Ni Putes Ni Soumises Organizes a March for Kavidha

Ni Putes Ni Soumises (NPNS – Neither Whores Nor Submissives) organized a March on Friday, March 19, 2010, at 12 pm in Meaux, France, a suburb of Paris, to honor and remember Kavidha Bala, the young woman who was burned alive by her husband in front of her eight-year-old daughter in November of last year.  Sihem Habchi, the President of Ni Putes Ni Soumises, and Rachida Benahmed, the leader of the new Meaux branch of NPNS, led a march through the housing project in Meaux where the family resided and the horrific attack occurred.  Approximately two-dozen women’s rights activists with NPNS were on hand as Sihem placed a wreath at the very spot where a young mother nearly lost her life at the hands of her husband.  Kavidha was severely injured in the attack and remains hospitalized to this day.  Kavidha had separated from her husband after having suffered years of physical abuse.  Kavidha is originally from India, which is where the couple married before he brought her to France.  Kavidha’s husband is her older cousin.  Immediately after the wreath ceremony and statements by both Sihem and Rachida, the group held a discussion in a nearby community center.  As the group of activists departed the housing project, a group of young men engaged them in conversation.  The young men claimed that gender violence is not a significant problem.  Violence perpetrated against women has been named the Grand National Cause of France for 2010. 

Ni Putes Ni Soumises is an international human rights organization that advocates on behalf of women’s rights as universal human rights without compromise.  The movement was created as a grassroots response to the egregious violence that was being perpetrated against the women and girls of the cités and quartiers populaires of the banlieues (the ghettoized suburban housing projects surrounding France’s major cities that are primarily composed of marginalized Muslim immigrant communities).  In 2003, after a young girl was burned alive in a suburb of Paris, Fadela Amara and others led a march across France, which culminated in a 30,000 strong protest in Paris demanding action and change.  The femmes des quartiers (the women of the housing projects) continue to lead the movement.