Women,resistance, and development: a case study from Dangs,India

Studies of resistance often overlook the significance of gender. This article, based on the author's experience as a Project Officer with an NGO that supported the development work of a grassroots organisation, the Gram Vikas Mandali Association Trust, describes the historical context of everyday resistance by village women against the Forest Department in western India. The article concludes with an attempt to understand why women were marginalised in more recent incidents of organised popular resistance, and what this tells us both about the nature of resistance to the state, and the nature of women's involvement in it.