ERIC ED380207: In Our Own Hands: The Story of Saptagram, a Women's Self-Reliance and Education Movement in Bangladesh. Education for All: Making It Work. Innovations Series, 2.

37 Pages·1994·1.6 MB·English

by  ERIC

7-
.
I 4
DOCUMENT RESUME
PS 023 036
ED 380 207
Guttman, Cynthia
AUTHOR
In Our Own Hands:. The Story of Saptagram, a Women's
TITLE
Self-Reliance and Education Movement in Bangladesh.
Education for All: Making It Work. Innovations
Series, 2.
United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural
INSTITUTION
Organization, Paris (France).
ISSN-1020-0800
REPORT NO
94
PUB DATE
37p.; Photographs may not copy well. For other
NOTE
documents in this series, see ED 369 535 and PS 023
037-039.
Basic Education Division, UNESCO, 7 place de
AVAILABLE FROM
Fortenoy, 7535S Paris 07, SP, France.
Descriptive (141)
Reports
PUB TYPE
MF01/PCO2 Plus Postage.
EDRS PRICE
*Developmental Programs; Feminism; Foreign Countries;
DESCRIPTORS
Health Programs; *Rural Women; Self Concept; *Self
*Social
Employment; Self Help Programs; Sex Fairness;
Action; Socioeconomic Influences; *Womens
Education
Bangladesh; *Consciousness Education; Exploitation;
IDENTIFIERS
Income Generation; *Saptagram (Bangladesh)
ABSTRACT
This booklet describes the origin of Saptagram, a
into a
grassroots organization in Bangladesh and its development
organization was
movement to empower deprived, landless women. The
its most
founded in 1976 by a woman history professor, and one of
original features is a gender-oriented syllabus. The booklet's
introduction outlines the aims of the organization, which focuses on
making poor rural women socioeconomically self-reliant. The
such
subsequent chapters discuss different aspects of the movement,
(1) tackling gender disparities; (2) using the group approach to
as:
(4) involving
confront problems; (3) demystifying the lives of women;
(5) adopting sericulture (silkworm
women in economic activities;
production) as a comprehensive income-generating project; (6)
female-oriented
focusing on preventive health care; (7) designing a
(9) including women at all
(8) recruiting teachers;
literacy program;
field staff;
levels of the organization; (10) recruiting suitable
of
(11)' encouraging self-sufficiency; and (12) securing sources
and
funding. The impact of the movement on women, and the challenges
In
perspectives for the organization's future are also discussed.
basic economic
addition, four features are included that describe the
indicators of Bangladesh, examples of social action taken by groups
and a day in
of women, a story used in the adult education course,
14-item bibliography.
the life of a Saptagram member. Contains a
(BAC)
***********************************************************************
Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made
from the original document.
***********************************************************************
DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
U
Once of Educational Research and improvement
INFORMATION
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ERICI
CENTE
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received from Me person or oroamzetion
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reprodoCtion quality
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Points& view or opinions stated in this
<Oficial
mint do not necessarily represent
OERI position or policy
pg
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"PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS
MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY
F. Z
114.-*
VYN
N.
BEST COPY
TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES
INFORMATION CENTER IERIC1"
rducation for All, Making it Work
is a major international UNESCO
programme to collect, analyze and
promote successful basic education
projects in the developing world. For
this purpose, a series of publications
on innovations was launched in 1993
with All Children Can Learn, on the
`900 schools project' for the under-
privileged in Chile. In Our Own
Hands is the second issue in our
series. Saptagram's philosophy is that
women can only better their lives by
joining forces Founded in 1976 by
Professor Rokeya Rahman Kabeer, the
Bangladeshi non-governmental orga-
nization is dedicated to helping
deprived and landless women Today
;if
the movement is active in one fit.
the country, extending to 900 villages
and reaching 22,000 target members.
8 ESTCOPY AVAILABLE

4
Introduction
6
Tackling gender disparities in Bangladesh
8
Saptagram: Confronting problems together
9
Demystifying the lives of women
11)
Taking out loans: A collective decision
12
Sericulture: Women at all stages of production
13
Learning about health
14
Education: A course designed for women
17
The teachers: Keeping up with demand
18
Saptagram's management: Women at all levels
19
The field staff: Key agents of change
20
Moving towards self-sufficiency
21
Funding: A turn in 1993
21
Budget
22
Saptagram's impact: The value of time
24
Challenges and perspectives for the future
26
Features.
26
Bangladesh basic indicatory
Social action
28
Ajmat Bibi's life story
29
member
a Sapid:yam
i (lay in the life of
Portrait: .
