<![CDATA[Unsung heroes: 5 Asian women transcending gender roles]>

"I belong to a non-conservative family, but they still treat me differently from my brother. For instance, I need to get home early and I am shut down every time I have different opinions from them," she says.

Thakur recently took part in a week-long protest at the Gargi College, one of Delhi University's top all-women institutes, after a group of men barged onto the campus and harassed students at an annual party.

The students were enraged by what they saw as a lack of action by the university's administration and the authorities. Some even blamed Thakur for not doing more as the student union leader.

For six days last month, Thakur joined thousands of female students on strike, helping to decorate the college with slogans that condemned sexual harassment and called for a safer campus.

Students at the Gargi College protested against sexual harassment last month. Photo: handout.

Across Asia, women like Thakur and her fellow students are becoming increasingly outspoken, taking part in protests from India to Hong Kong and bringing change to their communities as feminist movements gain ground in the region and globally.

Here, five women from different countries tell This Week in Asia they are witnessing a turning point, withnew generations emerging as a driving force for gender equality in Asia. However, despite some positive signs, they say girls and women continue to suffer more discrimination and violence than men.

Living standards in Asia and the Pacific have improved dramatically in the past years, with the region contributing two thirds of global growth, according to a recent report by the United Nations. "Yet many people " and women especially " remain left behind, caught in a net of inequalities that prevent them from reaping the benefits of this growth," it said.

"Progress towards gender parity in education has not translated into equal rights for women to labour markets, while violence against women remains widespread across the region."

Indian activists during a silent protest campaign against the rape and murder of an eight-year-old girl in Kolkata, India, in 2018. Photo: EPA-EFE

A poll of global experts in 2018 named India as the world's most dangerous country for women due to the high risk of sexual violence and being forced into slave labour. War-torn Afghanistan and Syria came second and third in the Thomson Reuters Foundation study, followed by Somalia and Saudi Arabia.

But "change is certainly afoot", according to Puja Kapai, an associate professor of law at the University of Hong Kong, who wrote about the evolution of the #MeToo movement in Asia in the Asian Jurist last year.

Around Asia, in countries such as China, South Korea, Japan and India, the #MeToo movement against the harassment of women was "clearly building on decades of feminist organisation and activism to challenge the widespread perpetration and tolerance of sexual violence as a privilege of the elite, powerful and well-connected", the scholar wrote.

Sundaram Thakur is a student leader at an all-girls college in New Delhi, India. Photo: handout

Student leader Thakur rarely leaves the house without taking various precautions. "When we go out we won't wear certain things, we have pepper spray in our bag, we have emergency contacts in our phones, and we often share live locations with each other," says Thakur, referring to how she and her friends protect each other.

"We also often restrict ourselves from going alone to some places."

Almost every one of her friends has experienced sexual harassment. "Previously, people would not discuss this. I see the change coming. We now come across rape cases each and every day " people are more educated, they are realising this is a serious issue."

Yet, there is a long way to go, she says. Thakur and many of her friends are frustrated by how slow the justice system works in cases of sexual violence.

Court cases can drag on for many years and suspects are often granted bail.

"These things should be faster and proper punishment should be implemented," she says. "People would fear it more."

Women protest against gender violence in India last December, after a young woman died after being set on fire while going to trial against her alleged rapist. Photo: EPA-EFE

Thakur hopes more parents will encourage their daughters to take self-defence classes and to discuss their problems openly, while allowing them more freedom to go out and protest.

In recent months, women have been at the forefront of several anti-government protests in places such as India and Hong Kong.

Despite some cultural shifts, Thakur still fears for her future as a woman.

After graduating this May, she intends to apply for a master's degree in business administration and then pursue a PhD.

Thakur is aware she will be pressured into getting married by the end of her studies. "People expect a lot out of a woman. My future will depend on the kind of people I will be surrounded with, if I can go abroad or outside my city. It will depend on the kind of husband I will have. I am scared as hell because of those things."

In Vietnam, Tra My Tran, 30, is feeling the pressure to get married and give birth. While her mother supported her in pursuing her education and professional dreams " even when that was frowned upon by neighbours who thought she should find a husband instead " she began feeling pressure from her family last year.

Tra My Tran, from Vietnam, on the day she was awarded her master's degree in Clinical Social Work in the United States. Photo: Handout

"In the last months of 2019, my mum kept asking me and telling me about the importance of a relationship and getting married," says Tran, who coordinates the psychology department at the non-profit Blue Dragon Children's Foundation.

Tran says she plans to get married but not just yet, despite warnings "not to leave it too late".

She says many like her are trapped by high expectations. "We need to be the perfect woman, the perfect role model in all areas."

