We had a powerful experience few days before at the Counter Narratives Conference by Mariwala Health Initiative in collaboration with KC College and HSNC University, Mumbai. It was an honor to have a role in setting the context for the two-day Conference, as our Founder Deepa Pawar was the Opening Plenary Speaker .
With panels throughout the two days on counter narratives to heteronormativity, casteism, ableism, majoritarianism, body-gender binaries, and to dominant mental health discourses, setting the context was a task of great complexity and significance.
Deepa began directly with an interactive quiz, which immediately made it clear to the audience that caste, gender, religion, ableism and heteronormativity influence even our memories. This concept of Politics Of Memory started the thought process of how deeply these systems affect us mentally.
The example of a plant being made to feel responsible for its distress, after being denied sunlight, water and healthy soil, pointed towards how limited the approach of the mental health profession is towards individuals and communities from the grassroots who face mental distress because of structural rights violations. Deepa then guided the audience to think about concepts of mental deterioration used as a tool for social injustice, that mental health is a reflection of social ills.
Deepa reiterated her assertion that there are many examples in the grassroots history of India, of approaching mental health with a movement perspective – the most powerful example being Savitribai Phule who had started a shelter for Brahmin widowed women who were facing sexual violence and being driven to suicide. Savitrimai had thus already established the practice of Justice-informed counseling .
Deepa then enumerated several ways forward , of how to respond to these gaps in current mental health practices – learn from the social revolutions of icons such as Dr Ambedkar, give back ownership rights over research data to the communities whose data it is , challenge the politics of knowledge and language, counter the narrative of anonymizing names of community members from whom researchers and practitioners learn everything, self-critique that we have till date only reached sensitivity and have a long way to go before actual representation, adopt intersectional feminism as a core life value which can solve most problems, approach mental health not as an illness but as a matter of politics and finally, look to the Indian Constitution and it’s most important lines enforcing Anti-Discrimination as the blueprint for mental dignity.
It was so pleasant to see the auditorium filled to the brim at 9 in the morning , and it is always a joy to meet new friends.
It is a privilege to work with Shruti, Pooja, Raj Mariwala and the whole MHI team who are in solidarity in this journey for mental justice and dignity.
