THE SANGRAM MAHILA BAND / 1 min 38 Sec
Refusing to be limited by the options before them, a group of women in the village of Dhibra in Bihar’s Patna district, chose a rather unconventional livelihood. With cultivable land shrinking and work for lowly-paid farm labourers drying up, they picked up sticks. Sixteen women started out on the journey, but family pressures and unending criticism saw six cave in and withdraw. The 10 who persisted, all of them with the surname Das, formed the state’s first women-only band of drummers in 2012 – the Sargam Mahila Band.
Puja Awasthi is a freelance print and online journalist, and a photographer based in Lucknow. She loves yoga, travelling and all things handmade.