The pink uprising

Pink Sari Revolution

Author: Amana Fontanella-Khan

Publisher: Picador India ,  price not mentioned

Sampat Lal rose from the mundane and meek rural Uttar Pradesh. This book documents how she went on to galvanise the timid village-women and made pink the colour of revolution, says SANJOY BAGCHI

The Indo-Gangetic Basin is one of the finest alluvium plains in the country, agriculturally, one of the most productive. Although geologically the Punjabi basin and the Gangetic plains are of the same vintage and character, there is a world of difference between their human resources. The Punjab peasantry is sturdy, enterprising, bold and adventurous; the peasants of Uttar Pradesh (UP) are just the opposite. They are meek and submissive, splintered by caste considerations and intellectually dominated by orthodox religious sentiments. All these characteristics have kept back the agricultural community in UP and prevented it from harnessing the natural wealth of the region.

Traditionally the rural society of UP has been exploited for centuries by the troika consisting of the local patwari or the keeper of village land records, the thanedar or the head of the local police station and the zamindar or the landlord. These three mercilessly exploited the rural society that had hardly any recourse for the protection of their legitimate rights. Shortly after Independence, these three were strengthened by a fourth agent, the vidhayak or the legislator. Frequently the vidhayak and the landlord were the same person. These four, individually and sometimes in collusion, preyed on the countryside. The vidhayak soon collected a band of local goons, began to be counted in local decision-making and took a cut in the release of funds for the local welfare. He was a political force and his power and authority was recognised all over. Many of them preyed on the local women who had caught their fancy. They used them and then mercilessly exterminated the victims when they became inconvenient. A couple of them are still paying the price for the cold-blooded murder of a health visitor and a poetess.

From time to time protest movements began. VP Singh constructed Mandalisation of society for the uplift of the downtrodden but it was soon converted into a struggle for loaves and fishes. Mayawati appeared as another messiah who used her position for amassing a colossal personal fortune. Phoolan Devi, the bandit queen, gave up dacoity to help the local people but it was a temporary phenomenon. Uma Bharti was another meteor who has yet to establish her place. The Pink Sari Revolution or the Gulab Gang is one of the latest phenomena that have made an impact in Bundelkhand, one of the most backward areas of UP.

This book opens with an incident where the goons of a vidhayak are swinging a villager, holding him by the arms and legs, over a fire. This unique torture was being inflicted to extract information about the daughter of the victim. This vidhayak had inducted the young girl as a serving maid who soon found the dubious nature of the service required. He forcibly deflowered the girl and was planning to palm her off to another person. The girl managed to escape from his clutches and was untraceable for a time. True to form, the vidhayak roped in the police for registering a false case of theft against the girl. This was also not unusual. The author approvingly quotes an obiter dicta by Justice Anand Mulla: “I say with all sense of responsibility that probably there was no other group of bandits whose crime record exceed that of the gang we call the Indian police”. Although Justice Mulla had said this more than fifty years ago but it holds good even now at least for the UP police. Independence and responsible governments have made no difference.

The exploitation had reached the limit. At last a local woman took up the cudgels. She was not a city-bredjholawali mouthing human rights slogans and feasting on funds from abroad. She was an ordinary village woman, barely educated. She was Sampat Pal. She is a “gifted public speaker who uses effective techniques to seize the attention of even the most sun-lazed farmers”. Her expansive body language is “matched by an equally loud, attention-grabbing voice and force of speech”. She had an instinctive sense of what is right and what is wrong. And she knew how to get her way even when things did not seem to be too encouraging. But it took a lot of patience on the part of Sampat to collect a band of women and to organise them for self-help.

Because of Sampat’s strong personality and her record of helping others, the women of her village started coming to her with their problems. Sampat started mobilising the women in the “self-help group to act collectively in response to their problems”. She galvanised them though they had “never undertaken a part in any protests, to march together to confront government officials to demand better roads and bribery-free bureaucracy”. At first she was derided but soon the determined group of women made their presence felt in the police stations and ration shops.

Sampat Pal decided to give her group of women a distinct identity by clothing them in a distinctive sari. She wanted something plain, functional and cheap. The choice of a colour needed serious consideration in order to avoid political or religionist associations. “Red is employed by socialists. Green by Muslims. Blue by Bahujan Samaj party. Orange by Hindus. Yellow by the Gayatri Parivar. Every colour, even white, seemed to be taken by some group or another. That is why pink was ultimately chosen — it was the only colour that seemed to be free of any association.” That was the origin of the Pink Sari revolution.

From a modest beginning, the Pink Gang has now become an all-women group of more than 20,000. It has become well-known all over Bundelkhand and its actions to redress the injustice done to the poor and down-trodden people have become legends. This book is a riveting narrative of the Gang’s persistent efforts to free a young girl unlawfully abused and imprisoned at the behest of a local vidhayak. It succeeded in its crusade.

Fontanella-Khan is a journalist, writing mostly for the American papers. She has spent two years extensively travelling and researching for this book in Bundelkhand. It is a very readable account of a modern phenomenon in India written with journalistic verve.

The reviewer is a Fellow of Royal Asiatic Society, London