Urapakkam (Kancheepuram district), Tamil Nadu: Even
by normal standards of violence in Tamil Nadu’s panchayat politics, the
events of March 29, 2001, were troubling. Menaka, 35, the feisty dalit
president of Urapakkam panchayat near Tambaram, a Chennai suburb, was
hacked to death right in front of her office in daylight.

It was 11:30 am, when a gang of four
men, armed with long knives, barged into her office. While one stood
guard at the door, the others slashed her neck, head and face. She was
dead before her brother Nehru could rush to her defence.

Menaka’s murder shook panchayat politics
and rural governance in Tamil Nadu, especially members of the Tamil
Nadu Women Panchayat Presidents’ Federation. But it hadn’t been entirely
unexpected.

“Menaka had been getting death threats
from her political rivals for quite some time,” said Kalpana Satish, who
has trained members of the federation in leadership and was Menaka’s
friend. “She had talked to some of us in the federation and we had
advised her to file a First Information Report (FIR) at the local police
station. She did, but no action was taken.”

Menaka’s murder, at first, appeared to
be linked to political rivalry. She was handpicked by the Dravida
Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) party chief K Karunanidhi to contest the state
assembly elections from the Tiruporur constituency in 2001. The party
veteran had seen her rising popularity as a gram panchayat president.
She had been allegedly getting death threats from rival DMK activists,
including one GNR Kumar.

A deeper probe conducted by a fact-finding committee instituted by the federation found that
real estate mafia which had been eyeing prime properties in Urapakkam
had orchestrated the murder. Menaka had resisted these overtures which
began when the village was developing into a satellite real estate hub
for Chennai.

Instead, she redistributed 36 acres of village land among the poor.

“This land belongs to us, our people.
Why should outsiders lay claim to it?,” she declared, recalled Satish.
“Do what you want, I will redistribute this land.”

Kumar, who was arrested later in
connection with her murder, had been  colluding with the real estate
groups, found the fact-finding committee.

In the first three stories in this series on women in grassroots governance in Tamil Nadu, we saw how women were navigating gender prejudices, systemic issues like sparse resources and rigid caste structures
to deliver governance in their communities. In this story, we see how
violence is used as the ultimate tool of intimidation against assertive
women leaders.

Violence against women in grassroots
politics began in 1997, a year after after 33% seats were reserved for
them and they began to participate actively in rural governance.

Leelavathi’s story: The first assault on a woman leader in local politics

On the morning of April 23, 1997, K
Leelavathi (40), a corporator of the Madurai Municipal Corporation in
southern Tamil Nadu with the Communist Party of India (Marxist), was
hacked to death in daylight in a bylane of Villapuram, her constituency.

A weaver who lived in a small one-room
tenement in Madurai, Leelavathi contested elections on the promise of
bringing drinking water to the poor of Villapuram.

In the first year of her tenure, she got
a water pipeline laid. However, drinking water is scarce in the summer
months from April to June and the corporation had to arrange for water
tankers to service the community.

An organised water tanker mafia
operating in the area was charging Rs 5-Rs 10 per pot of water, though
it was supposed to be given free by the corporation as per law.

Leelavathi challenged this water mafia and was murdered soon after.

“Leelavathi was bold. She faced open
threats from these goons who had links to the then DMK government,”
recollected Vivekanandan, then a professor at PMT college, Madurai, and
part of the local CPI (M) unit. “She lodged complaints with the local
police but they did nothing.”

All of Madurai was shocked.

“She was not a big politician
with questionable dealings,” said Vivekanandan. “She was a modest and
hardworking party worker, who lived in a 10×10 sq ft room, and was
fighting for people’s rights.”

Women political leaders are easy targets
for political violence, especially if they belong to marginalised
sections of the society such as scheduled castes and tribes and have few
or no assets.

Backlash for breaking the gender barrier in politics

Much of the backlash against women
leaders in Tamil Nadu can be traced to the fact that they shook up male
dominance in politics. Even J Jayalalithaa, the former chief minister
and one of the most popular leaders in the state, was subject to verbal
and physical assault in the state assembly for questioning the then chief minister K Karunanidhi’s budget speech in 1989.

The first local body elections in 1996
following the 73rd Constitutional Amendment, held after a gap of 20
years, were largely uncontested. Women, who for the first time could
hold elected positions from seats reserved for them, were usually
selected by the village elders on the basis of their education, family
background and so on.

Rani Sathappan, the former president of K
Rayavaram panchayat in Sivagangai district, was part of the first
cohort in 1996. She vividly remembered the day 10 men from her village
came to her house to inform her that she should contest because she came
from the ‘right’ family.

“I was petrified. I refused,” she said,
seated in the living room of her home in Karaikudi in southern Tamil
Nadu where she later moved. “They came back again after a few days and
told me that I could not disrespect the will of the elders. I had to
agree.”

