Features
Women more upfront
MPs
Fact of women being more in the forefront politically, is proven by these statistics got from googling. The general election of 2024 had 22 women elected to Parliament, one being Dr Harini Amarasuariya who was MP of the previous Parliament too and formed the triumvirate that wielded power over the country with newly elected President and MP Vijitha Herath, until the general election was held. The only other re-elected woman MP is Rohini Kumari Wijerathna from Matale. Saroja Savithri Paulraj, is now Minister of Women and Children’s Affairs. The previous Parliament had 12 women MPs. Thus the increase is almost double and the present female representation is approximately 10% of total number of parliamentarians.
Interesting to be reminded that Ceylon’s first State Council -1931 to 35 – had as elected women Adeline Molamure from Ruwanwella and Naysum Saravanamuttu from Colombo North. Mrs Molamure was the first woman to be elected to a political position. In the second State Council – 1936 to 47- Naysum S was the only woman.
Women in politics
Mujib Mashal, the South Asian bureau chief for the New York Times who leads coverage of India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan, continuing his article writes: “Two years after Sri Lankans rose up and cast out a political dynasty whose profligacy had brought economic ruin, the country is in the midst of a once-in-a-lifetime reinvention.
“Women were a driving force behind the protest movement that forced Sri Lanka’s president to flee in July 2022. When the country all but ran out of cash and fuel, the burden fell disproportionately on women, who shoulder the domestic load. Their rage sent then into the streets. Now women are at the center of efforts to give the country lasting protection against the whims of strongmen. Women are also doing the slow and steady work of shaping a political culture that allows them equal space.
“Women who make up 56 percent of registered voters, were crucial to the electoral victories late last year by the National People’s Power, a small leftist outfit. President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, the party’s leader, has spent his life in leftist politics. He appointed Dr Amarasuriya, a sociologist and activist, as prime minister. She is the first woman to hold such a high post in South Asia who was not the wife or daughter of a previous top leader.”
Now that is remarkable. I must admit that it was reading this article that made me realize this important fact. Harini rode to power on no one’s back, least of all a father’s or brother’s. She was new to politics but AKD, I must say, is just and treats everyone with respect and fairness. He chose her to be his second in power, seeing the potential in her. If you look at Asian leaders, particularly South Asian political women leaders from our mother and daughter Bandaranaike, to Hasina, Benazir and even Suu Kyi, they were all of high flying political families and all, if I may say so, came to power due to people’s sympathy and/or anger against murderers of their fathers/husbands. Our first woman PM was even dubbed ‘weeping widow’. This fact enhances Dr Harini Amarasuriya’s rise to power politically. It is solely due to her plus points. Neither did she strive or maneuver to reach the position she is in. She was offered it on her merits. Apart from family ties, I blush to state that there have been political women who rode to power on their ‘looseness’. Go on bended knees to a strongman and there you are: a minister! Do more and more power and perks to you!
I quote Mashal again with a whimsical narrative of his. He says the New York Times visited Dr Amarasuriya in her home. “Its walls covered with cat art. She was keeping an eye on the political debates in the US, where she spent a year as an exchange student. ‘I feel I am one of those childless cat ladies,’ she said with a smile, referring to a dismissive comment by now Vice President JD Vance, that became a rallying cry for some American women. Dr Amarsuriya has long preached that a more equal society cannot be achieved without making governance more friendly to women, injecting what she calls ‘feminist sensitivity’ into policy making.” He adds that with reduction in long motorcades and large security details, the PM has reduced her working staff from over a hundred to just a dozen.
Mashal also writes about mushrooming women’s organizations and well attended meetings. He quotes what Samanmalee Gunasinghe, the local member of Parliament said at one such meeting: “We used to be flower pots on the political stage. They would take our votes and throw us into the fire afterward, abandoning us with our children. Now women’s committees have created a space where we can shout together.”
Women in other working spheres
The above is with reference to politics. I have long set forth the theory that though many of our population belong to patriarchal societies, women are the ones who hold power in homes. Raised in a conservative extended family in Kandy I, like my two older sisters, were inducted to give father, brother, husband first place, even son later in life. My sisters were housewives given prime place as decision makers by their very fine husbands. I adroitly allowed my man to be the boss but when nothing positive got done, except live well and never mind higher education of children, I timidly made decisions at least about the second child’s university and career prospects. You will find this applies across the board of families where it is mothers who take over the education of children and inculcating good values in them.
University student statistics show that women students rise in number even in faculties that for long were male oriented – engineering, aeronautics, architecture. The discipline medicine from some time ago was dominated by women. As early as 1960, Premala Sivaprakasapillai (now Sivasegaram), from Ladies’ College entered the Faculty of Science, University of Colombo, and a year later shifted to the Faculty of Engineering, the only girl with 60 male co-students. She holds the distinction of being Sri Lanka’s very first woman engineer. It was such joy to hear about a year ago that a charter flight was available for a jaunt to India for past pupils of a women’s school; the pilot, co-pilot, stewards all ex-pupils of the school.
Consider the public sector. A large number of highly qualified women hold very senior posts. The private sector was dominated by males, the disadvantage for women employees being maternity leave and then giving first place to children and not to workplace. But even in the private sector glass ceilings that seemed indestructible have been broken by women.
Serious impediment
From all strata of social classes, many women face another block to their advancement, a barrier set before them by violent husbands. That is a serious issue and I mean here domestic violence. I inquired from a woman who is an activist and professional giving help with a team of counselors, lawyers, a temporary home to save women and their children from being battered. She said that far from the issue of domestic violence decreasing with resources for saving themselves available like the police and law protection and awareness for both men and women created, violence has increased. Reason? She said it was drug taking; drugs being as strong or even stronger than alcohol in inflaming tempers and thus the increase in suffering of unfortunate wives and children. The present government’s effective drive against drugs is doubly lauded.
A glad thought is that almost every woman has steel in her. As Eleanor Roosevelt, a strong woman herself, declared: “A woman is like a teabag. You never know how strong she is until she gets in hot water.” So very true whether the hot water is male harassment of a politician, badgered as a wife, suddenly widowed, sorely disappointed as a mother, or any other misfortune. The woman almost always rises to live her life minus the severe irritant or impediment, with the will and ability to overpower it.