Pan Wang, senior lecturer in Chinese and Asian Studies at the University of New South Wales, Australia, says that in China's urban areas "many women have become so-called 'leftover women' because they can hardly find a compatible marriage partner due to their age, with most in their 30s, high educational attainment and economic independence".

"This situation is worsened when men look to 'marry down' and women 'marry up'," says Wang.

Tran, who lives in Hanoi, Vietnam's capital, says those surrounding her are increasingly aware of women's rights. "I can see we are at a turning point. There is a behaviour change in my generation. More men are now willing to do house work and share child-caring responsibilities."

But Tran says there continues to be discrimination against women in the workplace, with some fearing they will lose their job if they take maternity leave.

She says the way women are perceived and their access to opportunities remain unequal in parts of the country. "There is still this perception that the wife is the one taking orders. Many become victims of violence. And women often blame themselves for not meeting the expectations of their fathers, boyfriends, husbands," says Tran, who works with human-trafficking survivors.

"Another issue among many ethnic minorities is that the right of education for girls is still not upheld and we see many early marriages. They are the most vulnerable," says Tran, who has come across women pushed into marriages when they were 13 years old.

Wang, the researcher, says feminist movements struggle to reach rural parts of neighbouring China.

"It's difficult for large numbers of illiterate women in rural China to disclose sexual misconduct by men. One reason is that many do not see this as a problem. The other is that some are too afraid to speak out and don't know how to speak out."

Although China's #MeToo campaign is growing, Wang says, "it is not quite a movement yet as it's limited in scale and has to be carried out in hidden forms, for example, using coded messages and homophone hashtags such as #ricebunny [spoken in Chinese as mi tu] to circumvent government censorship".

The urban-rural dichotomy is felt elsewhere, too, including in Nepal, the home of Sharmila Dhungana, 25.

She was born in the western part of the country in a buffalo shed. Things have improved since then, but some people living in rural areas continue to uphold superstitions and cultural norms that dictate the place of women in society.

Sharmila Dhungana has advocated for women's rights in Nepal. Photo: Jitendra Raj Bajracharya

When Dhungana, a climate change researcher for an intergovernmental centre in Asia, began menstruating, she tried to keep it to herself. But her mother eventually found out. "I was in this isolated room for like 13 days," she recalls. "I was told then that I should not look at my brother or father, only after taking a bath " because it's purifying. Shouldn't touch the plants or sit on the sofa."

Dhungana, who now lives in Nepal's capital Kathmandu, has since graduated in public health from the Asian University for Women in Bangladesh and has travelled to other countries.

She realises how deeply rooted the traditions around menstruation are in some parts of Nepal. "I am still supposed to wear a separate set of clothes and not enter the kitchen. But now I often say that I just forgot," she says, explaining that one of her ways is to push for change within her own family every time she visits them. "I also have open conversations about it with my siblings [a younger sister and brother] and cousins," she says.

"If I have a daughter, I will never put her through this. This will stop," says Dhungana, who has led workshops teaching village children about menstruation.

In recent years, the government has taken measures to uproot the "menstruation huts" where women are required to sleep during their periods in some western parts of the country.

Some have died due to the dire conditions in the huts. But despite the authorities' attempts, many residents are resisting the change.

Dhungana, who has taken part in several female-led initiatives, says that feminism is rising in Nepal. "But talking and doing is a different thing," she says. "The society has been structured patriarchally and there is still this sense of entitlement [among men]."

She says the conversation needs to be broader and include people of different regions, casts and social backgrounds.

Dhungana was brought up with the idea that a woman's role is to care for others. "The ambitions of my mother's generation were building a house, giving education to their children. But I never saw my mum having individual dreams."

Dhungana " who won a solo travel challenge for women in Nepal " says although she grapples with social expectations, she won't give up on carving dreams of her own. "This is why I find financial independence and learning about myself so important. Travelling is, for me, a way to understand the world and myself."

In Hong Kong, Circle Yuen, 35, hopes that when her two young daughters, aged two and nine, reach adulthood they will encounter less prejudice in society.

"I hope they get to be true to themselves. It may sound easy, but it's so hard."

Yuen, born and raised in the city, knows what she is talking about. She and her former partner broke up when their daughter was only two. After a series of heated arguments, Yuen realised they could not live together, but she did not know what to do next.

"When I faced this problem, it was so hard to seek help and talk to people. Very luckily I walked into a bookstore and saw a co-parenting communication handbook. I did not know what that was," she recalls.

