By Kavita A Chhibber
Paro, a compelling film on bride slavery, came to Massachusetts in March and continues to win hearts and make minds think. After the sold-out private screening on March 9th at Apple Cinema in Cambridge and a very successful screening at the Los Angeles Fashion Week, there was a private screening arranged by Priya Samant at the home of Punita and Jayant Sinha on the 30th of March.
The film showcases the lives of bride slaves known as Paro(the outsider) and Molki(one who is bought).
Punita said even though her son Aashir has made his film debut in Paro in a small cameo, she had not seen the film in its entirety until the day they had the private screening at their home. For her, the fact that Aashir was associated with a powerful, socially relevant film was a good enough reason to share the film with friends.
Punita was impressed by lead actor Trupti Bhoir’s stellar performance and added that “The movie brought out an issue most of us were not aware of. It was shocking and distressing that the gender imbalance was causing these issues of bride slavery and that it was happening all over the world as Trupti explained after the screening.”
Both filmmaker and lead actor Trupti Bhoir and impact advisor Priya Samant were very appreciative of how well the screening was organized and that a very diverse group of viewers was present.
“Everyone was glued to the screen for the entire duration of the film and after the screening they asked such powerful and impactful questions. You could see that the story had resonated deeply with them,” said Priya. “It was interesting to find people there who had ancestral roots in the areas where the film was shot. Some had been posted there for work. People were very appreciative of the kind of research Trupti had done, and everyone asked how they could help.”
For Trupti it was a very emotional moment. She had started the process of writing to the Government of India, the Government of Uttar Pradesh (the state where the film was shot) and a Police officer she met at Mewat Haryana, while researching the film, even before the film went on the floors.
Trupti informed them that she was going to make this film on the Paro women who had been bride slaves for decades and needed support. She was assured by Awinash Awasthi, who recently retired from the Indian Administrative Services, that they will provide whatever support the Paro women needed to come out of such terrible conditions.
At the private screening, Trupti mentioned that what made her really sad was the fact that when she approached the offices of Ramdas Athawale (Cabinet Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment) and Annapurna Devi Yadav (Minister for Women and Child Development) Ramdas Athawale heard her out, showed up for a meeting regarding Paro, but Annapurna Devi was a no show.
“It was disappointing that a woman would not show up for a major issue affecting women or show any interest, while Athawale ji has stood by us like a rock, despite his earlier concern that India will be shown in poor light by this film on bride slavery. And that 45 years later they still have no rights or identity.”
“But I explained to him that this is happening in so many other countries. If the Indian Government stood up and changed the laws, others will follow suit. He has been with us ever since.”
It was then then the host of the private screening Jayant Sinha, who has held eminent positions in the Indian state government, and the parliament, stepped in.
“I have been a two-term member of the Lok Sabha. So for ten years I have been representing about thirty lakh people in 2 districts – Hazaribagh and Ramgarh. As an elected member, you deal with a lot of such issues where you must help people who have been exploited, abused or mistreated. I always had an open house where people could come to me and speak to me about any problem they had, and I would intervene and take quick action. Once you learn about how women are being abused and exploited as Paros, it is very important for those of us who have dedicated ourselves to public service to help wherever we can and as much as we can.”
“So when Trupti ji mentioned that she would like to meet with Annapurna ji, I quickly volunteered because the constituency Annapurna ji represents is my neighboring constituency and I have worked extensively with Annapurna ji on many local matters. So it is my duty and responsibility to help her meet with Annapurna ji and have significant policy intervention to deal with this matter.”
Jayant Sinha also pointed out that rehabilitating Paros requires a multi-level approach.
“The first level is that these poor ladies must have a secure identity which means we have to enroll them in a variety of social welfare programs that exist. In Jharkhand for example, we have the Maiya sammaan yojana. In Madhya Pradesh we have the Ladli behena yojana where women get a monthly support of 2500 rupees. Then there are various pension programs that are available for those women who have been left vulnerable.”
“The Paros need a secure identity, a bank account, and the support of the government and wherever possible, we must return them to their families. People think the trafficking happens outside a village or state, but we have seen women being kidnapped within the state, and in some cases working as domestic help or sex workers.”
“Then we must catch the criminals who kidnap these girls, bring them to justice, and get the police involved. The good news is that in every district now, we have a thana (police station), that is completely staffed with women where the intent is that they will investigate and help with matters that are associated with women as well. We must make sure that all the services that we have for people that are suffering like this, are made available.”
“Of course, the jan pratinidhis (representatives of the people) must get involved to provide these kinds of interventions.”
