Bina Agarwal & Kamla Bhasin

We have suffered enough, we'll suffer no more;

We will fight for our rights, struggle to the fore

- Feminist slogan chanted during a Delhi street demonstration

Given that the nature and form of media growth is structurally linked with big capital and commercial interests, and given the subtle ways in which media images permeate our consciousness, attempts to effect change in the way women are portrayed are neither easy to specify nor undertake. Yet it is imperative both to campaign against the existing negative portrayals and to create alternatives which do not misrepresent. It is the emergence of such attempts in India in recent years, which provide the few havens of sanity in a nightmare of distortions.

One such attempt is the campaign of a Delhi-based group — the Committee on the Portrayal of Women in the Media. Constituted in January 1983, the Committee aims at: monitoring and analysing the way women are depicted in films, advertisements, newspapers, magazines, theatre and children's literature; mobilising public opinion and launching a wide-ranging campaign of protest against sexist, negative and distorted portrayals; and, in some small measure, at creating alternatives.

The Committee is composed of concerned individuals as well as members of 13 women's and other Delhi-based organisations working towards social change. Among the 60 women and some men who constitute the Committee and who have come together on a voluntary basis, are journalists, college and university teachers and students, community-level workers and activists, researchers, theatre actors and directors, and housewives. For the initial year a smaller, core group of women met regularly to plan and carry out the work of the Committee, to undertake in-depth analyses of each aspect of the media in order both to improve their own understanding of issues concerning the media, women and society, and to evolve a strategy for action. Now the group is more loosely structured, and meetings are directed specifically to forms of action to be taken.

The attempts by the Committee to effect changes in the media depiction of women have been of three kinds: protest action, that is action against objectionable portrayal; public consciousness-raising action; and positive action, that is action for creating alternatives.

Protest Action

Writing letters to the editors of national dailies against offending advertisements, newspaper or magazine articles, TV programmes, and films; writing letters of protest to ad agencies which promote offensive advertising; holding street demonstrations against pornographic films and offensive film hoardings; and initiating legal action against pornographic magazines, are some of the strategies adopted. On the whole, there has been a perceptible degree of success in these campaigns. For example, the Committee analysing radio ads found that they were not only sexist but were also promoting dowry: 'Apko shaadi mein jolly bibi hi nahin, Jolly TV bhi mila hai — yani double entertainment' (You have received not only a jolly wife at your wedding but also a Jolly TV — that is, double entertainment!) A letter to the editor of an English language daily and one to the Director-General of All India Radio led to the withdrawal of this and other ads propagating dowry.

Sometimes, when the Committee finds certain hoardings, films and magazines blatantly anti-women, more direct forms of action, such as street demonstrations, have been resorted to. The first such demonstration was held in early 1983 to blacken a set of objectionable hoardings of Hindi feature films. Following the publicity it received, the municipal authorities publicly denounced the display of obscene posters around the city, and had several of the more offensive ones removed.

The second major street demonstration by the Committee was in September 1983, against Indian pornographic films, 14 of which from South India were running as morning shows in Delhi cinema halls. They were advertised in the newspapers with titles such as Crazy Lady, Sexy Boy, Sex Hungry, Evils of Rape, etc., with graphic visuals. These films were found to be presenting extreme violence and sadism towards women as entertainment for men. (One Committee member rightly described them as 'horror films'.) Yet they were extremely popular amongst a primarily male audience. Many such films are now being made for export (especially through video cassettes) to the Gulf countries. In most cases, having received censor certificates, the clips censored out are re-inserted and the titles changed from those originally used.

In this particular instance, about one hundred and fifty women and some male supporters demonstrated outside a centrally-located cinema hall in Delhi, where one of the films was showing. Carrying placards with slogans protesting the screening, advertising and viewing of such films, the demonstrators blocked the entrance to the hall. A leaflet (in Hindi and English) highlighting the Committee's objections to the films, and to pornography in general, was distributed to those who had come to see the film. Some members also confronted the manager of the cinema hall, forcing him to cancel the show. Within a few days of the demonstration all such films being screened in cinema halls in Delhi were withdrawn, and newspaper advertisements ceased appearing.

A significant contributor to the success of this campaign was the widespread and sympathetic coverage it received from the press and TV, which brought the issue to wider public notice and brought adverse publicity to the cinema halls in question. As a follow-up, members of the committee met the Minister of Information and Broadcasting and some members of the Censor Board. This demonstration did bring an offensive and angry rebuttal from the Malayali Film Society which tried to turn it into a North India-South India confrontation, but for almost nine months after the September demonstration, not a single such film was shown or advertised in Delhi.

Consciousness-raising Action

Street demonstrations essentially constitute short-term actions aimed at calling public attention to the issue. The struggle for effective betterment however, is a long-term one, requiring wide-ranging changes both in public consciousness and in government policies. The initiation of a dialogue with as wide a cross-section of people as possible is thus an essential aspect of the Committee's efforts. To this end, the Committee, in collaboration with the Centre for Women's Development Studies (New Delhi) organised a seminar on 'The Portrayal of Women on Indian Television' in which women and women's action groups from all over India, involved with media in different ways, participated. The views and recommendations of this seminar were outlined in a paper and publicised through the press as well as presented at another half-day seminar to the Working Group on Software for Doordarshan (the State controlled Indian television) appointed by the Government of India. They adopted many of the recommendations made in the paper.

An integral part of the Committee's campaign to raise public consciousness is to present the analyses of different sub-committees and of individual members through articles in newspapers and magazines, including special numbers of selected journals. Several discussions have also been held with journalists and journalist trainees, with students and teachers in schools and colleges, and with communities, to create a critical awareness on the subject. To make these discussions more interesting, three slide-tape shows (on women as portrayed in ads, magazines and films) prepared by Committee members are used, along with a half-hour video film on women in Hindi films (containing excerpts from feature films with a background commentary) made for this purpose by the Centre for the Development of Instructional Technology (CENDIT). Interactions and discussions with students and other groups based on these audio-visual aids have been extremely lively.

Positive Action

Several members of the Committee have also been involved directly in producing alternatives. One attempt was the production by the drama sub-committee of a play in 1983 entitled Aks Paheli (The Image Riddle). It sought to reinterpret the characterisation of well-known female figures (such as Sita, Kaikeyi and Laila) in Indian mythology and literature. A noteworthy feature of this play was that it evolved through participative group interaction. Also important is the play's explicit recognition of the relationship between myth and media, and its attempt to 'demystify' mythological female characters who have long served as models for media depictions of women, historically and in the present. Another member of the Committee has written a book of children's rhymes which move away from male-female stereotypes and role specifications.

But all this is only a beginning. To make a dent in the existing media, much more needs to be done by concerned individuals and groups to create alternatives which incorporate the complexities of human experience, emphasise equality and respect between the sexes, and challenge the existing media thrust towards male glorification and female degradation. Further, control over media represents a special kind of power. In this context, it becomes important both that women have greater access to and control over media technology, and that 'conscious' women are more widely represented as 'media-makers' and not just as consumers of anti-women media.

Building the Chain

Ultimately, the work of this media Committee is only a small link in the chain. The Committee recognises the need for and has sought to establish links with groups in other cities which, too, have been monitoring the media, so that protests carried out in Delhi can be taken up on a geographically wider basis to create a greater impact and become part of a movement. It is also critical to link up with the women's movement and with the efforts of other progressive groups that are working towards fundamental changes in the structure of our societies. It has also tried to link the media issue with other issues being taken up within the women's movement, and to collaborate with other progressive groups that are working towards fundamental changes in the structure of our society.