All societies undergo alterations. In some instances these may be gradual. i. e. . spread over a long period of clip. In others they may be rapid. Social alteration. as we know by now. does non take topographic point simply by opportunity or due to some factors predetermined by destiny. There are several forces runing at the same time in society. which bring about alteration. Some of these may be external to societal establishments. Changes caused by a alteration in the economic system or the production dealingss are one such case. At the same clip. there are change- bring forthing agents inside a society every bit good. Social motions are one of these internal forces. which contribute to alterations.
A societal motion is defined as “sustained corporate action” over clip. * Such action is frequently directed against the province and takes the signifier of demanding alterations in province policy or pattern. * Such corporate action is frequently marked by administration. Spontaneous. disorganised protest can non be called a societal motion. * This administration may include a leading and a construction that defines how the members relate to one another. do determinations and transport them out. Those take parting in a societal motion have shared aims and political orientations. * The societal motions are designed to advance alteration or resist alteration in the society in which the effort is made. So corporate effort may be to change. inaugurate. supplant. restore or reinstate all or some facets of the societal order.
In the recent literature. a differentiation is frequently made between old and new societal motions. This differentiation is frequently stipulated on the land that while old societal motions are by and large class-based and concerned with issues of economic redistribution. the new societal motions ( NSMs ) are normally a characteristic of post-industrial or “postmodern” societies. They are non narrowly caste based and by and large raise inquiries like ecological protection and clime alteration or hitherto ignored issues of gender. justness. gender etc. However this differentiation is neither precise nor universally valid. Old societal motions were category based such as working category motions and peasant motions or anti-colonial motions.
NEW SOCIAL MOVEMENTS ( NSMs ) New societal motions are the merchandises of a post-industrial societal formation where the public assistance province had made authoritative signifiers of development and want obsolete but where modern society created new signifiers of disaffection. These motions demonstrated that category had become excess as organizing signifier of societal individuality and action. Some of the recent motions peculiarly in and after the sixtiess in Europe such as peace motion. ecological motion. women’s motion etc. are called ‘new’ societal motion. In India. tremendous addition of in-between category and in student population every bit good as a rush of political activism in the 1970s and 1980s engendered a new phenomenon. described as new societal motions.
These motions revolve around the issue of individuality – dalit. adivasi. adult females. human rights. environment etc. They are called ‘new’ societal motions because they have raised the issues related to individuality and liberty which are non-class issues and make non face with the province. Issues that animate NSMs are less concerned with economic production and redistribution than with remotion of corruptness. protection of environment. proviso of civic public-service corporations. gender equality and kid rights. employment. rights of the most vulnerable and marginalised subdivision of population like those populating in hilly and forest countries and victims of large dikes. Good administration and human rights by and large are other countries where NSMs are much in grounds.
Features of New Social Motions are described below:
1. The New Social Movements ( NSM ) are non directing their corporate action to province power. They are concerned with single and corporate morality. Individual rank or engagement and motive in all kinds of societal motions contain a strong moral constituent and defensive concern with justness in the societal and universe order. These motions are chiefly societal and are more concerned with cultural domains and mobilization of civil society on socio-cultural issues than with the political issues like ictus of power.
2. The new societal motions are non class–based. They are multi-class. In fact. they do non subscribe to the theory that society is divided on category line and the categories are counter. The new societal motions are either cultural or nationalist and plural. Women’s motion is an illustration. NSMs are non concerned for the benefit of one category or group. They are concerned for the good of every one irrespective of category.
3. The new societal motions are confined to and concerned with civil society. NSMs raise the issue of the ‘self-defence’ of the community and society against the increasing enlargement of the province setups: bureaus of surveillance and societal control.
4. NSMs are non around economic issues of land. rewards or belongings. They are chiefly concerned with self- individuality and liberty of an single and community against the province. market and societal establishments. Therefore. dalit motion for self-respect and adivasis motion for their liberty are treated as NSM.
5. These motions tend to concentrate on individual issues. transeunt inquiries. regional and local issues and even sectional involvements ( which are aimed towards narrow individualities than larger nonsubjective involvements ) for this ground they are frequently called “micro movements” . they catch on the long felt demands of locals and multitudes at the disempowered grassroots in the top heavy political and economic systems of India.
