Bhanwari Bai's Courage and Commitment to be Emulated by: Manimala (a media person Ms. Manimala is a recipient of PUCL Journalism Award)

Bhanwari Bai has been selected to receive the prestigious "Neerja Bhanot memorial Award" for her extraordinary courage, conviction and commitment. (Readers would recollect the incident, for the press had had covered the happening, thanks to women's organizations joining the struggle.) The award had been instituted in 1991 in memory of Neerja Bhanot who had acted with unprecedented dedication and courage to save those under her care without bothering about her own life during the Pan-Am plane hijack at Karachi in 1986, to recognize guts and grits of women who fight injustice and who act beyond the call of normal duty in a difficult situation. The Trust gives two awards --one to the woman-power from common civil life, and another to hardworking, risk-taking, dutiful woman. The award of the first kind has been given to Bhanwari Bai.

By honoring Bhanwari Bai, the Trust has recognized with respect the struggle and strength of the downtrodden people who belong to the bottom layer of our hierarchical society and who have faced perpetual humiliation, indignity and torture_in fact they have hardly been recognized as persons. For the first time such a prestigious award of Rupees one lakh (100,000) goes to a poor Dalit woman of a remote village Bhattri in Bassi Tehsil in Rajasthan, only 45 kms from Jaipur. Bhanwari Bai resides there with her husband Mohan, a rickshawpuller, and her two children. Up to 1992, she and her husband carried on with their caste allotted profession-claywork. Later she joined the government sponsored Women Development Program (WDP). One of the important functions of WDP is to put a stop to the practice of child marriage which is widely prevalent in Rajasthan. Her trouble started when she tried to persuade members of a family not get their one year old daughter married.

Under the WDP, 800 Sathins in 800 remote villages had created a wave against social injustice that has been inflicted on villagers for centuries. Sathins became so popular among the rural folk that the people changed the name of the program from WDP to Sathino ke Karyakrame. It was perhaps for the first time that a government sponsored program came to be known by the lowest paid and lowest level workers. Bhanwari Bai has been one of these Sathins.

In the year 1992, all Sathins were instructed to inform the nearest police station and administrative unit about child marriage taking place on the occasion of Akha Teej, a religious festival. According to traditional beliefs and faith, marriages taking place on this day become happy and successful. Therefore, maximum number of marriages take place on Akha Teej day in Rajasthan.

Almost all the Sathins including Bhanwari Bai were of the opinion that child marriages should not be stopped by using force. It should be done through persuasion and education. An environment should be created, they argued to discourage child marriages. They suggested that more and more schools for girls and boys with vocational education as the core subject should be opened so that there would be reasonable assurance of getting jobs after completion of school education, which would mean better life in villages and more involvement of young people in social affairs.

Bhanwari was trying to save a victim of this tradition in her own village--the family referred to above. She took great pains t persuade the parents of an one-year old daughter who was to be married on the occasion, but in the mean time the police interfered and stopped the marriage forcibly. The Gujar community, to which this family belonged, thought that the police were informed by Bhanwari. They took it as a great insult to their superior status that a Dalit woman should have tried to persuade them and finally succeeded in stopping the marriage through police force. They reacted; as a first step they got the child married the next day, and as the next step, inflicted socio-economic boycott on Bhanwari and her family. Those who were unhappy with the decision were compelled to abide by this as the village was dominated by this community who are economically and politically more powerful than others. The administration favored them. Bhanwari was told to quit the village. She defied and paid a very heavy price. To teach her a lesson, in the evening of 22 September, 1992, five persons caught hold of Bhanwari and her husband in an agricultural field. Two of them, Gyarsa and Badri, raped Bhanwari in the presence of her husband. On returning to the village she cried for justice from the village panchayat and the elders of the village, but none came to her help. Bhanwari was alone; she faced untold misery; none would sell even the basic necessities like food etc., to her; but she stuck on to her duties. How could she, a Sathin in her own village leave the village in such difficult and trying time; being a Sathin she had to be with the villagers for their welfare, she told herself and resolved accordingly.

Police, magisterial and CID inquiries were conducted. According to all these reports, all her allegations were found to be false. The inquiries concluded that there was bad blood between her and the accused and hence these false allegations! The culprits now became more furious, and ask her to withdraw her complaint at once. She defied the mighty force once again.

Meanwhile, Sathins, WDP officials, women's and civil rights organizations raised their voice, and demanded a CBI inquiry. The government was made to yield. The CBI report made public on 27 September 1993 found all the allegations made by Bhanwari Bai to be true. Arrest warrants for all the culprits were issued. But only one culprit could be arrested; the other four had managed anticipatory bail and then absconded.

Women's organizations did not relax; they filed a petition in the Rajasthan High Court at Jaipur seeking justice for her, and demanding that the other accused also must be arrested soon. The High Court passed an order on 17 December 1993 to the effect that all the culprits must be arrested without any delay while criticizing the police and CID for playing foul game and giving opportunity to the culprits to manage anticipatory bail thus enabling them to abscond.

Women's organizations approached the Supreme Court. The Court directed the state government to compensate Bhanwari Bai by paying a sum of Rs. 25,000/-. We all know that money cannot compensate what Bhanwari Bai has gone through. Our society must deliberate on whether money is the answer to such henious--crimes against women, against humanity, indignity and torture. Bhanwari's courage, conviction, and defiance--facing the entire might of the village and the administration--deserve to be emulated by all.