“Now that women are awakening … with the working class they will change society”. Vibrant voices raised in songs, now joyous peals of laughter emanating from their ‘classroom’, and sometimes a serious drone of voices engaged in learning. These were the sights and sounds at the two workshops held by Pragatisheel Mahila Sangathan (PMS) for its activists in Delhi.

PMS has had area based work in the areas of Mahavir Enclave (a lower middle class colony) and in Hyderpur Jhuggi Basti for the past five to six years. While the local activists participate in local struggles and in general programmes, there have been problems in building leading teams in the areas. In both areas, the main activists are semi-literate women; housewives in Mahavir Enclave and workers in homes or factories in Hyderpur.

PMS leaders outlined the main aims of the workshops keeping in view the problems facing the area units. In both, there was urgent need to develop a leading team with a perspective of why and how to build PMS. Total localism, lack of interest in reading and lack of perspective about the revolutionary women’s movement was dragging back expansion of the organization. So the aims of the workshops were to develop the leadership qualities of the participants and thus build their confidence, to give them a broad overview of why PMS must be built, and to introduce them to scientific attitudes and other issues. These could be followed up with simple reading and further classes.

Both the workshops were held in August 2002. In Mahavir Enclave the local team has led militant though sporadic local struggles for water, against blue films being shown on local video parlours, against family harassment of women etc. Despite repeated suggestions for a bigger team, they insisted on restricting the workshop’s access to nine members – in the course of the classes, others entered the open ‘class room’ and participated.

In this area a total ‘school time’ of twelve hours was fixed, spread over four continuous days with three hours each day. The day’s schedule began and ended with songs. Each class lasted 45 minutes to an hour. Each day there was one Activity Class where participants learnt essentials of public speaking and went through exercises in mimicry and story telling. Since the major complaint in this area is ‘we cannot get women to join our organization’, they were also guided in writing a script on how to tackle this problem.

Classes were held on

(a) Historical Materialism and the Status of Women. In this was emphasized that society changes, that values and culture are not ‘eternal’ but society specific, and the link between the second class status of women and private property, and the origin of class based society.

(b) Status of Women in India, how women have participated in democratic movements,

(c) How the cultural mores, rituals, traditions and practices we follow reinforce patriarchal values. Why a cultural movement is needed to build an alternative culture and change women’s attitude to even themselves.

(d) Women and Laws in India

(e) Women and Communalism: The Gujarat Experience

(f) Why to Build PMS

(g) How to Build PMS – by building area struggles on local burning problems (e.g. water) involving the whole community, especially women, by taking up specific cases of women’s harassment where the victim is willing to struggle and also trying to build a general movement on it, by struggling and supporting struggles against injustice and by solidarity struggles with other sections/organizations who are also struggling towards building a new society, by organizing cultural movements against the negative aspects in society and also for building up a new culture (e.g. PMS in both Hyderpur and Mahavir Enclave visits homes where a girl child is born to welcome her birth – a practice which is normally done by the families to welcome a male child’s birth). Along with these strugles, discussions on role of women’s movement, and how it must link to the revolutionary movement if women’s liberation is desired.

(h) Introduction to Science – Why is the sky blue? What is the sun? What makes day and night? Where are the stars at night? Why do eclipses occur?

Apart from leaders of the Party and other organizations, and PMS Delhi Executive Members, many others – Heena (lawyer at Tees Hazari), Dr. Ish Mishra (Asst. Prof. at Hindu College, Delhi University), Dr. Bhupender (Prof. of History in Meerut) and others came forward to take the classes and present the topics so as to invigorate and stimulate interest. At the end a review was held, but the response was very general. A better measure was perhaps the fact that the ‘students’ came regularly, and did not mind the delays and extensions that occurred.

A similar experience was repeated in Hyderpur, where the classes were for two hours per day for three days. The Activity Classes were excluded for this area. Here the women’s organization has taken up issues of police excesses, family violence on women, and such other issues. Six members were chosen to take part in the workshop from here.

Both areas area now preparing to build their PMS Committees, plan struggles, cultural teams, libraries and extend the membership.