A community’s progress is determined by the degree of progress women have achieved, held Dr. B.R. Ambedkar. This ‘progress’ has to be social, economic and political, necessarily, for women to be really liberated to rise up. Lalita Devi, a Dalit woman under Caritas India-Manthan’s Dalit Women and Adolescent Girls Leadership Building programme in Patna, Bihar, demonstrated this ‘progress’ by sounding the clarion call for uniting against systemic apathy, refusing to be detracted by her caste dictates.

Mochita village in Bihta block of Patna comprises 30 households of the Rishidev, Saday and Manjhi communities, who care officially categorised as Mahadalit communities in Bihar. A unifying terminology for referring to these communities has also been ‘Musahars’, which literally translates into rat eaters. It was because of their lowly status that the Anganwadi system kept under-servicing the children and women of the community in Mochita village. An anganwadi centres under ICDS scheme of the Government, extends basic healthcare and supplementary nutrition to children under-5 years of age, and dry ration to pregnant and lactating women. Neither were the children being fed cooked food nor were pregnant and nursing mothers receiving their monthly rations. Upon noticing the inconsistencies, Lalita Devi, a mother of two, and wife of a wage labourer, resolved to act against malfunctioning Anganwadi centre than be silenced by her social position.

Lalita gathered the women of the community and made them aware of their entitlements, and sheer deception they were suffering at the hands of the service provider. Under her leadership, women united and confronted the Anganwadi worker demanding rectification, lest the higher authority be approached.  It was this feisty leadership and decision of Lalita that lent courage to other women to stand up against systemic apathy.

The collective action compelled the Anganwadi to regularise the service in a quality and dignified manner.
Moreover, the collective show of strength also ensued in increasing the enrolment from 25 to 40 children at the centre. Lalita’s courage defied all odds and set an example for her community’s women. Lalita has been associated with the Caritas India-Manthan programme since 2014, and harbours a dream to educate her children at least up to higher secondary level.

The classification of Rishidev, Saday and Manjhi communities (and several others) as Musahars, continues to ostracise and marginalise them because of strict notions of untouchability attached to them. It is this subjugation and systemic apathy that this programme aims at eradicating by raising Dalit women leaders and change agents like Lalita in Bihar. Since inception, the programme has raised 300 women and 200 Mahadalit adolescent girl leaders in communities who are acting as pressure groups and standing up for community rights and entitlements.