6. NSM administrations tend to be segmented. diffuse and decentralised.
7. New societal motions tend to concentrate on issues that cross national boundaries. and therefore they become internationalist. Environmental motions. LGBT Movement are illustrations of NSMs that transcend international boundary lines. Non-governmental administrations ( NGOs ) and New Social Motions on the national and Global planes have flourished as ne’er before.
Assorted New societal Motions in India
Environmental Movement The Indian environmental motion is critical of the colonial theoretical account of development pursued by the post–colonial province. The post–independent province failed to construct up a development docket based on the demands of the people and continued to recommend the modern capitalist docket which led to the devastation of environment. poorness and marginalization of rural communities. The environmental motion in India advocated the political orientation of ‘environmentalism of the poor’ .
It non merely critised modern developmentalism but besides strongly advocated the resurgence of traditional ‘self –sufficient small town economy’ . The conservationist stated that local communities were best suited to conserve natural resources as their endurance depended in the sustainable usage of such resources. A important feature of environmental motions in India is that they have chiefly involved the adult females. the hapless and deprived multitudes who have been straight affected by or are victims of environmental debasement.
Therefore. these motions are chiefly political looks of the battle of local communities and people who are victims of environmental debasement or maltreatment of resources. The beginning of modern environmentalism and environmental motions in India can be ascribed to the Chipko motion in the cardinal Himalayan part. Chipko as a self-generated motion started in the early 70s and got organized under the able leading of Sunderlal Bahuguna. It was ignited by the resistance of the people of the Tehri-Garhwal part to the felling of trees by outside contractors. In the Himalayan parts. woods form an indispensable beginning of support for the tribal population life at that place. Chipko literally means ‘hugging’ the trees.
The motion articulated the concerns of forest-based communities such as depletion of woods. eroding of dirt and attendant landslides. drying up of local watercourses and other H2O resources and deficits of fuel and fresh fish for domestic ingestion. It besides fought against the building of the Tehri dike which threatened the eviction of around 25. 000 hilly occupants. Though the motion has non succeeded in all its enterprises. it has achieved some applaudable triumphs.
Geting prohibition on droping trees above an height of 1000m and coercing the authorities to denote certain forest countries as protected parts are some of the successes of the motion. Chipko. being a non-violent opposition motion. embodies the Gandhian spirit of battle. Chipko motion inspired green screen motions elsewhere in the state. the most of import being the Appiko motion in the Western Ghats against the over-felling of trees and covering forest lands with commercial trees replacing the natural 1s. Like the Chipko. the Appiko motion revived the Gandhian manner of protest and mobilization for sustainable society in which there is a balance between adult male and nature.
The other popular motions of importance in India. which have environmental protection as one of their aims. relate to major dikes. Noteworthy among them are Tehri Dam. Silent Valley Project and Narmada Valley Projects. In fact. the most popular motion in the environmental history of India is the motion against the Narmada River Valley Project called Narmada Bachao Andolan. Though the motion started every bit early as late seventiess. along with the clearance of the undertaking. it received impulse merely during late eightiess. To get down with. this motion was cantered around the issue of human rights. Due to improper execution of the rehabilitation programmes by the State the human rights militants have become the articulators of anti-dam protests.
Their demands included complete fillet of the dike. relocation and rehabilitation benefits to the oustees. These demands were competently supported by conservationists who oppose building of big dikes for ecological grounds. The motion. nevertheless. gained wider public attending with mobilisation and organisation of oustees ( largely tribals ) and the connection of the high societal workers like Baba Amte. Sunderlal Bahuguna and Medha Patkar. Though its wider public attending is due to its coverage ( impact ) in three provinces. the most noteworthy characteristic of this motion is the international support it has received.
The run forced international fiscal bureaus like World Bank and USAID to retreat support for the undertaking. While this Gandhian motion could non halt the building of the Sardar Sarovar Dam. it did coerce the provinces concerned- Gujarat. Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh- to turn to the issue of rehabilitation of the displaced more earnestly than earlier. Thus environmental and ecological motions became outstanding in India since the 1970s. The issues raised by them concern all subdivisions of society in changing grades. These issues are besides related to people’s self-respect. environmental rights and their decision-making rights on the issues refering them.
