Creating a think tank

Hosted by the Hyderabad centres, the two day workshop saw a conglomeration of directors from around 130 institutes converge to discuss the common problems of women in general pertaining to the study centres.The idea behind the workshop was to create a common platform for the centres to discuss the process of utilising the research pool that academic centres have.Spearheaded by professor Armaity Deasi, former chairperson of UGC and standing committee member, the workshop was a new initiative in strengthening networking and collaborative efforts.The centres were divided into zones based on regional similarities.Groups attempted to identify focus areas common to them.Problems discussed included the increase in violence against women despite the progressive society, declining sex ratio and reproductive health.Another question raised was the occupational viability of taking a professional course in women’s studies and the ability for these students to join mainstream jobs.Said Dr Rekha Pande, head of the centre for women’s studies in University of Hyderabad, “The course structure is such that it is inter disciplinary and cuts across all other subject fields.Thus it was a common question as to where are students would fit in.we realised we would have to streamline the course in such a way making it a much more viable profession.” She added that while social service and human resources were recognised fields, women’s studies is still a largely unrecognised field.“We will need to lobby for making women’s studies a better academic and professional option.” It was also identified that the major problem faced was that each had its own system functioning.While some colleges and universities were a lot more liberal in having different subject professors cross over, other institutes were a little more unwilling.Thus drawing up a set of guidelines and policies would help in regularising the process.India has been producing a lot of interesting individual work through people like Kumkum Roy, Jawaharlal Nehru University and Sharmila Rege, University of Pune.Yet no collaborative work can match up to it.The mutual consensus was that a change in policy would make better use of the humongous resource pool that India is home to.