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Chain of women formed on 1 January 2019 at Kerala
Vanitha Mathil
![](//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e4/Vanitha_Mathil_Kollam_6.jpg/240px-Vanitha_Mathil_Kollam_6.jpg) Women's Wall at Kollam
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Date
| 1 January 2019
|
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Location
| Kerala
, India
|
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Type
| Human chain
|
---|
Motive
| To uphold gender equality and protest against gender discrimination in entry rules at
Sabarimala
|
---|
Organised by
| Government of Kerala
|
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Participants
| Around three to five million women
|
---|
Vanitha Mathil
("Women's Wall") was a
human chain
formed on 1 January 2019 across the
Indian
state of
Kerala
to uphold gender equality and protest against gender discrimination. The wall was formed solely by women and extended for a distance of around 620 kilometres (390 miles) from
Kasargod
to
Thiruvananthapuram
.
[1]
[2]
[3]
Around three to five million women participated in the event.
[4]
[5]
Background
[
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]
In Kerala, the
Hindu
temple at
Sabarimala
traditionally barred women between the ages of 10 and 50 from entering to worship
Ayyappa
. Some people claimed women were barred because
menstruation
is impure, but devotees claimed they are not allowed because of the celibate nature of the deity.
[6]
[7]
In September 2018, the
Supreme Court of India
, in a historic verdict, allowed women of all ages to enter the temple, stating that any discrimination based on biological differences is clearly unconstitutional.
[8]
The ruling coalition of the state
Left Democratic Front
welcomed the judgment, while opposition parties like the
Bharatiya Janata Party
and the
Indian National Congress
launched protests opposing the verdict.
[9]
Many Hindu groups protested against the judgment and the state government's decision to implement it.
[10]
Wall
[
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]
On 15 December 2018, Kerala's
Chief Minister
Pinarayi Vijayan
announced after meeting with 176 social and political organisations that the women's wall would be held on New Year's Day to protect the renaissance values of the state.
[11]
[12]
A theme song for the event by
Prabha Varma
was released.
[13]
On 1 January 2019 at 4:00 pm, the wall was formed by around three to five million women along the national highways of the state of Kerala for around 620 kilometres (390 miles).
[14]
The wall began in the northern end of the state by Kerala's Minister of Health and Social Justice
K. K. Shailaja
in
Kasargod
, and ended in Thiruvananthapuram in the south with
Brinda Karat
, leader of the
Communist Party of India
.
[1]
Activists of the
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh
and the
Bharatiya Janata Party
reportedly tried to attack the wall in Kasargod.
[15]
On the same day, in support of the event in Kerala, women's walls were organised in solidarity with Vanitha Mathil in other Indian cities, including
New Delhi
,
[16]
Mumbai
,
[17]
and
Chennai
.
[18]
The women's wall in Kerala became the world's fourth largest human chain ever made, and the largest formed solely by women.
[19]
References
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]