Kya Hai Yeh Samjhauta works with material of the everyday, scraps of cloth, needle thread and the timbre of human voices (“The voices of the caseworkers animate the dolls, and is the documentary part of this,”) to explore these questions. The scraps of cloth in turn, animate the grain of the voices, to gesture at the many choices women make when faced with domestic violence.
The easiest thing to tell a woman in a violent marriage is to just leave. But is leaving always that simple? From financial vulnerabilities to a loss of kinships, to a turbulent clash of hope and fear, to a complex interplay of love and desire, the decision to not leave are also stories that need to be heard.
What are the bargains we make, the samjhautas we strike, the deals we despair in, to feel safe, to feel loved? In this story, a caseworker from Bundelkhand takes us through the many rooms she has lived in, and asks, which room is mine?
In this episode, meet Hameeda from Sadbhavana Trust in Lucknow, who sees samjhauta (settlement) as a tool, in order to try out new ways to negotiate.
In this episode, meet Pushpa from Vanangana in Banda, who centres the woman and not the family while working on the cases.
In this episode, meet Meena from Sahajani Shiksha Kendra in Lalitpur, who has worked with cases of violence for over three decades.
The easiest thing to tell a woman in a violent marriage is to just leave. But is leaving always that simple? From financial vulnerabilities to hopes, desires, dreams, fears and responsibilities, all collide in the decision to not leave and stay.
News around us tells us that the brokering of deals over the untimely deaths of women is not rare. It is as common as the crime itself. The nature of such monetary saudas exposes the reality of our most personal relationships – as being hollow, fragile and dispensable.
When The Third Eye organised a discussion with three caseworkers from Banda in Uttar Pradesh, we began the conversation with one detail. We had noticed that the caseworkers used the word iqraarnama a lot. The meaning of the Urdu term iqraar is to declare or acknowledge something. The caseworkers use this idea as a tool while negotiating for women in cases of gender-based violence.
What does it mean to counsel a woman while centring her needs? At the time of taking a decision, a woman finds herself caught in a complex web of social expectations that she progressively frees herself from. Many questions stand in the way of making a decision: Where will I live after separating from my in-laws? What will I do?
