Is there a Road Map Once a Rights Struggle is Legislated?

This week, we look at what roadmap has worked for Young India Project over the years in helping households access their rights

Once a rights struggle starts there are certain logical steps it has to go through. Though the first step is getting the Act legislated, which in itself is a long struggle and can involve a number of different steps and pressure points. This is something we can come back to through showcasing what role civil society has had in helping get rights legislated in India. 

Once a right is legislated, the steps involved are: 

• Make a training manual of the act and start training the poor families on the rights given them by the act  
• Organise them into village based unions; 
• Identify the authority to whom the struggle has to be directed: 
• Land and house sites struggles against the revenue department, 
• Bonded labour against the District Collector, 
• Right to work against the Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD), 
• Right to food security against MRD; 
• Select the most appropriate strategy/strategies to conduct each struggle; 
• Continue each specific struggle until the concerned families have received their demand e.g. once the 6oo families had received their land deeds for 1500 acres their struggle was over, it is their struggle not yours; once the women received the house site pattas on their names their struggle was over, the same with bonded labour; 

Once the Government has conceded the demands made by the families who are undertaking the struggle the NGO must withdraw. But the NGO may continue to support other families who are struggling for the same demand.