The courts have drifted far from their humanitarian past, and judicial aggression against the urban poor is now the norm, says Videh Upadhyay.

Kalpana Sharma looks at the implications of the Nisha Sharma episode for our society.

Sexual harassment has to be vigorously tackled where it begins -- at school -- says Kalpana Sharma.

The Air India case on categorization of airhostesses illustrates how difficult it is to establish the principle of gender justice in employment, says Kalpana Sharma.
Dec 2003 update: Air India yields

Unworkable policies conjured up in the guise of 'necessity' and 'national interest' merely perpetuate the discrimination women and girls endure, says Kalpana Sharma.

At every turn, the Supreme Court has had two options, and always the justices leaned towards the unconvincing one, says Videh Upadhyay.

Kalpana Sharma remembers the first dawn of the movement for women's rights to vote.

There must be systemic changes if companies are serious about encouraging competent women to overcome the obstacles they face, says Kalpana Sharma.

Kalpana Sharma notes the presence - and absence - of women at the World Social Forum in Mumbai.

Are women in India feeling more "empowered" today, asks Kalpana Sharma on International Women's day.

Indians continue to believe that we are the moderate nation and that Pakistan is extremist. But sometimes, what we observe isn't what we expect, says Kalpana Sharma.

Sushma Swaraj used the most backward face of religion - its treatment of widows - to register her protest at the prospect of Sonia as PM, notes Kalpana Sharma.

In the very profession where people should innovate, should try out new things, should experiment, the work atmosphere is ossified, hierarchical, resistant to any new thinking or to any change in the rules of engagement. Kalpana Sharma urges a new turn to an old profession.

In any society, the process of change is painful, and in ours, women are being forced to pay the price for this, says Kalpana Sharma.

Despite quality education, the mindset of people is not changing in this country, says Kalpana Sharma.

Women's oppression will not end only with economic progress, or with education. The problem lies in a deeply disrespectful, even contemptuous, attitude towards women, says Kalpana Sharma.

Being concerned does not mean taking the law into your own hands or encouraging vigilantism. Still, there are no pat solutions, says Kalpana Sharma.

Calls for the renewal of hundreds of thousands of lapsed insurance policies have begun, reports P Sainath.

The recent controversy over a soldier returning after four years to 'claim' his wife is telling. It illustrates that where women are concerned, everyone has an agenda: the panchayat, the media and the media-consuming middle class says Kalpana Sharma.

Where other nationalisms insisted on a homogeneity of attitudes and worldviews, this one - from Gandhi, Tagore, Ambedkar, and Nehru - respected and even celebrated the linguistic, cultural and religious diversity of its peoples. Such was their idea of India. Ramachandra Guha continues his series on the great patriots.

Contrary to many predictions a unified and democratic India still survives. Why? Ramachandra Guha continues his rememberance of the great patriots.

She lives in a six feet by eight feet hut in Mumbai and pays a whopping Rs.400 per month for electricity that lights one bulb and a table fan. She is a leader of her community, and yet some better off want her disenfranchised. Kalpana Sharma rebuts a new divisive cry in Mumbai.

When it comes to violenc within the four walls of the home, even educated and affluent women are reduced to victim status not very different from women who are not so well provided for. Kalpana Sharma asks if it is too much to want a law that will truly protect women from torture behind closed doors.

She only knows at the end of each day whether there will be enough money to survive tomorrow. Does this woman have rights, the right to produce a child? Or should someone else decide what her rights are, and conclude that sterilisation is the only option, asks Kalpana Sharma.

While women who have to commute at night, or use public transport, are forced to remain alert at all times because they are aware of the dangers, call centre employees who believe that "the company" takes care of all their needs might just let their guard down. Kalpana Sharma answers a reader's question: will it ever end?

The search for a viable national alternative to the Congress goes back more than fifty years, But India is too large, and too unwieldy, to be represented by two parties alone, or even, as it now seems, by two coalitions each dominated by a single party, says Ramachandra Guha.

Sania is the star today, but there are many more waiting on the horizon, expecting to be noticed and determined to excel. Sania has forced the media, and the country, to sit up and take note. Sania and her "sisters" will not be stopped, says Kalpana Sharma.

The percentage of girl students pursuing science in college is quite impressive. Yet, when it comes to careers in science, the numbers suddenly drop. Kalpana Sharma notes the social and institutional reasons that deny women a level playing field.

Perhaps one of the most moving and inspiring stories to have come from Pakistan in recent times is the story of Mukhtaran Bibi or Mukhtar Mai as she is now called. Her fight is an uplifting example for all women, not just those who are victims of sexual crimes, says Kalpana Sharma.

There is plenty of native intelligence among the people that is very useful in averting and responding to disasters. Planning for disaster management must see this as an asset. The top-down planning and implementation currently in vogue is a poor substitute for community participation, says Videh Upadhyay.

