 You would have noticed that in recent times amongst women, in general, there has been a huge sense of assertion, in the sense, they are wanting to come out of their earlier bonds, out of their earlier spaces, and they are trying to occupy different spaces now. I mean, just look at the sports field, for example. I mean, you have women winning what, in tennis, in wrestling, in weightlifting. I mean, these are areas which were assumed to be so highly male dominated, but now you find that women are doing so well, and they are proving that they can come into any of these fields, and they can do equally, if not better, than men. And it is not only this, it is not only sports or in areas of this sort, in education also, there have been women in much larger numbers, who are aspiring, coming into higher education in your fields, in communication, etcetera. But also, if you look at the grand panchayats, if you look at the municipalities, there has been an impact of this, you know, 33 percent, and now 50 percent reservation for women in the local bodies and in the grand panchayats. So, you find large numbers of women have come into the political system at those levels, at the levels where they can take decisions about area level problems, civic issues, things that they are familiar with. So, they are making those decisions. They are willing to come in over there, they are willing to fight the elections and they are doing it. So, you have a large mass of women trying to come into these public spaces as individuals, you know, as people on their own. Now, this somewhere, you have a larger social system, which does not favor this shift, which in fact, does not favor, I think, is putting it mildly. What we have noted is that there is a hostility, and this hostility comes from a mindset, which sees women in that ancient patriarchal mold, you know, what we call Manuwadi. Now, this Manuwadi ideology continues to try all the time to entrap women within those existing norms of the household, the family, you have to have four children. You look at some of the baians that are being given by some of the, you know, the Hindutva leaders here and there, the RSS leaders, I mean, they are not shy of putting it or saying it, though it is against our constitution, it is against our democratic rights, they are not bothered. They are saying women have to be here, they have to bear so many children and so on and so forth, and they are trying to create this conservatism as a system, which will continue to shape the women's future. Now, this is something that the women are resisting. These women were coming out they are, so there is a backlash, there is a conservative backlash. So, what we are trying to show is that this conservative backlash is taking place a, because these Hindutva forces are on the rise and are trying to reimpose these kind of regressive ideas and ideologies Manuwadi, and which is highly, you know, Brahminical also, caste, if you look at how they have treated the Dalits, how they look at the Dalits, etcetera, that also feeds into this. And second most dangerous aspect of this is that they are being often upheld by the state, because the BJP in power represents these forces, rather than the forces of, you know, democratic rights, equality and your constitutional spaces, your fundamental freedoms, it does not represent that, it represents this. So, therefore, today we find that the state when it has to step in, the law even when it has to step in, it should step in in a particular way, it is stepping in to push the legal framework backwards. So, that is something we want to bring out and this is where, you know, how section 498A is sought to be weakened, how PCPNDT act in a new situation, where, you know, you have a booming economy apparently, but economic growth has not meant equal growth, it has not meant equitable growth, it has not meant that your poor are less poor or that the backward are less backward and that they are moving in towards a more, you know, greater share of what is being produced or that is not what it means. They are being further pushed back as a result of these kind of development paradigm, you know, the neoliberal development paradigm, what we say, because of that the women who are aspiring and are moving into this actually become more vulnerable to the sort of crimes and assaults that are occurring. So, you have a double attack on them, a twin barreled attack. So, today we are at this point of time, where women will are resisting, will have to resist, will have to come out stronger and will have to understand what is happening in this current framework and that is why, we feel that, you know, a political, a social and economic and a cultural change, all these changes will have to occur simultaneously. You have to see the whole paradigm, that is why this convention is of particular importance, the AIDWA national convention is of particular relevance. So, one area would be, we have to safeguard the rights that we have won in legal terms, that is, safeguard the laws. These laws, see, if you remember, even after this whole episode of, you know, this Nirbhaj, Bhaia Khan in Delhi, after that, that rape law was amended and in that, as Varma had said that marital rape should be included, but today what do you see? You see actually that there is a pullback, there is no effort to ensure this is brought in, rather there is an effort to show that this will destroy the family. What? You want to keep the family alive, where rape is allowed, marital rape is acceptable, that is the thing you are trying to suppose. So, we are saying safeguard the rights that have been won already and move for more gender just laws. So, this is one very important area. We need those laws, they themselves may not bring about total change, but the laws are part and parcel of the larger system where equity and equality can be assured to all including women. One thing is that against this regressive kind of ideology, where you find that women are being encapsulated again, captured again, trying to be, you know, can you thrust a genie back into a bottle? I doubt very much, but they are trying very hard and they are using all kinds of diversionary tactics. They will, you know, they will pretend something, this is because of this, but till now blaming the victim for the crime against her is across board happening. In many of the states, those who speak tomorrow, they will be mentioning how, you know, they have been attacked and assaulted and they themselves have been blamed for the crime that has been committed against them. So, this regressive ideology, Manuwadi ideology, this is something we will take on and in one step towards that we hope that we can have some kind of social reform campaign, may be, you know, use Phule, Savitribha Phule's birthday comes up early Jan. So, you know, use that as a sort of give a call for a future campaign for a social reform movement. That is very much necessary and both amongst women and amongst men, because we feel that it is not only a women's issue, it is an issue for all sections including for men. Social reform cannot happen only for women, right? It has to happen for men and women, social reform. And third thing is our basic democratic rights enshrined in the constitution. That is a basic fundamental fight and we join hands. We want to ensure that women will be part of this huge battle that I am sure is going to take place against the assault on democratic rights, intolerance, the way in which history gets rewritten, the way in which Padmavati gets targeted in the most absurd of manners, diverting attention from the Kisan struggles, diverting attention from the workers' struggles, these kind of things, against all these to uphold what we fought and got in the constitution. What Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar said in those days, that we have put it down in writing, but for it to turn into reality, you will need a much greater and much wider struggle. So, I think that is the struggle that we are getting ready for and this national convention will give a call for that and we hope we will progress towards that goal.