Recasting Citizenship for Development - File UPI

Transgressing Political Spaces and Claiming Citizenship 75
MLA: How do you know what I have or have not done?
KN: If you would have raised the issue in the Assembly, we would have
read about it in the newspapers. Other MLAs and ministers’ news cover
the pages of the newspaper, whereas nothing has come out in the newspaper
on this.
MLA: Don’t you know that ministers don’t raise questions in the Assembly?
KN: I don’t know when you became a minister. I only know that you are
our MLA.
MLA (very rudely): Who the hell are you, what is your village’s name?
KN (replied confidently): I am Kuntala, from Mardakote Village
MLA: Since when have you started showing leadership?
KN: Why are you saying so, why are you not concerned about the hardships
of the poor?
MLA: I will not listen to you, get lost.
KN (thought): Of course, I will leave. I have not come to stay at your
place.
By this time another woman leader intervened and told about the matter
politely, and the MLA said, ‘Fine, I will listen to you, and not to (KN)’.
After the entire episode, all the other women stood by KN and went on to
say that the MLA showed that she was not a woman, rather she was a very
unfair man.
However, following this encounter, the MLA called representatives of
the MMJSP for another meeting in the evening, and after some discussion
and pressure from women due to the dharna, the media coverage, et cetera,
the administration agreed to open one more phadi in the area. The opening
of one more phadi was seen as hardly a cause to celebrate (given the
demand for 18 phadis), but women felt that they would at least not have
to return home empty-handed.
For many women, this was the first time they had stepped out and were
away from their families for so long. Some of them said that this was the
first time that people from their area, Ranpur, had come to Bhubaneswar
for their demands. This placed a substantial burden on them, as they
were the first to venture out into the streets of the state capital. There was
a sense of responsibility, which was conveyed when they spoke about