What is a samjhauta? It is a decision made to wrap up disputes, in a way that ensures everything goes smoothly in the future. In my opinion, a samjhauta could turn out to be either successful, or utterly unsuccessful.
In this episode, meet Shabina Mumtaz from Banda, Uttar Pradesh. Shabina has been working with Vanangana NGO for 17 years on gender based violence cases. She says, “I do this work to process my own feelings and help others break free from instances of violence, focusing more on mental and sexual violence.”
Usually, a compromise is done between two people, as we have often seen. A compromise is done to resolve a fight between a husband and wife, or to resolve other kinds of conflict. But, in life too, we have to go through many compromises.
Today, I have to go and visit my in-laws house. My son, who is 11, got ready to go with me. The kachcha roads here do not invite an easy means of transport, and so, both of us walked.
In this story, a caseworker walks us through her Sunday, that day of the week when she takes her son to visit her husband’s village. What awaits her there are the probing questions of neighbours as well as the calming presence of her best friend – a Mahua tree.
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 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.
