Recasting Citizenship for Development - File UPI

374 RAJESH RAMAKRISHNAN, VIREN LOBO AND DEPINDER KAPUR
refusal to meet sterilisation targets. WDP, thus, became an instrument
for what were essentially atrocities against women.
HARASSMENT OF SATHINS BY WDP
The harassment of sathins and prachetas by the WDP reached a flashpoint
in 1991 when five sathins and a pracheta were arbitrarily dismissed immediately
after they had participated in the National Women’s Conference
in Calicut (Kerala) in December 1990, under the banner of the Mahila
Samooh Kekri (MSK), a separate organisation.
The MSK was a women’s organisation of the Kekri Panchayat Samiti
(Ajmer district) formed with the laborious efforts of sathins in these
villages. This was in keeping with the avowed objectives of the WDP,
wherein sathins were expected to organise local-level Mahila Mandals in
the villages of their panchayats. Yet, when the sathins led protests against
family planning excesses, the decisions of the traditional Jati Panchayats
and land grabbing by upper-caste Rajputs, the WDP authorities disapproved
of their involvement in ‘political’ activities and kept aloof. On
their return from Calicut, five sathins were arbitrarily dismissed by WDP,
after intimidation and harassment and without following any of the
procedures laid down in their own documents, such as holding village
meetings to test if a sathin had lost the confidence of her village, discussions
of other sathins and prachetas with villagers, and discussion in the
pracheta meeting. A long legal battle ensued all the way up to the Supreme
Court, which upheld the High Court order reinstating the sathins, after
four wearisome years. Besides this well-known case, which had a happy
ending for the sathins, there had been several other instances of sathins
being dismissed in a similar manner.
CHANGE IN THE ORIENTATION OF WDP
About five years into the programme, there was an unannounced shift in
its orientation. While the original concept was to turn the notion of development
on its head by moving away from centralised policy planning to
needs and demands articulated from the village itself, within five years