Articles by Amrita Chhachhi

Amrita Chhachhi, Farida Khan, Gautam Navlakha, Kumkum Sangari, Neeraj Malik, Ritu Menon, Tanika Sarkar, Uma Chakravarti, Urvashi Butalia, Zoya Hasan THE Anveshi article (Anveshi Law Committee, is Gender Justice Only a Legal Issue? Political Stakes in the UCC Debate', 8, 1997) criticises tendencies within the 'Indian women's movement' that, in its opinion, have focused very narrowly and exclusively upon legal reform. The main thrust of such reforms, moreover, is described as a monolithicising intention that would like to erase all plurality of caste and community, custom and practice in the name of abstract, universal gender justice, thus denying women as well as a range of marginalised communities the right to autonomy. The universalising tendency of this version of gender justice betrays a biological essentialism that fails to take on board other aspects of women's social existence. Such tendencies are most evident among feminists who, according to Anveshi, are termed as 'upper caste, Hindu and urban' in other words, they share some social characteristics of the hindutva politics that they otherwise criticise. However, presumably because of shared social space, they 'unwittingly' lapse into some of the language and agendas of their political adversaries: the demand for a uniform or gender just civil code would be one such instance, the campaign against obscenity would be another. As examples of such immature and politically naive feminist thinking, Anveshi has singled out Forum against Oppression of Women from Bombay and Working Group on Women's Rights from Delhi.

The State, Religious Fundamentalism and Women Trends in South Asia Amrita Chhachhi The growth of state-sponsored religious fundamentalism is one of the crucial issues affecting women. Recent years have seen a shift away from even the liberal rhetoric of equal rights for women with the passing of laws withdrawing legal and political rights which women had already won. These trends, however, go along with government policies and programmes to integrate women into development. This apparent contradiction can be seen as two sides of the same imperative to control and direct women's labour, fertility and sexuality to suit both capitalist and patriarchal interests.

Solidarity in Poland Amrita Chhachhi Ravi Arvind Palat Paul Kurien THE struggle by the working class in Poland, of which there have been three earlier manifestations (1956, 1970-71 and 1976), is located in problems which originate in the specific form in which production is organised. The control exercised by the bureaucracy over production, distribution and consumption puts fetters on rapid economic progress. It is in the context of the background of the battle at the shopfloor and factory level, between the drive to increase production and the workers' resistance to it, that one can situate the emergence of Solidarity; and the imposition of martial law represents the culmination of the experiences gained currently and over the three earlier cycles of struggle.