How women nd are changing parties’ agendas
Basanti Sabar, 30, is a third-time voter. But this time round, as the eastern Indian state of Odisha goes to the polls in simultaneous general and state elections, the former migrant worker will make a crucial shift in the way she votes.
In patriarchal rural India, who the family vote for is usually decided by the men. On 13 May, however, Sabar and other women in Padampur village will for the first time vote for a candidate of their choice – a shift that is influencing the way state and national politicians speak to the female electorate in their manifestos.
Padampur, in the drought-hit Kalahandi district, is one of India’s most impoverished villages. For decades its residents have been compelled to migrate for work. Today the men still leave but the women stay, having found financial independence through Odisha’s self-help group (SHG) movement, which offers them loans and benefits from state schemes.
This independence is changing what men and women want from politicians. Padampur’s men have their hopes pinned on broadbased changes such as more jobs and better incomes, which they believe only a national party can deliver. The women, bolstered by the income now available to them, support the state government, which is run by a regional party.
India’s Economic Survey 2022-23 notes that the country’s female-led SHGs are collectively regarded as the world’s largest microfinance project. According to the survey, the SHG-Bank Linkage Programme, which helps poorer Indians access microfinance through selfhelp groups and banks, covers 142 million families with savings of 470bn rupees (£4.5bn).
SHGs were introduced nationally in 1984. A department for the scheme was established in Odisha in 2020, its loans bringing not just financial independence. “Earlier, voting was a family decision but now I want to decide for myself. I am not just tending to my family but also contributing financially,” says Sabar, as she moulds bricks in the small kiln in her back yard.
The bricks will go into building the family a new home to replace their thatched bamboo one. “For how long are we expected to wait for a solid house?” asks Sabar, referring to a project of the ruling Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) to build brick and concrete houses for poor rural households. “We waited for a long time but no more,” she says. “Now we will start constructing our own homes with the interest-free loan of 10,000 rupees that I took through the state government’s SHG scheme.”
Padampur has a long history of migration, whole families leaving to work at brick kilns and becoming entrapped as bonded labourers. Sabar and her husband were rescued from bondage at a kiln in Tamil Nadu state in 2017.
While her husband continued to travel in search of work, Sabar joined a women’s SHG in 2020, a turning point in her life. “Through the group, I could take small loans for emergencies,” she says.
“During my pregnancy, I availed of benefits under the state government’s Mamata scheme. I had no such security while working elsewhere.” Sabar says she will vote for a party that has already delivered such benefits, not one that merely promises them.
Experts say this split in voting between the sexes is becoming apparent across Odisha’s remote villages and is shaping political agendas. Tara Krishnaswamy, a coordinator of the non-partisan collective Political Shakti, says: “Many regional parties, including those in Odisha, have progressed from thinking about women’s needs only in terms of cooking gas and maternity to focusing on higher education, entrepreneurship and microloans through SHGs.
“Women tend to vote based on what is already delivered, not just the promises in the manifesto.”
Migrant workers are a large part of the electoral base in the state: at least 850,000 people leave for jobs from 10 districts. Traditional migration from Ganjam and other southern districts is considered aspirational, but in western Odisha, including Kalahandi, people migrate because of poverty or a degraded environment.
But while the manifestos of the three parties in Odisha – the Biju Janata Dal (BJD), the BJP and the Congress – address female voters, promising to strengthen SHGs, increase social security for widows and destitute women, and create female squads to improve rural women’s safety, they are silent on the subject of migration.
Migrant workers say politicians have made little effort to encourage them to vote, but add that will not stop most from casting their ballot.