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| Japleen Pasricha |
The founder of Feminism in India, Japleen Pasricha is a force to reckon with. Using the power of knowledge and information to bridge the gap in many spheres, Japleen presents a space for feminist narratives specific to India, all under one roof. Here is her story.
I’m a feminist activist and entrepreneur based in New Delhi.
I was born and brought up in New Delhi and was a feminist even before I knew
the term. Growing up, I was a rebellious child and was told I’m too loud for a
girl. During school, I learnt the German language and was fascinated by it. I
took up German in college and also went to Germany thrice for summer schools
and exchange programs. I have a BA, MA and M.Phil in German language and
literature. However during my M.Phil, I was disillusioned by what I was doing
and decided to change tracks. That’s when I started FII as a Facebook page in
March 2013.
Feminism in India started out as a Facebook page that
curated feminist content from the Internet. It is now a website, a Facebook
page, a Twitter handle, an Instagram account, a Youtube channel, and a WhatsApp
broadcast list with unique content created everyday.
Setting up Feminism in India
I began the Facebook page when I began my own journey as a
feminist. I began to look around on the Internet for accessible resources on
the feminist movement in India. All I found was academic articles which were
dense, theoretical and mostly behind a paywall, or content from Western
feminist platforms like Bitch Media and Feministing. Feminism in India thus,
was created with a vision of having easy-to-understand, accessible, popular
Indian feminist content on the internet written by Indian women for Indian
women.
The Facebook page, created in March 2013, initially
contained curated content from all over the Internet, as well as Japleen's
opinion pieces. Slowly other people began to start engaging with the page and
building up a nascent digital feminist community. So when I put out my plans of
creating a website, I immediately began receiving offers to contribute to the
website. Thus, the Feminism in India website was created on 19 August 2014,
publishing one or two crowdsourced articles a week. Since then it has grown
exponentially, with a minimum of four articles published daily, in English and
Hindi, on diverse topics under the feminist umbrella, with an ever-expanding
writer community.
The main idea is to increase the representation of women and
marginalized communities on the internet – their stories and their
histories. We amplify these usually unheard stories using digital storytelling
techniques, pop culture references, and new media.
I started FII when I was still a student and my tools were
social media. I actually did not have a plan when I started in 2013 and only
decided to go full-time in 2016. So for the first three years, I was running
FII as a passion project voluntarily. Some other members joined me as
volunteers in 2014. For the first three years, I just went with the flow and
didn’t really have any goals as I wanted to see how it will shape up. Friends
and family were very supportive who’d volunteer tech time, social media time,
writing time, etc.
In 2016, when I decided to go full-time, I started applying
for funds and received many rejections. As a young entrepreneur, I wish I had
the training or mentorship on how to go about registering an organisation,
doing admin and accounts work, monitoring and evaluation, fund raising,
applying for grants, etc. These were the resources that were missing and I wish
to help young entrepreneurs today so that they are in a better position to take
risks.
In a bid to prevent appropriation and to center the voice of
the marginalized, our editorial policy only allows people who occupy a
marginalized position to comment on the issues and lived experiences of that
community. So for example, men will not
speak for women, upper-castes will not speak for lower-castes and
cis-heterosexual people will not speak for the queer community. For too long,
dominant communities have controlled the narratives and the stories of
marginalized communities. Individuals belonging to a marginalised group are
alienated and silenced. We, at FII, aim to challenge this and provide equal
opportunity for all to voice their narratives for themselves. FII has dedicated
sections for intersectional experiences – caste, gender, sexuality, religion,
race, and also other forms of stigma and discrimination like mental illness and
physical disability. (You can read more for the rationale of our editorial
policy here.)
Milestones from the journey
In the wake of the shameful mass molestation case that
occurred on New Year’s Eve in Bangalore, the hashtag #NotAllMen was trending on
Twitter, used by men seeking to dissociate themselves from these attacks of
sexual violence on women. This overshadowed and disrupted the more important
and necessary conversation about the sexual violence women constantly battle in
public spaces.
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| L-R: Japleen, Suman, Amudha and Asmita |
The conversation about women's right to public spaces
continued across India, and resulted in a nation-wide collective movement
called #IWillGoOut, in which more than 30 cities participated in a walk to
reclaim public spaces on 21st January 2017. We were actively a part of the
social media awareness team for this march, culminating in live-tweeting the
Delhi chapter of the march, contributing to it being a trending hashtag on the
21st of January 2017.
We were thus successful in converting a discourse from the
defensiveness of men seeking to disassociate from sexual violence to a more
important conversation about women’s lived realities in navigating public
space.
We recently hired someone and now we are a four-member core
team which works full-time and we have one member who works part-time. Our
biggest support during such difficult times is each other. We also make sure
that we coordinate our leaves with each other so that someone can take up the
other person’s work. We also encourage our team to take leaves and focus on
their mental and physical health. Being a small team, we really do work as a
family!
I have very supportive family and friends who never
questioned my choice to change my career, quit my full-time job and start a
feminist organisation. I’m grateful for them. I have been trolled quite a lot
of times on social media. It is a part and parcel of activism, especially
digital activism. At FII, we take online abuse collectively. We all are very
supportive of each other when one person is being harassed and jump in together
to maximise the support and divide the hate.