Rani
Sathappan, the former president of K Rayavaram panchayat in Sivagangai
district, was compelled to contest by the elderly men in her village in
1996. In the first election in 1996, women were usually selected by the
village elders on the basis of their education, family background among
other things.

The early years of female involvement
had been empowering and mostly trouble-free. In 1996, there was little
awareness about panchayat institutions and the powers of the president,
even though they were designated as executive authority, giving them
financial powers to sign cheques.

“In the first period between 1996-2001,
women were conducting gram sabha meetings without many obstacles,”
recalled Satish. “Everyone, including family, village elite men and even
party cadres thought: ‘Let her go. It is an honorary position after
all. What can she do?’”

Between
1996-2001, for the first time, women leaders were learning the ropes of
governance and getting trained in a domain that was considered
exclusively male. Kalpana Satish trained members of the Tamil Nadu Women
Panchayat Presidents’ Federation in leadership.

But these were seminal years, when women
were learning the ropes of administration and governance, attending
trainings conducted by NGOs and universities such as Gandhigram Rural
University. They were meeting with bureaucrats at all levels, travelling
as far as Chennai to meet the commissioner of rural development. This
was also when they were organising themselves into the federation, a
state-level network of women panchayat presidents.

Women were signing cheques and getting
development funds for roads, water and bridges–infrastructure no one had
seen in 50 years.

“All this did not escape the notice of
those who saw their status quo being challenged by women,” said Satish.
“It was particularly irksome if it was a dalit woman challenging the
rigid, established caste hierarchy.”

By the second round of panchayat
elections in 2001, it began to dawn upon the upper caste male elite with
political aspirations that women leaders had enough powers to make a
real difference.

This was also the time when money
started entering the election process and political parties started
participating in rural governance.

“People who were spending Rs 3 lakh in
2001 began spending upto Rs 7 lakh by 2006,” said G Palanithurai,
professor at the Rajiv Gandhi Center of Panchayat Raj Studies,
Gandhigram Rural University. “Before the elections were postponed in 2016, people were ready to spend upto Rs 27 lakh.”

This also meant that money spent on
elections had to be recovered. Corrupt practices grew in gram panchayat
works where fixed percentage “commissions” became the norm. Dominant
caste vice presidents took to forcing dalit women presidents into
parting with these “commissions”, as we reported earlier.

What also became problematic was the
power Panchayat heads had to deal with land-related issues–grant
permission to corporate groups to set up factories, remove illegal
encroachments from commons or approve land allotment to real estate
groups.

Panchayat presidents in Tamil Nadu have
the power to grant or reject permission to set up industry within the
remit of the gram panchayat, as per Section 160 of the Tamil Nadu Panchayat Act, 1996.

It was these powers that caused the most antagonism.

Land and sand: The most dangerous issues

“Sand and land are two dangerous issues
in Tamil Nadu,” said Palanithurai. “In Chennai suburbs alone, more than
60 panchayat presidents have been killed so far for land deals.”

Jothimani Sennimalai (42), the former
councillor of Gudalur west panchayat in Karur district, knows this
danger well. She fought a long and protracted legal battle in the
Madurai High Court against sand-mining in Amaravathi river in Karur. She
was abused and threatened by miners but got marched ahead with
unflinching support from the community.

Jothimani
Sennimalai, the former councillor of Gudalur west panchayat in Karur
district, received verbal abuse and threats for taking on the sand mafia
that were mining the Amaravati river in Karur district. Land and sand
are two dangerous issues in Tamil Nadu that pose considerable risk to
women leaders who dare to stand against them.

P Krishnaveni,
the dalit head of Thalaiyuthu panchayat in Tirunelveli district who
featured in our 2017 series on women panchayat presidents, had a narrow
escape. She had taken powerful castes that had encroached on Poromboke
(village common land) that she reclaimed. She had also rejected India
Cements’ bid to set up a polluting cement factory in her village.

In 2011, she was attacked by 15 men, barely 200 metres from her home. Krishnaveni survived, but it took her months to recover.

P
Krishnaveni, the dalit dalit head of Thalaiyuthu panchayat in
Tirunelveli district, was attacked by 15 men close to her home, for
waging a sustained fight against land encroachers and the corporate
group India Cements that wanted to build a polluting cement factory in
her village. Dalit women presidents are particularly prone to abuse,
threats and physical attacks when they take on powerful vested interests
because of weak support from within and outside their communities.

“In a highly corrupt system, the village
administrative officer (VAO), a revenue department official, and the
panchayat president often collude to convert government land into
private property by fudging land records,” said Satish. “This is the
reason our federation fought for the powers to summon the VAO for
information on land records and deals.”

Why women leaders, especially dalit, are vulnerable

Are women leaders more vulnerable to violence than men?

“When you take on powerful vested
interests, men and women are equally vulnerable,” said Jothimani
Sennimalai. “But there is a general perception that women won’t fight
back, that they will back off in the face of physical threat.”

