Playwright Eve Ensler to Arrive in Mumbai to Address Meetings on Women's Rights Issue (The Times of India)

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/Playwright-eve-ensler-to-...

By Bella Jaisinghani, TNN

MUMBAI: Playwright Eve Ensler, who wrote the Vagina Monologues, will arrive in Mumbai on January 4 to address a series of meetings on the issue of women's rights. She will launch the Mumbai edition of the One Billion Rising (OBR) campaign, a global movement aimed at ending violence against women. OBR was an event planned well in advance but stands to gain relevance owing to the fatal gangrape of a medical student in Delhi on December 16.

Ensler is being hosted by theatre director Mahabanoo Mody-Kotwal who has been staging her play in Mumbai. Of course, Vagina Monologues is not without its critics either who question whether its blatant descriptions of the female anatomy are not intended to titillate after all. They accuse it of taking the women's liberation movement back a few decades by playing into the hands of those who objectify the fair sex.

Those who will accompany Ensler and Kotwal during Thursday's launch will focus their solidarity on the OBR campaign. Actors Sakshi Tanwar, Nandita Das, Dolly Thakore and Kotwal's son Kaizaad will be present at Jaihind College Thursday to kickstart the movement.

OBR began as a call to action based on the UN's mind-boggling claim that one in three women will be beaten or raped during her lifetime. With the world population at seven billion, this adds up to more than one billion women hence the name One Billion Rising.

The playwright and her team will proceed to Churchgate railway station later in the afternoon in order to ''salute the spirit of women and flag off a unique walkathon.''