Women’s Movement Throughout the period after independency the predominating position was that development. industrialisation and economic growing would present the consequences as they had been seen elsewhere in the developed universe ; all would be donees of development. adult females included. This shortly proved non to keep true in the Indian society. A study from the Committee on the Status of Women in India released in 1974 showed that non merely had the conditions for adult females in India non improved. for many adult females. particularly the hapless. the conditions had worsened. Gender differences had become greater in political engagement. instruction. wellness and employment.
The 1970s and 1980s witnessed the growing of legion women’s groups that took up issues such as dowry deceases. bride firing. colza and sati and focused on force against adult females. They stressed the sexual subjugation of adult females in a manner old reform or women’s rightist groups had ne’er done. Some of the earliest independent women’s groups were the Progressive Organization of Women ( POW. Hyderabad ) . the Forum Against Rape ( now redefined as Forum Against Oppression of Women ) . Stree Sangharsh and Samata ( Delhi ) . Among the first runs that women’s groups took up was the battle against colza in 1980. This was triggered by the judgement of the Supreme Court to assoil two police officers who were accused of ravishing a minor tribal miss. Mathura. despite the fact that the High Court had indicted them.
This led to country- broad presentations. Several other colza instances became portion of this run that culminated after several old ages of protest in Government holding to alter the bing colza jurisprudence. The amended jurisprudence was enacted in 1983 after long treatments with women’s groups. The POW in Hyderabad organized new and fresh protests against dowery. In the late seventiess. Delhi became the focal point of the motion against dowery and the force inflicted on adult females in the matrimonial place. Groups. which took up the run. included ‘Stree Sangharsh’ and ‘Mahila Dakshita Samiti’ . Later. a joint forepart called the ‘Dahej Virodhi Chetna Mandal’ ( organisation for making consciousness against dowery ) was formed under whose umbrella a big figure of organisations worked. The anti-dowry run attempted to convey societal force per unit area to bear on wrongdoers so that they would be isolated in the community in which they lived. Women’s organisations besides succeeded in acquiring the dowery jurisprudence changed.
There were several runs in the 1880ss associating to women’s rights. Among them was a run. in 1985. in support of the Supreme Court judgement in the divorce instance where Shah Bano. a Muslim adult female. had petitioned the Court for care from her hubby under Section 125 of the Criminal Procedure Act and the Court granted her demand. The Orthodox Muslims. nevertheless. protested against intervention with their personal jurisprudence. In 1986. the authorities introduced the Muslim Women’s ( Protection of Rights in Divorce ) Bill denying Muslim adult females damages under Section 125. Women’s associations protested against this outside Parliament. The Committee of the Status of Women besides stated in its study that seats should be reserved for adult females in municipalities. and proposed that panchayets should include adult females to procure a minimal per centum of female engagement.
In 1993 this was adopted nationally when the Constitution Act 1992 ( 73rd Amendment ) and The Constitution Act 1992 ( 74th Amendment ) were passed. associating reserves for adult females to panchayets and municipalities. One-third of seats in all panchayets and municipalities nationally. every bit good as tierce of the place of being presidents in the organic structures. were reserved for adult females. The reserves Acts of the Apostless were passed without any resistance in the Parliament. and with merely a minor argument. However. the measure on Women’s reserve in Parliament has non yet been passed. Over the old ages it has become clear that altering Torahs entirely means small unless there is a will to implement them and unless there is instruction and literacy which makes adult females aware of their rights and allows them to exert them efficaciously.
It was this realisation that has led the women’s motion to take up. in a more conjunct mode. programmes of legal literacy and instruction. gender sensitisation of text editions and media. The issues today are sexual torment at the work topographic point. the force of development. caste and communal force. buttonholing for increased political engagement of adult females in the highest degrees of decision-making. etc. The success of the women’s motion has non been in the figure of adult females appointed to office or in the figure of Torahs passed but in the fact that it has brought about a new consciousness on the full inquiry of adult females in Indian society.
