{"id":368,"date":"2011-04-28T10:10:38","date_gmt":"2011-04-28T14:10:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/thequeenofmyself\/?p=368"},"modified":"2011-04-23T10:18:53","modified_gmt":"2011-04-23T14:18:53","slug":"pretty-damn-effective-in-pink","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/2011\/04\/pretty-damn-effective-in-pink.html","title":{"rendered":"Pretty (Damn Effective) in Pink"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Gulabi (pink) Gang, is a group of about 10,000 women who have banded together to combat male violence and corruption in one of India\u2019s poorest regions, the Banda district in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. These brave and brazen women have become folk heroes, winning public support with their successful series of militant actions against abusive husbands, corrupt officials and indifferent police.<\/p>\n

Their name, Gulabi, means pink. The members of the group wear bright shocking pink saris, because pink is the color of life. Armed with traditional sticks, or lathi<\/em> these pink vigilantes go after corrupt officials and boorish men, striking fear in the hearts of wrongdoers and earning the grudging respect of officials.<\/p>\n

“Mind you, we are not a gang in the usual sense of the term. We are a gang for justice,” declares the gang\u2019s founder, Sampat Devi Pal, is a 46-year-old mother of five who, like the other women lives in a mud-brick hut with no running water or electricity, and survives on less than\u00a0 $1. per day.
\nIn this extremely poor area, women bear the brunt of poverty and discrimination in Banda’s highly caste-ridden, feudalistic and male dominated society. Rough demands for dowries, domestic and sexual violence and child marriages are common \u2014 Pal herself was married off at the tender age nine and had her first child at thirteen.<\/p>\n

Village society in India is loaded against women. It refuses to educate them, marries them off too early, barters them for money. Village women need to study and become independent to sort it out themselves. <\/strong><\/p>\n

To recruit new members for her group Queen Pal traveled from village to village belting out her repertoire of rousing protest songs urging women to “uproot the corrupt and be self reliant.” Her stated goal was \u201cto lift them out of the black hole they\u2019d been pushed into.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the two years after they gave themselves a name and a uniform, the pink sorority sisters have thrashed men who have abandoned or beaten their wives, returned girls who were thrown out of their homes to their spouses with dire warnings against further ill treatment, and unearthed fraud in the distribution of grain to the poor.<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody comes to our help in these parts,\u201d states Pal. \u201cThe police and officials are corrupt and anti-poor. So sometimes we have to take the law into our own hand. At other times, we prefer to shame the wrongdoers.\u201d<\/p>\n

You go, gals!<\/p>\n

I Adore that pink! It\u2019s the navy blue of India! <\/strong>
\n– Diana Vreeland<\/strong><\/p>\n

* Please send me your thoughts about power. Also stories of your own empowerment. When shared, these ideas and examples are extremely inspiring to others. Thanks.<\/em><\/p>\n

***
\nThe Queen welcomes questions concerning all issues of interest to women in their mature years. Send your inquiries to thequeenofmyself@aol.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

CONSULT THE MIDLIFE MIDWIFE\u2122<\/a>
\nQueen Mama Donna offers upbeat, practical and ceremonial guidance for individual women and groups who want to enjoy the fruits of an enriching, influential, purposeful, passionate, and powerful maturity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Gulabi (pink) Gang, is a group of about 10,000 women who have banded together to combat male violence and corruption in one of India\u2019s poorest regions, the Banda district in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. These brave and brazen women have become folk heroes, winning public support with their successful series of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":218,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,2,3],"tags":[858,108,13,29,100,21],"class_list":["post-368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-empowerment","category-inspiration","category-womens-issues","tag-feminism","tag-gulabi-gang","tag-holistic-living","tag-india","tag-social-justice","tag-women-leaders"],"yoast_head":"\nPretty (Damn Effective) in Pink - The Queen of My Self<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/2011\/04\/pretty-damn-effective-in-pink.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Pretty (Damn Effective) in Pink - The Queen of My Self\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Gulabi (pink) Gang, is a group of about 10,000 women who have banded together to combat male violence and corruption in one of India\u2019s poorest regions, the Banda district in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. These brave and brazen women have become folk heroes, winning public support with their successful series of…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/2011\/04\/pretty-damn-effective-in-pink.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Queen of My Self\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-04-28T14:10:38+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2011-04-23T14:18:53+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Donna Henes\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Pretty (Damn Effective) in Pink - The Queen of My Self","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/2011\/04\/pretty-damn-effective-in-pink.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Pretty (Damn Effective) in Pink - The Queen of My Self","og_description":"The Gulabi (pink) Gang, is a group of about 10,000 women who have banded together to combat male violence and corruption in one of India\u2019s poorest regions, the Banda district in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. These brave and brazen women have become folk heroes, winning public support with their successful series of…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/2011\/04\/pretty-damn-effective-in-pink.html","og_site_name":"The Queen of My Self","article_published_time":"2011-04-28T14:10:38+00:00","article_modified_time":"2011-04-23T14:18:53+00:00","author":"Donna Henes","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/2011\/04\/pretty-damn-effective-in-pink.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/2011\/04\/pretty-damn-effective-in-pink.html","name":"Pretty (Damn Effective) in Pink - The Queen of My Self","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/#website"},"datePublished":"2011-04-28T14:10:38+00:00","dateModified":"2011-04-23T14:18:53+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/#\/schema\/person\/544e888db264d2e1c6e32fd2f80c031a"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/2011\/04\/pretty-damn-effective-in-pink.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/2011\/04\/pretty-damn-effective-in-pink.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/2011\/04\/pretty-damn-effective-in-pink.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Pretty (Damn Effective) in Pink"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/","name":"The Queen of My Self","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Donna Henes","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/#\/schema\/person\/544e888db264d2e1c6e32fd2f80c031a","name":"Donna Henes","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/0c6\/0c683cd428803d35cf10fae85f8125ebx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/0c6\/0c683cd428803d35cf10fae85f8125ebx96.jpg","caption":"Donna Henes"},"description":"Donna Henes is an internationally renowned urban shaman, ritual expert, award-winning author, popular speaker and workshop leader whose joyful celebrations of celestial events have introduced ancient traditional rituals and contemporary ceremonies to millions of people in more than 100 cities since 1972. She has published four books, a CD, an acclaimed Ezine and writes for The Huffington Post and UPI Religion and Spirituality Forum. Mama Donna, as she is affectionately called, maintains a ceremonial center, spirit shop, ritual practice and consultancy where she works with individuals, groups, institutions, municipalities and corporations to create meaningful ceremonies for every imaginable occasion.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.thequeenofmyself.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/author\/dhenes"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/218"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=368"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":371,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368\/revisions\/371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thequeenofmyself\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}