Perunthalmanna Thazekadu Village / Kalikavu (Malappuram District) KERALA :

An ordinary Muslim woman from a remote village in North Kerala’s Malappuram district is today one of the general secretaries of the Congress party in Kerala.

Any woman involved in public service in Kerala, or for that matter anywhere in the country, faces several difficulties and challenges. It is all the more daunting if you are an ordinary woman and a Muslim to boot. Especially in today’s ‘New India’. Let us face the facts: unlike men, the circumstances are not conducive for a woman to enter politics in Kerala.

It is after a lot of uncertainty and dithering that the Congress party in Kerala managed to recently release a list of new office-bearers of the Pradesh Congress Committee. Though the leadership has claimed that the list is a reflection of a unified Congress – remember the local Congress has been ravaged by group rivalry for decades that had once again cost the party dearly in the recent Assembly elections in the state – it has naturally come under criticism for minimal representation for women in different committees. The AICC has co-opted five women, including three general secretaries and two executive committee members, into the KPCC leadership hierarchy. The women general secretaries are K.A. Thulsi, Alippatta Jameela and Deepthi Mary Varghese. The executive committee members are Padmaja Venugopal and P.R. Sona.

It is in this backdrop that Alipatta Jameela, the only Muslim woman general secretary of the KPCC, spoke to DoolNews Malayalam about her political journey. Asked how as a Muslim woman from Perunthalmanna Thazekadu, a village situated in the hilly terrain in Malappuram, one of the most backward districts in north Kerala till not very long ago, she rose to become a KPCC general secretary, Jameela said she had represented the KSU (Kerala Students Union, student organisation of the Congress in Kerala) in the College Union when she was studying in Mannarkkad MES (Muslim Education Society) College. She said she moved to Kalikavu, where she is settled now, after her marriage. She became active in politics after being elected president of the local Kalikavu Mandalam Congress in 2000. In 2005 she became a member of the Kalikavu panchayat after winning from Eenadi ward. In 2010 she contested from another ward and became president of the Kalikavu panchayat.

In 2015 she contested the Zilla panchayat election from Vandiyur division. In 2018 she became the district secretary of the Mahila Congress. In the 2020 panchayat elections, she successfully contested from Thenjippalam division. Currently she is a member of the Thenjippalam division and chairperson of the Public Works Department (PWD) standing committee there.

Jameela said it is significant that the party chose to select her to the PCC while she is already holding the post of general secretary of the Kerala Mahila Congress. “I consider it an honour and a sign of the party’s continuing faith in me. It is a great achievement to become one of the general secretaries of the State Congress, especially for someone hailing from the hilly terrain and living in this small town of Eranadu Kalikavu. I consider it recognition of the work I have done so far and I hope to fulfil the responsibilities bestowed on me to the full extent of my abilities,” she said.

Asked if she had a long struggle to reach the level she has, Jameela admitted that it was very difficult as a woman, especially as an ordinary woman from Malappuram, to embark on a life of public service, which is full of hazards and challenges entirely different from what men face in such circumstances. “When I contested for the panchayat in 2005, my younger child was not even a year old. The elder one was just three. To go out and campaign leaving my two children at home was very tough. This is not in my case alone. A lot of women face the same problems. Many of them are forced to give up as they fail to get enough support at home,” she said.

Jameela asserted that she could reach this level purely because of the support and encouragement she got at home. Despite that as a woman she faces many difficulties which she somehow overcomes to go forward.

On whether she belonged to a traditional Congress family and how she came into the party, she confessed that her family is basically a Muslim League one, but her late brother Nalakath Yusuf was a staunch Congress supporter and introduced her to the party’s ideology. “It was he who initiated me to the basics of politics. That was how I got involved in student politics,” Jameela said.

On the criticism over the shrinking representation of women in Congress forums, Jameela said compared to the previous jumbo KPCC (over 100) the current one has been trimmed to 51. “There are three women general secretaries and two in the executive committee. So, five of us are here. I think this is a decent number. I am myself an answer to that criticism. The fact that of the three woman general secretaries one is from Malappuram (Muslim-dominated district where League roots are deep) is in itself, in my opinion, an important signal to the changes that are sure to happen,” Jameela said.

On the new Congress leadership in Kerala vowing to end group rivalry in the state unit and whether she belongs to any group, Jameela admitted that leaders in the state Congress have grown only through these groups. “All along I have worked above these groups, but it is a fact that Thenjippalam from where I am a member belongs to the I (Indira) group. So, in a way, many see or identify me as spokesperson of the I group. But I try to be above all this and consider myself a humble worker of the Indian National Congress,” she said.

(Note for those who are not familiar with Congress politics in Kerala: For years these groups – A and I – are identified as the former aligned with senior Congress leader from the state, A K Antony, whose soulmate is former chief minister Oommen Chandy. The other group consists of followers of the late K Karunakaran who had stood with Indira Gandhi at the time she split the Congress a second time. Their current leader is former leader of the opposition Ramesh Chennithala.)

Asked whether the Congress, which is not in power either in the state or at the Centre, and is passing through perhaps the worst period in its history can make a comeback, Jameela said the country is passing through a grave crisis and is heading towards total anarchy without the Congress in power. She said the BJP is destroying India’s secular democracy by the day. “Women in particular are facing many problems in the state and the country in general. We see only such news these days. If Congress was in power these things would not have happened. In such circumstances people want the Congress to return to power. The new state Congress president and the leader of the Opposition are working for that only – to bring Congress back to its glory in the state. We will emerge victorious,” she said.

Asked what advice she would give to those women wanting to come into public life, Jameela said more and more women have started joining mainstream politics. She said it is the need of the hour as the country is passing through dangerous times. She added that she will always be there to guide women, Muslim or otherwise, who come forward to play a role in shaping the destiny of the country.

source: http://www.milligazette.com / The Milli Gazette / Home> News> Community News / by MG Correspondent / January 14th, 2022