Kisan Sansad to be all-woman affair

SKM to launch Mission UP in Lucknow

When farmers return to Jantar Mantar to continue their parallel parliament protest on Monday, the participants will look different from their counterparts inside Parliament House as well as the delegates of previous Kisan Sansads in one major way: they will all be women. “The Mahila Kisan Sansad will reflect the key role that women play in Indian agriculture, and their critical role in the ongoing movement too. Convoys of women farmers from various districts are reaching the morchas for the Mahila Kisan Sansad,” said a statement from the Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM) joint platform of farm unions coordinating the protest. According to Census data, 30% of all cultivators and 43% of all agricultural labourers are women, although few of them have land rights in their own names. At the height of the ongoing agitation against the three farm reform laws in January, about 15-20% of protesters were women, according to Kavitha Kuruganti of the Mahila Kisan Adhikaar Manch, an alliance of women farmers organisations and supporters.