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From September, a new kind of drawing competition has been underway in the city of Dehradun and surrounding areas. The topic? The life and dignity of women workers.
NB: On October 23rd, we held the final round in this competition. But we still need your support - in order to complete the competition on time, we needed to borrow money from a village chit fund and from other friends. We'll now be organising a series of meetings with the women organisers and the children, but we need your support to cover the expenses of this initiative.
Read below to know more about the competition and the expenses. First, some photos of the final round.
Women workers organised this competition themselves - and the process sought to honour them as women, as workers, and as organisers. Here are the organisers on the day of the final round.
The topic was the life and dignity of women workers. These are the finalists - the children who secured the top three ranks in each of seven areas in the city of Dehradun. 
This is the Director General of Police, Ashok Kumar, IPS, who very kindly agreed to grace the occasion and distribute the first, second and third prizes to the winning children.
The two first prize winners (senior and junior categories respectively), who were awarded Rs. 15,000/- in cash prizes and trophies.
Some of the winning drawings in the first and final rounds of the competition.
Some photos of the first round of the competition, which was carried in out in workers' settlements across the city. Why are we doing this?
As we said, women workers across the city ran the competition themselves. Through this and related activities, we hope to give children a shared, enjoyable activity that allows them to be proud of the people no textbook talks about - their own mothers.
Women workers are invisible both as women and as workers. In 2020, the world watched in horror as millions of Indians left cities and began to walk home along the highways, in what has been called the largest mass migration since Partition. Women workers in particular faced the most horrific impact of this terrible time in our history. Yet a year later their reality has vanished again from both media and policy discussions.
With the help of the Chaukambha Trust, this competition was an effort to break this invisibility. We want to honour women workers and their struggles - as women and as workers - in society's eyes, in their communities' eyes, and hopefully in the eyes of their own children.
After the competition, we'll be organising a series of meetings with the women organisers to discuss next steps on raising issues of relevance to them, as well as talking to the children who are interested about art trainings and other training.
More than 500 children participated. The competition was organised via all women organising committees in each mohalla. The committees registered children in senior and junior categories and conducted the first round of the competition in their mohallas. The city was then divided into seven areas and the drawings in each area collected. These were then given to external judges (not affiliated to us), including senior art teachers, poets, social workers and educationists. On the basis of the marks given by these judges, the top ten children in each of the seven areas are awarded Rs. 500/- and a trophy; the top three among them were invited for the final round. In the final - judged by well known artist Pramod Sahay and senior feminist activists Geeta Gairola and Uma Bhatt - cash prizes of Rs. 15,000/-, Rs. 12,500/- and Rs. 7,500/- were given to the first, second and third prize winners respectively.
Expenses and Budget
After the competition, we'll be organising a series of meetings with the women organisers to discuss next steps on raising issues of relevance to them, as well as talking to the children who are interested about art trainings and other training.
More than 500 children participated. The competition was organised via all women organising committees in each mohalla. The committees registered children in senior and junior categories and conducted the first round of the competition in their mohallas. The city was then divided into seven areas and the drawings in each area collected. These were then given to external judges (not affiliated to us), including senior art teachers, poets, social workers and educationists. On the basis of the marks given by these judges, the top ten children in each of the seven areas are awarded Rs. 500/- and a trophy; the top three among them were invited for the final round. In the final - judged by well known artist Pramod Sahay and senior feminist activists Geeta Gairola and Uma Bhatt - cash prizes of Rs. 15,000/-, Rs. 12,500/- and Rs. 7,500/- were given to the first, second and third prize winners respectively.
Expenses and Budget
NB: These have been revised in light of the actual expenses incurred.
Prizes:
Competition winners: Rs. 15000 x 2 + Rs. 11000 x 2 + Rs. 7500 x 2 = Rs. 67,000
Area winners: Rs. 500 x 134 = Rs. 67,000
Trophies: Rs. 48,700
Final Round:
Prizes:
Competition winners: Rs. 15000 x 2 + Rs. 11000 x 2 + Rs. 7500 x 2 = Rs. 67,000
Area winners: Rs. 500 x 134 = Rs. 67,000
Trophies: Rs. 48,700
Final Round:
Food expenses for final round: Rs. 15,000
Hall Rental for final round: Rs. 2,000
Chairs and mats for hall: Rs. 8,000
Photographer for final round: Rs. 1,500
Certificates for participants: Rs. 2,500
Other miscellaneous expenses: Rs. 1,500
Grand Total: Rs. 2,13,200
Hall Rental for final round: Rs. 2,000
Chairs and mats for hall: Rs. 8,000
Photographer for final round: Rs. 1,500
Certificates for participants: Rs. 2,500
Other miscellaneous expenses: Rs. 1,500
Grand Total: Rs. 2,13,200
We were able to purchase the trophies from the donations received here. But we still need your support for the remainder.
