Five women achievers came together to share their success stories and experiences from their personal and professional lives at the Bharat Soka Gakkai (BSG) symposium organized at Bal Gandharva Rang Mandir Auditorium, Bandra, Mumbai.
The theme for the evening was ‘Women Who Believe Are the Women Who Build’ and gracing the stage on the occasion were actor-filmmaker-social activist Nandita Das; founder, chairperson of Mann Deshi Bank Chetna Gala Sinha; marketing and communications expert Minakshi Achan and Head - Department of English, Delhi University, Prof. Anjana Sharma.
The event was moderated by actor-producer Tillotama Shome and curated by Bharat Soka Gakkai, an organization dedicated to promoting peace, culture, education and sustainability.
From left to right: Prof. Anjana Sharma, Minakshi Achan, Nandita Das, Chetna Gala Sinha and Tillotama Shome. |
How the film industry treats ageing women
During the symposium, Tillotama quoted Soka Gakkai, mentioning that “true success or failure won't be apparent until you reach your 40s and 50s”, and quizzed Nandita about how that applies to Bollywood, a film industry that expects women to disappear once they get to that age.
"If you see my work, I have always been on the periphery of the industry and have made that choice,” replied Nandita revealing that she never wanted to be an actor or filmmaker. “I literally stumbled upon it”.
Nandita did her master's in social work, and was working in an NGO, before transitioning into an actor-director. “Slowly, because of the opportunities I was getting, I was called to talk at various public forums, and I would think when I actually did the work, no one called me, and now that I have done a few films, I am being called.”
“At 40s and 50s, women become invisible; they start to vanish. They get roles to play the mother of a 35-year-old,” added Nandita, revealing that she was a late mom and her child is still 14. “He keeps me nice and young.”
The anxiety of being obsessed with beauty
“Not just in the industry, in society too, there is an anxiety that we are inducing about how women look. It is a burden that none of us are being able to escape.
“I will say, it is a matter of degrees. I might see myself being less obsessed about my looks, but am I truly free of those pressures? Am I really worried about my hair and my wrinkles? I am not doing anything about it, because it is the eleventh important thing in my life, and I can barely do five. It is very low down in my priority list.
“But this is an industry that celebrates how you look and now it is about grooming, packaging, looking sexy and glamorous.”
Why one must never give poor solutions to poor women
Chetna, who travelled for six hours from Satara for the event, spoke about how she started off her rural bank with 15 women, and today is able to impact a million lives.
"I started the first bank for and by rural women," she said, mentioning that she was born and raised in Mumbai yet decided to work in rural India. When Chetna first applied for a banking license, it was rejected because the "promoting members were not literate".
"These women didn't go to school, but they believed so strongly that they wanted to learn to read and write just to get the license. The whole day they would work in the fields and in the evening, they would come together to study. There would be so much giggling and excitement because in five months they were going to RBI for the license. I was certain that we were not going to get it. I did not give any hopes to these women. When they entered the RBI cabin, they said, "you denied the license because we can't read and write but we can count". They challenged the bank officials and told them, "Ask us to calculate the interest on any principal amount, and tell your officers to do it too, but without a calculator. Let's see who gets it right." The women ended up getting the license and the Mann Deshi Mahila Bank began.
"These are the women who are my teachers," says Chetna. "The lessons and the wisdom that I have learnt from these women was they had an idea, and they believed that one must never give poor solutions to poor people. Today, they are using digital wallets without going to school."
Surviving a male-dominated industry
Minakshi, who started her career 38 years ago, advised women to understand who they are and what are their strengths. “Make sure that is what you focus on,” she explained. “The colour of money is not gendered and eventually that is what matters.”
"The corporate world can be a hard, aggressive world. I think I am barely surviving." Minakshi started her career 38 years ago, fresh out of an MBA school. "My father had to force me to become a doctor or engineer, and I thought an MBA was easier. I went to IIM Bangalore and when I completed the course, I tore my certificates and threw it in the Arabian sea because I wanted to become a creative writer."
Minakshi eventually became a writer at Ogilvy. "There were few women writers at that time and when we walked into a client's room, there were largely men, and they didn't even look at you. They pretended you didn't even exist. Over a period of time, you realise that what you say is what matters. What value you add at the table is what matters. You have to be a voice at the table, and it is so important to choose yourself as there are enough voices trying to drown you. "
Being an educator in the present-day
Anjana, who also happened to be Tillotama’s professor, went ahead to share her role as an educator and mentioned her greatest blessing in life to be “able to make each person value their own self.”
When asked what made her want to be an educator, Anjana said that she was born that way. "I don't think I made a choice. From the time I had any consciousness about myself, I would come home from school and start teaching what I had learnt to my seven dolls.
"When the dolls became unresponsive, I turned to whatever children I could find around me. I went only to girls' schools, but my students were the boys from boys' school. I am pretty certain they came to study and some of them retired as generals in the Indian army. They passed the exams, so they did study.
"The classroom is miraculous. I work very hard to teach and it seems as it is unlaboured but a lot of it is hard work. Medicine, engineering and MBA are hard, but nothing is harder about trying to teach about ideas. That is what a teacher does. The important thing is making people understand that they can do it too."
Chairperson of Bharat Soka Gakkai, Mr. Vishesh Gupta, delivered the closing remarks. “The moment a woman believes and stands up, it’s never just personal. It puts a dent in the system. That’s how change begins,” he said.