Anjali Tyagi was an invitee at Punita and Jayant Sinha’s home. She was warned that the film was difficult to watch. She researched about the film and was surprised like many others that Paro was not just one woman but thousands of them. “What was shocking to me was that we knew the atrocities of the caste system and how the Harijans had to deal with a lot, but at least they had their own community. Many of them were educated and could go abroad and get some sense of equality. We had heard of sexism and misogyny where women were concerned, but seeing this film about women who were treated worse than indentured slaves, was hard.”
For Anjali, the fact that the practice of women slavery in the USA happened in the 16th century and was abolished in 1865, but here in modern day India, bride slavery still existed was a hard pill to swallow. “How can we have thousands and thousands of women, across cultures and states who are treated so inhumanely under the Modi Government? The Indian American response seems to be to donate money, but people must look deep within and get involved at every level.”
At one point Jayant said if you wish to donate you can donate to the women shelters. But it was surprising to hear Trupti say that the shelters only accept abused women from other strata of society. “Paros are not accepted at any of the shelters. A Paro has zero rights, she is not recognized, receives no inheritance, her children are sold off. And in many cases the children have no sympathy for their mother’s plight. In their old age many are thrown out on the streets.” Anjali feels that the reason the change has not happened is because politicians do not want to rock the boat.
“They want the votes and that is why they let things slide. Unless they are ready to step in and intervene, nothing is going to happen.” Anjali’s mother who attended the event with her noticed that the theme of apathetic bystanders ran throughout the film. “Trupti said that is exactly how it is. People are scared to step in because they do not want to go against the system, and that is the real issue. It is not that men ill treat women. It is really both police and the politicians who are all complicit. It took a huge revolution to abolish slavery in the United States. It did not mean that their lot immediately improved but at least they had a sense of ownership of themselves. They finally had an identity. The Paros have yet to have theirs.”
For Praveen Tailam who has worn many hats as an entrepreneur, angel investor, business advisor, mentor, and philanthropist the movie was compelling, but his question was “Okay so now what?”
Praveen has been closely associated with TiE, (the Indus Entrepreneurs, a nonprofit organization with a mission to nurture and promote entrepreneurship through mentoring, networking, education, funding, and incubation) for close to three decades. “When I look back to 2013-2014, when we were looking to invest in companies, I could see a huge discrimination against women. Women led companies were not getting the same funding or even asked the same questions as men.”
TiE started an initiative called TiE Women to empower women entrepreneurs across the globe. “We are now in the 8th year, and we have a lot of successful women in our network. But I noticed that a lot of women entrepreneurs were coming from companies that promote social entrepreneurship or agrotech.”
“I wanted to see women heading AI, technology, and healthcare companies for instance and we did not see that. I was asking myself – “Are women not good enough to run their own AI companies? And whatever they are heading, are these companies fundable?” Because at the end of the day most investors want a return on investment but also want to see an impact that these companies must have in improving lives.”
Praveen says that the creation of TiE Women was to move towards equal visibility and support for women and that he hoped the program would eventually cease to exist once that equality was achieved. But there were instances when in conferences where they had a woman track, the attendees were women and the speakers were women, while his hope had been that the attendees would be an equal number of men, and all panel discussions would have an equal number of men and women speakers.
Any time they had a woman keynote speaker she would bring the house down.
Praveen was the 10th President of TiE Boston, and before that there was not a single woman on the board or a TiE President.
“I said we must change that. Since then, there have been two women Presidents, women Keynote speakers, and more women involvement. Let me add that we did not pick women for the sake of picking women or to create gender equality. We picked them because they were as deserving as men.”
For Praveen Tailam, a film that impacted him even more deeply than Paro was India’s Daughter, a documentary by Leslee Udwin which was released in 2015. It was based on the now famous Nirbhaya case, and highlighted the story of a young medical student Jyoti Singh who was brutally raped and murdered on a bus in 2012. Udwin had to leave India in a hurry for fear of being arrested because the preview created so much controversy.
But the point remains that rapes have continued, and the Paro practice has continued for the past 45 years as well.
“What did we really learn from that Nirbhaya incident? Have our courts battled it out for women? Did we change the judiciary? Have we become better human beings? Have the men changed their mentality? Are they giving women more respect? Every time I go to India and travel around, I hear that things are changing. Are they?”
“Are we teaching our sons that they are NO different from our daughters just because they are a different gender? Have we told our sons they will not receive any special privileges? I am an optimist but as far as women’s rights are concerned, and even in general, we are not evolving as we should. Change, if any, is very slow. And my question remains – So now what?”
So if highly educated, highly accomplished women were struggling for equality where did that leave women from the underprivileged classes who have fallen through the cracks? Something to think about.
