The Gulabi Gang, or Pink Gang, is an all-women vigilante group in India.
โYes, we fight rapists with lathis [sticks]. If we find the culprit, we thrash him black and blue so he dare not attempt to do wrong to any girl or a woman again,โ boasts Sampat Devi Pal, the groupโs founder and head.
Devi first discovered the power of the stick in the 1980s when she used it against a neighbour who abused his wife.ย Deviโs intervention had the desired result and the recalcitrant husband was forced to mend his ways. More importantly, Deviโs model of delivering alternative justice inspired a movement that now boasts of a network of 400,000 women - dressed in pink sarees and all wielding a stick - across 11 districts of Indiaโs largest province of Uttar Pradesh.
From fighting violence against women, preventing child marriages, arranging weddings of couple in love despite local resistance, to ensuring delivery of basic rights for the poorest of poor, the Gulabi Gangโs vision is to โprotect the powerless from abuse and fight corruptionโ has found easy resonance across much of Indiaโs hinterland, blighted by unending reports of sex crimes and gang rapes.
โWhen a woman seeks the membership of Gulabi Gang, it is because she has suffered injustice, has been oppressed and does not see any other recourse,โ says Suman Singh, the groupโs deputy commander, from Mahoba district. โAll our women can stand up to the men and if need be seek retribution through lathis,โ she adds.
โThe Gulabi Gang has stepped into the vacuum left by the state and offers an alternative means of attaining justice.โ
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