CHENNAI:In an effort to create awareness and fight against the taxation on sanitary napkins, members of the Dhagam Foundation, along with few other volunteers met in the city on Sunday. Dhagam foundation was originally formed in Coimbatore seven years ago by college student Govind and his friends, and has been working in Chennai for the past 18 months. Their focus is on two projects — Aram, which focuses on education, and Aval, which focuses on women’s issues. Under the project Aval, they have another category called ‘Talk Periods’ and have been conducting seminars, workshops to talk about mensuration to break certain myths around it.
“Menstruation is just a normal biological process in a woman’s body and there is nothing in it to be ashamed of or grossed out about. We want to be able to bring this message out to the masses,” says Govind. The protest started with members from the foundation playing the ‘Parai’ which represents a symbol of revolution. This was followed by a street play that focussed on breaking the myths associated with menstruation and why it is necessary to make sanitary napkins tax-free.
Meenakshi, a foundation member, explained why it is necessary to cut the taxes and make napkins available cheap. “Most of the girls and women today are dependant on sanitary napkins and are still skeptical about cloth pads or cups. Napkins cost a lot and nobody did us a favor by bringing down the tax rate from 13.5% to 12 %. It is still a burden to pay taxes for a necessity like a sanitary napkin. Why are we not paying taxes for sindhoor and other products?” she questions.