Recasting Citizenship for Development - File UPI

Women’s Development under Patriarchy 371
In 1984, WDP was set up in six districts, namely, Bhilwara, Jaipur,
Udaipur, Banswara, Jodhpur and Ajmer. Financial assistance for five
districts, as well as state-level expenditure, was arranged from UNICEF.
By 1995, the programme had spread to 21 districts.
The programme had a four-tier structure through the village, block,
district and state levels. At the village level, each selected Gram Panchayat
had a trained village-level worker called a sathin, who belonged to one of
the villages of the Gram Panchayat. She was responsible for the formation
of women’s forums at the village level. At the block level, a cluster of
10 Gram Panchayats with 10 sathins was coordinated by a Pracheta, a
block-level government functionary, who provided support and guidance
to the sathins, and was the communication link with the district. At the
district level, there were distinct government and NGO components.
The District Women’s Development Agency (DWDA) was chaired by the
District Collector, and had a Project Director assisted by a Project Officer.
Technical resource support was provided by an Information Development
and Resource Agency (IDARA). An NGO with experience in the fields of
adult education and rural development was designated the IDARA, which
was seen as a link between the grassroots and the wider women’s movement.
Activists from the women’s movement served as functionaries and
consultants. At the state level, there was a state IDARA, which coordinated
all district IDARAs. The WDP Director was overall in-charge. The Institute
of Development Studies (IDS), Jaipur, was to carry out the monitoring
and evaluation throughout the state.
THE SATHIN AND HER IMPORTANCE
IN THE PROGRAMME
The WDP recognised that Rajasthan was a very backward state with highly
underdeveloped agriculture. In the arid and semi-arid regions, subsistence
agriculture was practised and migration for wage labour was predominant.
The social milieu was characterised by feudal values of casteism
and feudal patriarchal values. The thinking behind WDP was that these
values had led to social fragmentation and acceptance of domination,
particularly by the lower castes. In such a situation, work had been deliberately
undervalued, statutory minimum wages were not followed, and the