Dhaarchidi
Dhaarchidi was initiated in 2018, but has grown and focused their work since then. They started off doing youth consciousness building work and publishing a local histories magazine. In the last year, they have come together as a group of young women, an informal collective,that works together to understand, respond to, create public interaction around and amplify the voices and stories of women in their region. While their region is predominantly rural, it is fast growing with a lot of migrant workers bearing the brunt of this “development”.
“We wish to understand different women’s experiences through all of these realities. Women do more than 70% of the work in fields, forests and city-building, yet are marginally involved in any form of decision making. We aim to challenge the propaganda of media and mainstream discourse, especially by bringing women’s perspectives out into public and web spaces.” They say. During the COVID crisis, they began to feel the need for spacious solidarity and closeness. During the lockdown they worked on a crowd-sourced collage of women’s experiences during lockdown, which brought about the understanding that women’s lives, struggles and roles were not “locked down” but busier than ever before.
Therefore, the group came together to work in a stronger direction towards building a bigger and more connected team to take up issues, reflect and act, agree and disagree, and value women’s narratives as a valid way of understanding the world. “At this moment our success is that we are committed to non-formal organising, and to spending time making sure our values and actions are emerging from the necessities of women and the planet in this moment.” they say.
