Workshop on status of women's studies in Northeast at Tezpur University

Guwahati, Dec 1: Omeo Kumar Das Institute of Social Change and Development (OKDISCD), Guwahati in collaboration with Chandraprabha Saikiani Centre for Women’s Studies, Tezpur University organised a two-day workshop on Status of Women’s Studies in Northeast India at Tezpur University on November 26 and November 27, stated a press release.

Tezpur University Vice Chancellor Prof Mihir Kanti Chaudhuri graced the occasion and welcomed the gathering. Prof. Indrani Mazumdar, Centre for Women’s Development Studies, Delhi delivered the iugural lecture.  The director of OKDISCD while highlighting the objectives of the workshop emphasised upon identifying research priorities and areas for the newly established centres for women’s studies in this region. The workshop also stressed upon the need for interventions to be made by the women commissions and other civil societies to deal more effectively with the women’s issues. The discussants agreed that the issues and problems of women of this region needed to be considered within the context of its own regiol specificity and historicity.

The participants also discussed the institutiolization of women’s studies as a discipline and the new vistas it opens to discuss women’s issues in a multidimensiol framework. The workshop saw the participation of scholars, activists and representatives of state women commissions of different states of Northeast India. In the workshop, there was a near consensus that the much glorified idea of gender equity in Northeast India is rather a myth which needs to be dispelled with academic vigour.