Articles from: 2013

While Doing Fieldwork

Saad, Paroma, Nayantara and I (all undergraduate students in different universities) were in Khunti, Jharkhand in the summer of 2009 doing fieldwork on the functioning of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. Khunti is largely a tribal district, but there are small pockets of areas where there are caste villages. In Birhu, one of those villages in the district where so-called high caste and low caste residents live in separate parts, we had to quickly find someone who would agree to cook dinner for us.

Let’s Talk About Rape

In the aftermath of the particularly gruesome rape in the national capital in December, Delhi’s streets spilt over as more and more of its inhabitants joined the numerous vigils and protests that followed it. the anger and pain were real. The fear in our girls was real. The shame the nation felt as we heard about her death was real. Healing, and through it, a solution begins with talking about it. With this in mind, Mitr, on 2nd February, held a discussion on sexual violence. A reassuring number of men turned up for the talk, during the course of which we had six speakers.

सिकुड़ता गणतंत्र

…जब देश के महामहिम एक विदेशी अतिथि के सामने अपने देश के वैभव-सम्पन्नता का दिखावा कर रहे होंगे तब विदर्भ का एक किसान आत्म-हत्या करने के लिए अपने गले में रस्सी डाल रहा होगा…