had small landholding status and were the most marginalised in the community). Reviving their dryland, biodiverse agriculture with a heavy focus on nutritious millets, they increased overall production while retaining control over land, seeds, water, and knowledge to achieve food sovereignty, and wiped out hunger in thousands of families. They also started their own media centre, setting up India’s first community-run radio station and a film-making studio. In a project called ConFarm, they have an annual arrangement with about 100 families in Hyderabad city, who invest in their farms upfront, receive organic and diverse food in return, and have the opportunity to visit them and work on the farms. As COVID-19 hit, the DDS women safeguarded themselves and their communities. There is as yet not a single case of infection in these villages. And remarkably, they are contributing 10 kg food grains per family to the district relief measures and feeding 1000 glasses of nutritious millet porridge to health, municipality and police workers in nearby Zaheerabad town. (from ‘How ordinary people can show us a way out through global crises’ by Ashish Kothari, Kalpavriksh).

Nitika from SAKAR, a grassroots collective of Muslim and Dalit women in Bareilly, UP, asserted that while developing and leading change, we must keep the community at the forefront. Real governance takes place when we find localised solutions, build relationships with people and let them lead. Governance, especially in the form of policy discourses that affects public provisioning and budgetary allocations must take into account the needs of women and queer folks. And if they are not represented in critical governmental bodies for decision-making at the village, state, and national levels, how will our policies truly address their issues?

Political Shakti, a non-partisan collective launched a powerful campaign in the run-up to the Bihar State elections, for higher participation, reservation, and representation of women in politics and governance. To bridge the dismal representation of women in the parliament, they joined hands with 120+ Bihar organisations, universities, and eminent personalities to demand 50% MLA tickets for women candidates. Due to this campaign, Bihar elections saw a parallel drive for elected women leadership with many women candidates standing and winning elections.

Towards an Inclusive Post Pandemic World

As we assess the past year we discover that alongside the ravages of the pandemic, there are numerous inspiring stories of initiatives led by women and the LGBTQUI+ community that showed great courage and verve in taking on leadership roles. Through the stressful lockdown, many succumbed to violence and mental health breakdowns, but scores have also impacted their community and environment with positive, compassionate, and lasting results. Their contributions have created, and will likely continue to add to the silent gender and caste revolutions that are taking place through the length and breadth of the country.

Besides COVID-19 related tasks for the government and spontaneous initiatives for community welfare, the inspiring stories have also shown us paths for building a symbiotic relationship between soil, agriculture and the environment, ensuring food sovereignty, gaining autonomy over natural resources, marketing green education, leveraging community radio and media centres, and above all, the power of compassionate bonding in the face of adversity.

As with all revolutionary work, many leaders face dire consequences; they are abused, beaten, and sometimes jailed for speaking up. Violence is still an everyday experience in many homes. It is a wonder that they carry on, despite the odds.

Veteran feminist thinker Kamla Bhasin asserts, “I believe that if we can transform humans then the institutions and the entire world can change. Capacity building is about friendship, love, solidarity and networking. Only humans have the capacity to change things. Capacity building is about empowering people with tools to understand where they are, and where they could go. There is no other way of life apart from unity, interdependence, and interconnectedness. We must learn how to share. We must learn how to live with each other. Women must create alternate familial bonds by connecting with their friends and communities. Wherever they are, whoever they are; they must engage in dialogue. To create an equal space for movements in the post-pandemic world, the first step is to build solidarity in the face of aggression and violence. And finally, to bring real lasting change, we must make men equal partners in this journey of building compassion because nobody benefits from patriarchy (not even the men) ”.

We thank the following individuals and organisations whose powerful experiences supported us in curating this story. If you want to know more or support their work, please click on the links below.

Meera, Jyoti, Hinaz Parveen, Anjali and Sohini Bhattacharya, Breakthrough

Geeta, Pinki, Bindu and Anita, BUDS

Chhitra Subramaniam and Astha, Pad Squad

Dr. Sneha Rooh, Orikalankini

Sadam Hanjabam, Ya_All

Rachana Mudraboyina, TelanganaHijra Transgender Samiti

Bappaditya Mukherjee, Prantakatha

Monika Sahu, Maina Krishani, Lekhni Kaushik, Hemlata Kashyap and Ahilya Kunjan and team , PRADAN

Meena, Sahajani Shiksha Kendra

Mahila Shakti Sangathan

Jagrata Mahila Sangathan, Raichur, Karnataka

Seema, Halima, Roshni Nuggehalli and Doel Jaikishen, YUVA - Youth for Unity and Voluntary Action