Because Trupti was able to extend her stay, Priya Samant arranged a private screening of Paro at the Harvard Kennedy School with the help of the India Caucus on April 2nd.
Both Trupti and Priya were very happy to see a mix of academics and students at the event and a lot of questions were asked by everyone. The students were glued to their seats and were very impacted by the film and its message. For Trupti, it was an unimaginable reality. “I barely passed 10th grade, and to be standing and speaking to students at Harvard was a surreal experience.”
Both Trupti and Priya said the one thing that stood out for them was the moment when former Massachusetts State Representative Kay Khan told them that she was part of an initiative to ban child marriages in the state of Massachusetts.
For Kay Khan, Paro was a very hard film to watch. “It brought back memories of the time when a freelance writer approached me probably in 2015 and asked if I was aware that there were women who were being forced into marriage before the age of 18 in Massachusetts.”
Kay Khan at that time was the House of Representatives Chair of the Committee on Children, Families and Persons with Disability. She was surprised because no one had ever come to her about this practice nor had she ever heard of it. Kay agreed to put together a group of women who held high level positions to find out more and maybe think of the possibility of filing a legislation regarding this practice.
The story by the writer was published in the Boston Globe and Kay was contacted by an organization called “Unchained at Last”. It is the only Non-Profit Organization dedicated to ending forced marriages and child marriages in the United States.
“The Executive Director Fraidy Reiss told me forced and child marriages did exist, and they had been successful in helping women in 3-4 states including New Jersey where she was from. She asked if I would be interested in collaborating with them and I said ‘Absolutely’.”
Kay Khan put together a group of accomplished people including Senator Harriette Chandler from Worcester so they could work together and try and present a legislation to ban underage marriages. They had many organizations come on board. Fraidy came to Boston with her team, but it took 7 long years before a law was passed banning underage marriages without exception.
The process is a very long and complicated one, and patience and perseverance are key, says Kay Khan. “First, you must file a legislation; it gets a public hearing and then the committee decides what to do with it. An important part of the process is educating your colleagues. In Massachusetts there are 200 legislators. 160 of them are in the House of Representatives and 40 in the Senate. And we must convince everyone to be on board. Many people could not believe these practices were prevalent in Massachusetts and wanted to see proof. One of the things that Fraidy does when she is out advocating for the bill to ban underage marriages is something call “Chained in.” “When she came to Boston, we all wore wedding dresses with chains around our wrists and tape on our mouths symbolizing the state of these women. We did four events inside and outside the State House.”
“The bill went to the Judiciary Committee and the Judge was not convinced that this was a problem that existed. The committee wanted someone from Massachusetts who had been a victim, to testify. They did not want to hear from someone in another state.”
“The loophole in every state where underage marriages were happening was that parents could go and request permission as a united family, to marry a child under 18 and the judges had to make an exception and allow that. Many colleagues also mentioned situations that could be exceptional circumstances, and where underage marriage should be permitted.”
They eventually did find a woman who had been forced into marriage as a minor, gave birth to 9 children and then was able to flee to New Jersey and look for support. “She found two names. Hillary Clinton and my colleague Harriette Chandler. We referred her to Unchained at Last. They were positioned to help her immediately and encouraged her to come to Massachusetts and testify before the Judiciary Committee and she did.”
Kay Khan agreed that Massachusetts is a special state when it comes to protecting human rights. “We have women coming from other states for abortions that are needed, and we are protecting them. People here, both men and women, are more empathetic, and want to come on board to help. But education is key across the board to change things.”
Massachusetts became the 7th state to end underage marriages. To date only 13 out of 50 states in the USA have banned marriages below the age of eighteen.
Trupti’s response to the minister who said she was showing India in a poor light was very significant because she pointed out that this practice of bride slavery is happening across the globe in different countries. And USA is among them.
Priya Samant agrees. “Even though we have shown only one country and a handful of states where bride slavery exists, the faces and labels may be different, but it is happening across the world.”
I had asked Praveen Tailam if it was family that was instrumental in making him enthusiastic about empowering women and he sent me a message after the interview was done. “You got me thinking when you asked about the influences that shaped my perspective. More than family or society, the biggest impact came from the films of one director – K. Vishwanath. Between 1980 and 1998, my formative years, he made a series of movies which touched on topics that included the caste system, gender bias, depression, alcoholism, ego, vanity, discrimination, music and arts, socio-economic issues and how it binds the society.”
It reaffirms what I have always believed. Films, visuals, powerful speeches, writing, have a profound impact on society. And that is why films like India’s Daughter and Paro must continue to be made to show us that many practices are a global phenomenon, and we need powerful voices to bring these to attention. Thank you Trupti Bhoir for being that powerful voice for Paro, and beyond.