Yuen, who eventually got separated, says pressure from society made her personal struggle even harder. "My daughter was living in our house with her dad, and my grandmother kept asking why I had left my daughter. At the time, I thought I had to take the blame. I believed I was not as good a mother as they were," Yuen recalls.

She has found more healthy ways to communicate with her former partner. "I am still learning," she says. "But I can say that I walked through the marriage storm and got more confident."

Circle Yuen [second, left], from Hong Kong, has produced theatre plays about love, separation and co-parenting. Photo: Wilson Tsang

On the way, she has grown as a community leader while being a wife and a mother, says Yuen, who was a fellow with Hong Kong-based non-profit Resolve.

"They got me a mentor who shared an important thought with me: we may see our story as shame, but others see it as courage."

Yuen, who has had a second daughter with her current partner, now dedicates most of her time to an independent project about co-parenting, which has included producing books, community theatre and educational programmes.

Although divorce rates have gone up, she says "there is still a lot of invisible pressure deeply rooted in Chinese and other Asian cultures".

Yuen, who previously worked for an advocacy group against sexual violence, says gender inequality has led to suffering among both women and men. "But perhaps women go through more self-blaming because of the traditional ways of perceiving motherhood," she says. "Many female survivors of domestic violence also have a harder time to deal with their partners and to find a solution for their relationship."

She says "the concept of a broken family needs to be rewritten. It should be seen as a reformed family or a restructured family".

Jhic Dacio, from the Philippines, agrees that traditional concepts of family and gender need to be scrapped.

She has lived in Hong Kong since 2002 as a domestic worker and is the sole breadwinner of her family. Dacio, 45, says she has felt several forms of discrimination in the city. "I have gone through some uncomfortable situations in the streets here, especially when I am holding hands with my partner. Some people stare at us," says Dacio, a lesbian.

She has also experienced discrimination within the community of domestic workers in the city, who are mostly from the Philippines and Indonesia. "Some people make nasty comments, things like 'a lesbian can't give a good family or a baby'," she says.

Jhic Dacio, who was a fellow with non-profit Resolve, spoke at Hong Kong's legislative council about domestic workers' rights. Photo: Handout

Her sexual preferences are not the only reason she has felt excluded at times. "Racism is still around," she says. On top of that, domestic workers " largely under-represented in recent feminist movements " also face systemic forms of discrimination that stem, in Dacio's opinion, from insufficient protection provided by the government.

Marie Segrave, an associate professor in criminology at Monash University, says across Asia low-skilled female migrants tend to have limited options "to secure their own safety and to bring to the fore experiences of abuse or exploitation running from the context of intimate partner relationships to the workplace".

In Singapore, female migrant domestic workers are among the groups most vulnerable to gender-based violence and discrimination, along with family caregivers, single mothers and foreign spouses and children, says Shailey Hingorani, head of research and advocacy for the non-profit Aware.

The researcher says that although Singaporean women receive the same opportunities as men in education and when entering the workforce, "traditional gender roles" still determine who "performs unpaid domestic or caregiving work".

For instance, the workforce participation drops sharply for women once they hit their 30s, which is when many have children. In 2018, women in Singapore earned 16.3 per cent less than men when comparing the median pay between both genders. These are among the factors, Hingorani says, that "result in many women in Singapore ageing into poverty".

According to Aware, sexual violence cases involving technology " such as cyber harassment, voyeurism and non-consensual distribution of intimate images " almost tripled from 2016, when 46 were reported, to 124 in 2018.

The 2020 Asia Girls Report and Girls' Leadership Index " which analysed 19 countries on aspects such as education and political voice " put Singapore, the Philippines and Vietnam in the top three positions.

"There is still no country in the world where girls and women are equal to boys and men. Asian countries are no exception. But we have the resources and expertise to do better, we just need to make it a priority," says Bhagyashri Dengle, regional director of the charity Plan International Asia-Pacific.

Sara Davies, an Australia-based international relations professor focused on women, peace and security, says the increased rates of female participation in formal employment are expected to bring "massive shifts" to employment relations, discrimination laws and wages in Asia. "This will not happen overnight but it is happening. As more women enter the formal workforce, societies cannot continue to accept or tolerate violence against women for travelling at night, for what they wear, etc," she says.

Dacio, who set up Share Hong Kong " a group that organises activities for migrants " says women in both developed and developing nations need to fight sexism.

"The sending-away culture of my country is not fair for women," she says, referring to the thousands of female migrants who work abroad and live apart from their families to send money back to the Philippines.

"Then, in their workplaces, many are sexually harassed and even raped," the domestic worker says. "And the problem in cities like Hong Kong is that victims are silent because they have limited access to an assistance network."

This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (SCMP).

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