Date: April 14th – April 15th 2019
Venue: Bangalore International Centre (BIC)
C.A Site No.7, 4th Main Road, Stage 2, Domlur, Bangalore
RSVP: saumya.dadoo@clpr.org.in

In the past decade, the discourse and legal advocacy around sexual and reproductive rights (SRR) has developed rapidly in India. While mobilising and developing action around maternal mortality, domestic violence, and sex-selective abortion has been rapid, it has been negligible around other key SRR issues such as the right to abortion, and adolescent sexuality, which continue to be at the margins of activist and legal SRR concerns. Similarly, the perspectives and needs of persons with disabilities or LGBTI+ persons tend to be overlooked in mainstream SRR advocacy.

Through this conference, we aim to bring together prominent SRR activists, academics and lawyers to evaluate the past, present and future of SRR work in India. Our objective is not only to learn from past actions, taking into account the contemporary responses to SRR but to draw attention to the issues that are often implicitly or explicitly excluded from the ambit of SRR. The conference will also serve as a space to deliberate on litigation and other strategies and tools to mobilize around these concerns.

Find out more about the speakers here

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PROGRAMME

 

DAY 1: SUNDAY, APRIL 14TH, 2019

 

10.00– 10.30 am – Tea and Registration

10.30 – 11.30 am: I. Introduction: Framing Legal Approaches to Sexual & Reproductive Rights
(i) Siri Gloppen, Director, Centre on Law and Social Transformation, University of Bergen, Norway
(ii) Maya Unnithan, Director of the Sussex Centre for Cultures of Reproduction, Technologies & Health (CORTH), University of Sussex
(iii) Jayna Kothari, Senior Advocate & Executive Director, CLPR

11.30 – 11.45 am – Tea

11.45 am – 1.00 pm: II. Sexual & Reproductive Rights & the Courts
(i) Siri Gloppen – Comparative perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Rights Litigation
(ii) Jayna Kothari – Is the Indian Supreme Court Recognizing Reproductive Rights?
(iii) Gauri Pillai, DPhil Student, University of Oxford – Reimagining Reproductive Rights in India: The Role of Equality and Non-Discrimination

1.00 to 2.00 pm: Lunch

2.00 to 3.30 pm: III. Sexual & Reproductive Rights of LGBTI+ Persons
(i) Trinetra Haldar Gummaraju, Transgender Rights Activist, Student of Medicine, Manipal University – Rights In Transition – A Trans Perspective From Within The Medical Fraternity
(ii) Vinay Chandran, Founder, Swabhava Trust – Community Experiences of Discrimination in Healthcare
(iii) Saumya Dadoo, Research Associate, CLPR – Recognising Compulsory Heterosexuality & Reproductive Coercion as Domestic Violence

3.30 – 4.30 pm: IV. SRR and Sexual & Reproductive Health
(i) Maya Unnithan – SRH Rights and Justice: Reflection on the (dis)connections
(ii) Jashodhara Dasgupta, Head, National Foundation for India- Rights, Claims and Negotiations: SRHR stories from the back of beyond
(iii) Padma Bhate-Deosthali, Senior Advisor, Centre for Enquiry into Health and Allied Themes (CEHAT), and Independent Researcher – Integrating SRR in Medical Education: Gains and Challenges

DAY 2: MONDAY, APRIL 15TH, 2019

 

9.30 – 11.00 am: I. Adolescent Sexuality & Child Marriage
(i) Jaya Sagade, Vice Principal, ILS Law College, Pune – Impact of Child Marriage on the Sexual and Reproductive Rights of Girl Child
(ii) Aparna Chandra, Director, Centre for Constitutional Law, Policy, & Governance, National Law University Delhi – Criminalization of Adolescent Sexuality and its Impact on SRHR
(iii) Swagata Raha, Consultant Restorative Justice & Legal Affairs – Treatment of “Romantic Cases” by Special Courts under the POCSO Act

11.00 to 11.15 am: Tea

11.15 am – 12.30 pm: II. The Right to Abortion
(i) Suchitra Dalvie, Coordinator, Asia Safe Abortion Partnership – Are we ready for safe abortion as a woman’s right in India?
(ii) Sarita Barpanda, Director, Reproductive Rights Unit, HRLN & Meenaz Kakalia, Lawyer, HRLN – The Right to Abortion and the Indian Judiciary

12.30 – 2.00 pm: III. Reproductive Rights and Disability
(i) Anita Ghai, Professor, Human Studies, Ambedkar University, Delhi – Rethinking about Prenatal selection and Disability
(ii) Nidhi Goyal, Disability & Gender Rights Activist, Founder, Rising Flame – Standing at the Intersection: Disability, Sex, Gender, and Violence
(iii) Renu Addlakha,  Centre for Women’s Development Studies – Intersections of Disability, Sexuality, and Reproductive Rights

2.30– 4.00 pm: IV. Reproductive Labour and Reproductive Justice
(i) Anindita Majumdar, Asst. Professor, IIT Hyderabad – Banning a Select Few: Conversations on Reproductive Justice and Reproductive Labour in Commercial Surrogacy in India
(ii) Mohan Rao, Independent Researcher – The Surrogacy Story in India: Reproductive Rights or Reproductive Unfreedoms

4.00 to 5.00 pm: V. The Present and Future of SRR Advocacy in India
(i) Siri Gloppen, Director, Centre on Law and Social Transformation, University of Bergen, Norway
(ii) Maya Unnithan, Director of the Sussex Centre for Cultures of Reproduction, Technologies & Health (CORTH)
(iii) Jayna Kothari, Executive Director, CLPR