A recent Oxfam report finds that women were, and are, disproportionately higher victims of the tsunami than men. While nature doesn't discriminate, says Kalpana Sharma, society certainly does, and such tragedies should remind us of this, or women will continue to remain invisible in suffering.

The All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) recently suggested that the custom of the man declaring "talaq" at one go and divorcing his wife should be discouraged. It stopped short of drafting further reform to the marriage contract, but this decade is seeing muslim women asserting for more, says Kalpana Sharma.

25 years ago, women's groups in this country fought for and succeeded to some extent in changing rape laws. More recently, one of the most regressive provisions of rape law was nullified. But the public spectacle made out of the rape of a Muzaffarnagar woman by her own father-in-law almost brings us back to square one, says Kalpana Sharma.

Hundreds of child marriages are held across Rajasthan with no one stopping them. Tiny boys and girls, some of them asleep and all of them unaware of what is happening, are betrothed to each other. The reality sinks in when the children attain puberty by which time they are told they have no choice. But they do, writes Kalpana Sharma.

It is no coincidence that it is women who have been targetted in the recent controversy over talking about pre-marital sex. If men voiced similar opinion, their remarks would have been overlooked. Women, apparently, should not speak about sex with this level of frankness, says Kalpana Sharma.

On December 28, 2005, Air India issued a directive stating that women could henceforth be in-flight supervisors. With this, one of the last vestiges of gender discriminatory practices that the airline has continued to hold on to, has gone. Kalpana Sharma recounts the Maharaja's glacially slow change of heart.

Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi's recent remarks on muslim women and the absence of sanitation at their homes sparked a controversy. Kalpana Sharma says that if the CM really cared, millions of Indian women, with or without a "burqa", would not be "forced to go the jungles."

Although relations between the United States and India have largely been cold or chilly since our independence, briefly in the early 1960s, there was a phase when Washington sensed the possibility of an entente. Ramachandra Guha recalls love and hate between the two nations before the age of George Bush.

In the recent impressive gains made by the Indian economy, the OBCs have not benefited proportionately. The recent extension of reservations to elite institutions that are seen as passports to the new economy is therefore logical. But it must still not be excessive, writes Ramachandra Guha.

A young Manipuri wrote to me recently: "I used to believe that media can really help ... But, how do we act when the media go silent?" India's northeastern States come into the news only when there is an election, an atrocity so huge that it cannot be ignored, or a natural disaster, writes Kalpana Sharma.

For her childish prank, domestic 'servant' Sonu was tortured, tied up and left to bleed to death. The police have rounded up her employers, but the story has not ended because it raises questions that all of us, educated, middle-class Indians need to face, writes Kalpana Sharma.

In the vicinity of a private hospital in Patiala district, a 30-ft-deep well yielded 50 dead foetuses, all female. The location of the well near the clinic was not accidental. For, clearly, despite the PNDT Act, the aborting of female foetuses continues virtually unchecked. The 'unacceptable crime' is still flourishing, writes Kalpana Sharma.

Crippling poverty, Naxalism and government bungling may have depressed the lives of poor women in Chhatisgarh, but there is now a shining ray of hope. 60,000 women have become trained community health volunteers and are making an impact, notes Kalpana Sharma.

The key to understanding information and communication technologies is that their potential for development does not lie in their electronic wizardry, but rather in the information that is communicated by their use, and the subsequent informed actions of citizens. Ashwin Mahesh on the much-touted ICTs.

The All India Services Performance Appraisal Rules, 2007 reminds us that women's work is assessed not necessarily by neutral, objective criteria. The gender angle somehow creeps in, directly or indirectly, as IAS officers in Maharashtra can now testify, writes Kalpana Sharma.

Although much amended and bent, the Constitution of India is still a charter for a democratic republic of men and women. But a recent experience made me realise that we are in danger of ceding highly resonant words to the men on our right, writes Ramachandra Guha.

For the sake of millions of voiceless women and marginalised groups, who were given a voice through the 73rd Constitutional Amendment, it is important to challenge laws that attempt to take away grassroots participatory democracy as it has begun to evolve, writes Kalpana Sharma.

The day the Uttar Pradesh election results came in, I was having lunch with a friend in Mumbai. "Mayavati appears to be the Jayalalithaa of the North," he said; the more I thought about it, the more the comparison made sense. Ramachandra Guha lists the similarities between the power women of the North and South.

Goa is, by Indian standards, a prosperous and progressive state. In terms of human development, access to education and healthcare, for example, it ranks almost as high as Kerala. But, as a small and beautiful state, it feels itself peculiarly vulnerable, writes Ramachandra Guha.

Despite their love for and knowledge of Tagore, the intellectuals of Bengal have sold him short. They have provincialised and parochialised Tagore; as a result, this thinker whose ideas extended well beyond Bengal has been turned into a local hero, writes Ramachandra Guha.