UPDATE: After reading through this again, my eye caught a few things.

1. Why does Padma Subrahmanyam take care to defend the UN charter on women and distinguish it from contemporary feminists, who still see themselves as in line with that charter? (see below)

2. Why does she not mention which schools in Chennai were going to introduce condoms and were instructing girls to sleep with their friends? (see below)

3.  Akhilia Sreenivasan, the business woman funding the movement, is active in the Art Of Life foundation, the movement of Sri Sri Ravishankar

You can see it mentioned here involved in co-sponsoring an interfaith vigil in remembrance of the Mumbai terrorist attack of 26/11 (notice the similarity to 9/11)

The site notes that the foundation is affiliated with the UN:

“The Art of Living Foundation is an international non-profit educational and humanitarian organization that works in consultative status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations. Its educational and self-development programs offer powerful tools to eliminate stress and foster a sense of well-being.”

I must admit this makes me feel that the “Chennai Declaration” is co-opted from above. It’s a way of creating an anti-Western feminist Indian movement that is still within the confines of the socialist UN agenda.

ORIGINAL POST

The great classical Indian dance Padma Subramanyam has declared war on modern feminism, taking for her starting point the introduction of condoms into Chennai schools. So glad to see India’s great classical artists have not drunk the kool-aid that some of her literary lions have (like Vikram Seth and Arundhathi Roy).

Declaration’ at January 23 convention
The Pioneer /Chennai

Traumatised and shocked by the action of certain schools in Chennai installing condom vending machines on the school premises and the authorities counselling parents that “there was nothing wrong in their daughters having sex with friends,” a group of eminent women have come together to fight for women’s respect.

The New Year resolution for women would be in the form of Chennai Declaration which is expected to bury the failed and outdated women’s liberation movement. The new demand is respect for womanhood.

“The women’s liberation movement of the late 60s has been found to be a total failure and the reason behind the ever growing attacks on women. Concept of feminism itself has changed drastically from what it was in the early 1970s. What the women need today is respect. If women are respected there will be no rape, harassment and molestation,” said Dr Padma Subrahmanyam, the legendary danseuse and scholar.

To give a new thrust and direction to the fights against injustice meted out to women all over the world, Dr Subrahmanyam and a group of renowned women who have excelled in their fields of work launched a collective on Monday. Named Swami Vivekananda 150 Women’s Initiative (SV150 WI), the movement will create awareness and sustain the spirit of Indian womanhood.

The SV 150 WI has convened a massive convention at Chennai on January 23, 2014 where the participants will bury the women’s lib movement once and for ever and launch a new initiative with the objective of making the world respect women.

“When you come across news that school managements have installed condom vending machines in the school and advice parents of girl students that there was nothing wrong in their daughters having sex with their friends, it is time for us to intervene. Otherwise this country will end up in ruins,” said the eminent danseuse. She declined to reveal the names of the schools.

She said Swami Vivekananda had great confidence and trust in Indian women. “The 150th birth anniversary of Swami Vivekananda is being observed all over the world. We feel this is the right occasion to launch such an initiative. The kind of feminism being practiced all over the world right now is the root cause of all our problems,” said the eminent danseuse.

She pointed out that some women in India aped the western concept of individualism and modernity. “For them modernity and individualism mean total individual freedom without any concern for family or human values. In the United States, this has led to breaking down of more than 60 per cent of the marriages. More than 50 per cent of the second marriages break down. This is as per the data of the US Government itself and is described as the major reason for the economic ruin of that country,” said Dr Subrahmanyam.

She said modernity and individualism has been defined by the United Nations Charter. “But what we see today in the name of modernity and individualism has no resemblance to what is mentioned in the UN charter,” she said.

More than 1,000 women are taking part in the January 23 convention and is expected to come out with the Chennai Declaration, which DR Subrahmanian and women like her feel would set the agenda for women for the next century. Instead of burning brassieres, the Indian women would set fire to the western concept of feminism and ideology of women lib and ask the world to respect womanhood.

Akhila Srinivasan, corporate honcho, who represents an equal mix of modernity and tradition and one of the moving spirits of the WI said women alone could mould the destiny of the nation, people and families. Well, it is time for Simone de Beauvoir, icon of the western world, who declared that traditional family represses women sexuality, to move over and usher in the Indian woman!”