From Slutwalks to Nirbhaya: Shifts in the Indian women's movement

Abstract

This paper takes a closer look at two significant mass-based feminist movements in India – Slutwalks and Nirbhaya agitation. Key questions guiding this paper are – why did Slut Walk Delhi, characterized as a ‘movement’ against victim blaming and sexual harassment fail to build momentum despite attempts at mobilization? What changed a year later that made Nirbhaya agitation a ‘successful mobilization’? In exploring these questions, the paper interrogates the tactics, discursive politics, and impact of these mobilizations on contemporary Indian women's movement; and argues that they mark an important moment of foregrounding debates on affirmative sexuality.