All India Dalit Mahila Adhikar Manch (AIDMAM) is a platform for women from the Dalit community to raise their voices for justice. This platform has raised several struggles and movements for self-respect and dignity. AIDMAM is a movement which was initiated by the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR). The aim of the movement is to recognize how the class, caste, and gender identity of a dalit woman overlap and place them at the very bottom of the social hierarchy. They work to empower dalit women to challenge these caste, class, and gender hierarchies and move forward in their struggle for justice. They do so through networking, enhancing skills and leadership at the state and district level.
Beginnings and organisation
AIDMAM started working in the year 2006. They primarily work in North India and have intervened in six states: Haryana, Orissa, Punjab, Bihar, Delhi and Rajasthan. As a movement they are constantly networking with dalit, women and human rights organisations and facilitate the building of dalit women's perspective. They monitor violence against dalit women and also conduct research on these issues which facilitated their advocacy efforts. Building on the capacities of dalit women connected with the movement is one of their main activities.
The convener (chairman) of AIDMAM is Vimal Thorat and the General Secretary is Asha Kowtal. Under her leadership AIDMAM has conducted several training programmes, conferences and self-respect marches.
In 2009, they started a programme which worked with dalit women who were elected representatives of panchayats in five states. The aim was to train these women to act upon issues of violence against women. They also started a dalit women's self-respect yatra, which was a monthlong yatra in 2014 where they travelled across states and organised the dalit community and campaigned against violence against dalit women.