Woman Panchayat leader sets example in Arunachal

Itanagar, Jul 14: The saying 'better too late than never' suites perfect for women folk of Arunachal's Changlang district, who are striving hard to let their presence felt in the society.

Beside their routine work of nourishing their children, preparing food for family members and also going to their fields, they have come across with charismatic approach to their new role of leadership in the male dominant society.

Ms Nongnem Techi, a Gram Panchayat Member (GPM) of Bubang village under Changlang South Constituency, had set example for her community.

The 28-year-old lady had been nominated as GPM of Lower Bubang village which consists of 62 households. The village is different from the rest nearby villages because it populates three different communities - the Mukloms, the Juglis and the Havis, coexisting harmoniously following faiths of their choice.

Being the sole earner of her family, she lives with her mother, two elder brothers and a younger brother and runs a small shop in the village. In the spare time, she materializes it for weaving clothes for the family members.

Before joining Panchayat, she had been associated with Arunjyoti the Arunachal chapter of Vivekananda Kendra, a renowned NGO, as well as other cultural and social activities in her village. She also played a pivotal role in eradicating the opium addiction to a certain extent in her village and also emphasized on cleanliness and sanitation.

Basically an illiterate, Nongnem is way ahead in her thinking and dealings with issues for instances like donation of village land to outsiders, for which she had to fight with certain section of the villagers. It was during last election, when a non tribal who had married a girl from the same village wanted to enrol his name as a permanent resident of the village, but she opposed.

Today they feel bad for what I have done, because they don't understand, if I don't do it today, they'll mind me tomorrow", she commented shrugging her shoulder.

As a panchayat leader, she had tried to ensure that rural developmental schemes are distributed to deserving beneficiaries. She had even collected the government supplied relief rice, hired a vehicle with her own expenses and distributed to the villagers. As such, many a times she spent her personal money for the welfare of villagers which needs to be mentioned.

In an exemplary instance, the village electrical transformer broke down, which left the village with darkness. Besides repeated request to the electrical department, the old one was not replaced as they were told that the department did not possess any of such transformer.

To this, Nongnem committed to bring light to the village, motivated the villagers to dole-out some amount household wise and collected about five thousand rupees.

When she approached the department with the money, they could not deny any longer even though it was not enough to procure a new transformer. And the rest is history.

Paving all the way to this stage, she has gathered respect from all her deeds and achieved a good rapport with all her senior Panchayat leaders who in turn helped her with all possible means.

While reflecting back she sighs with what she had done though how small it may be, she is satisfied.

Her confidence was also geared up by attending orientation training programme conducted by Arunachal Pradesh Women Welfare Society, Changlang branch and workshop for women Panchayati Raj leaders by The Hunger Project.

Now that she knows the duty and responsibilities, she wants to contest again in future even from unreserved seat, which in fact is a remarkable eye opener for other women folk of the district as well as the state. Such commendable achievement and commitment never needs 33% reservation for woman who really can do landmark activities and prove to be a real leader.

Equal status to women was a distant dream due to patriarchal nature of the society in Arunachal Pradesh. Their role was undermined and was in some sort of subjugation. The matter is not different in Changlang district, where the maximum women folk are underestimated, ignored by their male counterparts. The very participation of women in PR system had been subjected to severe criticism by the egoistic male folks.

UNI