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What
began as a means of sustenance for poor farmer women, many of them
Dalits, in the Telangana region of Andhra Pradesh has over the years
developed into a powerful tool for their empowerment to address the
issues of sovereignty over land, traditional seeds, nutritious food,
natural resources, traditional knowledge, education and health. More
importantly, the women from 80 villages in Medak district, who came
together to form grass-roots Sanghams, stepped out of the shadow of
ignorance and intimidation and carved for themselves a niche in the
challenging area of multi-media. They now wield their own movie/video
cameras to tell their stories in their own manner and language. They
have not only turned back to sowing traditional and nutritious coarse
cereals in their semi-arid lands but also developed an alternative
Public Distribution System that is just, fair and participatory. Under
the banner of the Community Media Trust, the collective of women
farmers from the State, launched their multimedia publication here on
Monday. Titled ‘Affirming Life and Diversity: Rural Images and
Voices on Food Sovereignty,’ the series comprises films that emerged
from an action research project on sustaining local food systems,
agricultural biodiversity and livelihoods supported by the
International Institute for Environment and Development, United
Kingdom. The Community Media Trust, affiliated to the Deccan
Development Society, was created to document the struggle, the images
and the voices of rural women. Society director P.V. Satheesh said the
12 video films made by the mostly illiterate women, who were given a
six-month training, traced the experience of women in regaining their
autonomy over food production, seeds, natural resources, and markets.
At an interactive session here, Masanagiri Narasamma, 35, related how
the community-led PDS taught the women to revive locally grown sorghum
and millets and create local systems of storage, and reach out to the
most vulnerable in society. As
if to prove a point, Ms. Narasamma took out her video camera and shot
the proceedings of the interactive session. Even while she was on the
dais, she continued to shoot the session. “I am a seed-keeper. I
store a variety of valuable seeds in baskets in my house and with
them, the knowledge of farming, environment and life. Since I learnt
to use the camera, I am storing the knowledge of my communities on
film and interpreting them for the world,” said Sooramma, who is in
her late 40’s. Ms.
Narasamma, a Dalit, said they were not allowed entry into temples and
rich homes earlier. “But now even the rich allow us to touch them to
pin the lapel-mike on them for a video-shoot.” While continuing with
their collective, the women now plan to replicate their on-farm and
off-farm activities and show the way to the world through their films. (Source: The Hindu, June 12, 2008) |
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