There is also the difference between how men and women build networks and alliances at work.

“Men travel more out of their villages,
meet district secretaries and other functionaries of political parties
and get information that helps them see the big picture,” explained
Satish. “Women are largely confined to their immediate surroundings,
their own villages, and hence miss the complex power networks in force.”

Training for women leaders is focussed
on laws and compliance–how to maintain accounts, implement government
schemes, what are the structures of bureaucracy and how to access them.
Crucial aspects of politics–the power networks, the nexus between big
capital, industry and politics–these are not a part of the lessons.

So Menaka believed that all the death
threats were from political rivals, while actually they had come from
fellow party activists of the DMK. What she had not figured out was that
the real estate mafia was working with party activists to get control
of the land she had chosen to redistribute to the poor.

“She thought it was the MLA ticket that
was the reason for the disgruntlement among party activists,” said
Satish. “She missed the bigger picture and so did we.”

Krishnaveni, on the other hand, saw the
clear link between her resistance to the capture of land resources and
the threats to her life because she had been active in the dalit rights
movement in Tirunelveli. That still did not protect her from the
near-fatal attack.

Dalit women leaders are particularly
prone to abuse, threats and physical attacks. This is particularly true
of those with no wealth or assets and are dependent on employment on
farms owned by dominant castes.

It has also been seen that women leaders
from upper castes are able to build better alliances that cushion them
from physical and verbal abuse. But as our earlier story pointed out, poor dalit women get no support at all–from within or outside their communities.

“These women have borne the brunt of
caste oppression and have greater stakes in resource distribution than
dominant caste women,” said Satish. “They want change, here and now.
This leaves them more vulnerable.”

Communities are okay as long as women
leaders tackle what are considered “soft issues”–child marriage,
microcredit, toilets, water and so on. They are expected to be
reformists but not rebels.

“Women cannot be seen allocating land to
the landless. Women cannot take on powerful corporate interests,” said
Satish. “These are hard issues. There is a clear demarcation on what to
touch, what not.”

Where are the safe spaces for women leaders?

A few months before the attack on
Krishnaveni, activists of the Arunthatiyar Human Rights Forum in
Tirunelveli district had written to the department of rural development
and panchayati raj in Chennai and to the Tirunelveli district
administration, seeking protection for dalit panchayat leaders.

“The administration did nothing, even
though we had written explicitly that Krishnaveni and another dalit
woman president were prone to physical attacks,” said Bharatan, who
heads the Human Rights Council in Tirunelveli. “We had identified 10
such dalit panchayat presidents and asked for protection.”

In all three instances of attacks featured in this story, women leaders had lodged FIRs, but were given no effective protection.

When Krishnaveni was in the hospital,
the Tirunelveli superintendent of police (SP) had visited and offered
her Rs 50,000 as compensation.

“When I asked you for protection, you
paid no attention,” she had told the SP. “These Rs 50,000 are of no use
to me. I want my attackers arrested.”

Even political parties fail to protect
vulnerable women leaders. The DMK, for instance, treated the threats to
Menaka’s life as a local problem.

Krishnaveni’s attackers were never
arrested. Kumar, who was arrested for Menaka’s murder after pressure
from federation leaders, was later acquitted.

After Menaka was murdered, the
federation petitioned the Rural development minister to allow dalit
women leaders the license to bear arms, extending the provision that
exists in the SCs and STs (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.

Women
leaders from the Tamil Nadu Women Panchayat Presidents’ Federation held
a press conference in Chennai in 2011 to highlight the vulnerability of
dalit women leaders who are particularly vulnerable, demanding adequate
protection from the state. Krishnaveni, seated fourth from left,
highlighted issues of corruption and threats leaders like her face. She
was brutally attacked a few months later.

“The system itself is so threatening.
There are no safe spaces for women leaders, especially the ones who
challenge powerful vested interests,” said Satish. “In such a climate,
mobilising women leaders for political action and expecting them to
function independently is unrealistic.”

More fundamental structural reforms are
crucial for women leaders, especially dalits, to function without fear.
“Women need more productive resources, like productive land, under their
control for gain a modicum of economic independence,” added Satish.
“With greater economic security and education, they can build better
alliances that can protect them and replace the oppressive structures.”

Urapakkam today is a sprawling real
estate hub, barely recognisable from 2001, when it was a quiet hamlet.
“Urapakkam is a town built on the blood of Menaka, who fought for the
landless poor,” is how Kalpana Satish summed up its place in the history
of women’s leadership in Tamil Nadu.

This is the fourth of a five-part series on women panchayat leaders in Tamil Nadu. You can read the first part here, the second part here and the third part here.

Next: Why Women Don’t Move Up The Political Ladder in Tamil Nadu

(Rao is a co-creator of GenderandPolitics, a project which tracks women’s representation and political participation in India at all levels of governance.)

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