10
Bibliography.
31
Acknowledgements
5
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4
,
.4-
Saptagram
,ie---
sia4ggies agaiost
,
4.
age-old traditions
4
that wvant to keep
erg.,
women inferior and
"J.
.
separate from men.
4 r
Its education
programme arose
4.4
irom women's
aemanas.
MOLE
r
g ESICOPY
instructors, giving women an additional
To help deprived.
decade ago, 300 angry women workers
in a
source of income and enhanced status
Bangladesh,
on a road-building project in
!endless women
country where only one in five primary
.,.most of them illiterate, surrounded their
jndersranc the
school teachers is a woman and female illiter-
district's Martial Law Office after realizing
causes of their
in the
acy, at 77 per cent, is one of the highest
they had 'signed up' with their fingerprints for
oppression. take
world. The women-centred curriculum is
been promised. It
a smaller wage than they had
especially relevant, since the
charge of their
caused a political upset and
government has promised to
lives and work on
convinced the women of the
aim at Education for All, of
need for education, so as to
income-generating
which non-formal basic edu-
secure their basic rights.
projects.
cation is a key part.
In a traditional Muslim
,
What makes Saptagram
Bangladesh,
society
like
different from the several
women are not often seen
hundred NGOs working in
admitted-
working on roads
this country of 114 million
ly a low status employment
inhabitants, one of the five
or staging demonstrations.
poorest in the world and regu-
But most of these women
larly devastated by natural
belonged to Saptagram Nari
disasters? From the start,
Swanirvar Parishad - the Seven
Saptagram has seen its strug-
Villages Women's Self-Reliance
gle as a challenge to keeping
Movement - a grassroots organi-
'
women inferior and separate
zation founded in 1976 by his-
from men. "We have been
4
tory professor Rokeya Rahman
told all our lives by our mo-
Kabeer. Today, the movement,
thers, aunts and grandmothers
to help deprived, landless
that our place is at the feet of
women understand the causes
Founder Rokeya Rahman Kabeer
our husband",
Lily
says
of their oppression,
take
Begum, a Saptagram member. Girls are often
charge of their lives and work on income-
married at 10, payment of exorbitant dowries
generating projects, has spread to over 900
supposed to
can ruin families, and women are
villages, reaching 22,000 members.
be invisible and isolated, in accordance with
One of Saptagram's most original
the old ideal of female seclusion, or purdah.
features, introduced in the mid-1980s, is a
Rather than taking a welfare-biased
gender-oriented syllabus that has attracted the
development,
or short-term approach to
interest of other non-governmental organiza-
Saptagram concentrates on empowerment of
tions (NGOs) in Bangladesh. This year, to
its members, starting with the assertion that
relieve the shortage of female teachers in the
strength lies in unity and group solidarity. Its
expanding education programme, Saptagram
aims are:
has begun hiring its own graduates as future
i
e
Towards a better
fitture fin- mother and
child. Saptagram's
education programme
arose from womens-
demands.
J.:JAE:AL
Professor Kabeer
;opposite page)
giving a lesson on the
importance Waring
an address using
Saptagrant designed
literacy material.
%es
1) To work among women in poor rural areas
Bangladesh, and kills the myth that women need
male protection if they are to work in the coun-
2) To make them aware of the causes of their social
and economic deprivation and give them the means
tryside.
For the past ten years, Saptagram has
to gain more control over their lives
3) To initiate non- traditional income-generating
received funding from OXFAM, the Swedish
activities on a cooperative basis and give women
International Development Agency (SIDA) and
the Norwegian Agency for Development
some control over resources
4) To provide education to groups, with emphasis
Cooperation (NORAD), and one-off grants from
other sources for special projects. To speed up
on hook-keeping. The gender-oriented syllabus also
the time-consuming process of applying for
reinforces women's knowledge of their rights.
The
education programme greW from the women
funds, Saptagram has drawn up an integrated
rural development programme for 1993-1996.
demand fbr classes, as they came to realize the links
between education. employment opportunities and
Based on the recommendations of an evaluation
report and a 1992 management review,
basic human rights
it aims
to consolidate Saptagram's activities, and is
5) To provide knowledge of health and nutrition
being funded by a consortium.
The presence of women at all levels of the
organization, from senior management to the
field, is unique in rural development work in
MAI11.3LE
13 ESI-COPY
3
-k\---1
sive military regimes have sought to reconcile
When Rokeya Kabeer returned to
political
pro-
contradictory
apparently
Bangladesh in 1976, five years after it
grammes", writes Naila Kabeer, a scholar at
emerged from anightmarish civil war,
Sussex University's Institute of Development
she resigned from her position at a govern-
Studies. "The contradictions are most apparent
from
ment college. An upper-class woman
in the sphere of women's rights, since state
Calcutta, she set off for the village of
policy has. on the one hand, championed
Komarpur, where her in-laws lived, in
`women in development' values and the
Faridpur district, one of the country's most
emancipation of women, and on the other, set
backward regions.
in motion a 'creeping' Islamisation process,
Saptagram began in the early days of
thereby encouraging those who would snatch
the United Nations Decade for Women. Aid
back the gains that women have made."
donors in Bangladesh (where foreign loans
At state level, promises of emancipation
and grants were 7.2 per cent of GDP in 1990)
and participation in development have not
programmes, empha-
gave more for women's
been followed up. Public sector funding for
sizing women as producers, not only
women's programmes only got 0.06 per cent
Growing !endlessness
child-bearers. At state level, General
of the budget under the first five year plan and
Zia-ur Rahman, who came to power
is slowly deteriorating
around 0.20 for the second and third.
in 1975, zealously took up the cause
the social fabric of
Today, some 99.4 million people live
of Women and Development, creat-
Bangladesh, where 80
below the poverty line, a disproportionate
ing a Ministry of Women's Affairs
per cent of the population
number of them women. In 1989-90, the
and increasing to 30 the number of
is rural. Nine per cent of
nutritional intake of women was 88 per cent
parliamentary seats reserved for
that of males and they earned 40 per cent less
Bangladeshis own 80 per
women.
than men. While 8 per cent of male-led
In those days, the notion of
cent of the land, and
households were classed as very poor, the
`women development' helped to chal-
some 60 million people
corresponding figure for female-headed
lenge the age-old preconception of
are functionally landless.
households is 33 per cent. Only 23 per cent of
Bangladesh
women at all levels of
the female population is literate, compared to
for
society. It also opened up new possibilities
44 per cent of men.
for their com-
women to organize and straggle
In 1993, compulsory primary education
organizations started
mon interests. Women's
was extended to the whole country, and as part
campaigning against dowry and opened shelters
of a pledge to narrow the gender gap in
for women who had been victims of violence.
I I See bibliography
education, free education for girls in rural
As a result, the government passed new laws on
Grade 5 to
areas has been extended from
these issues.
Grade 8. Secondary education, from the age of
However, "in their quest for internal
10, lasts for up to seven years. 22 per cent of
constituency and external legitimacy, succes-
AVAILABLE
6
BEST COPY
r.
.
<
Saptagram's gender
oriented syllabus has
;von government
prizes two years in
....;1
a row
the country's 17.6 million primary school-age
women's programmes (government, private
children never attend school. Of the 13.7
and international), were mostly embroidery,
sewing and knitting. On the other hand,
million who do enroll (67 per cent boys, 57
per cent girls), 60 per cent drop out before country-wide
initiatives
such
the
as
completing the five-year cycle with most
Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee
dropping out in the
(BRAC) and the Grameen Bank have
first three grades.
encouraged women to
Enrolment ratio at the secondary level was
start
small
up
businesses and other productive activities
equivalent to 18 per cent (24 per cent of boys,
outside the home. Over the past two decades,
11 per cent of girls).
BRAC has promoted income generating
landlessness
Growing
slowly
is
deteriorating the social fabric of Bangladesh,
projects among the rural poor and created a
where 80 per cent of the population is rural.
network of over 12,000 primary schools.
Nine per cent of Bangladeshis own 80 per cent
Despite their involvement at grassroots
level, Kabeer argues that none of these
of the land, and some 60 million people are
functionally landless. Studies predict that by
programmes are completely geared towards
women, partly because they are not run by
1995 three quarters of the rural population will
be in
this category, partly because of
women. "If you want to work with women,
inheritance rules which divide property
you must have women to understand what the
problem is. But that is not done by male
equally between all sons. (Muslim law allows
NGOs", she told a seminar at Reading
daughters to inherit land, but in practice,
"They are now
social factors and family politics prevent
University
1992.
in
desperately trying to get women on staff
women claiming these formal rights).(2)
Many NGOs are working
because there is pressure from the funders to
and often
throughout the country. Most
competing
have competent women in their organization."
have integrated the 'women and development'
component into their strategies. But many put
( 2) See bibliography
women into labour-intensive, low-profit
sectors, such as handicrafts or poultry rearing,
usinty, very simple technology. One study
found 70 per cent of training curricula in
10
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