Seamstress of fair deal

Viji Penkoottu’s journey from tailor to activist has helped women in workplaces to sit easy, writes Anubha George

Viji Penkoottu wanted to be a salesgirl in a clothes showroom when she was 22. It wasn’t meant to be. She was told she was fat, dark-skinned and not the “right shape” for someone who would have to serve customers. So she went away and decided to become a tailor instead, sewing nighties and blouses for women in her home city of Kozhikode. “Basically, we had no money to survive. My husband was a daily wage labourer. If he didn’t work, we didn’t eat,” she says looking back on that time in 1994.

Viji has a presence, she fills a room. Her spectacles and a short salt and pepper bob make her instantly recognisable. She says a lot of the women across Kerala end up becoming tailors because it’s an easy business to set up. “The state government is keen on women becoming financially independent,” she says. “Women are given a loan for a sewing machine and that’s it — you’re ready to go.”

The journey from 1994 has been nothing but incredible. In 2018, 52-year-old Viji Penkoottu was named by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) as one of the ‘most influential and inspiring women in the world’. She came in at number 73. The list named women from 60 countries and included the likes of Chelsea Clinton, daughter of Bill Clinton the former President of the United States, and the Chilean writer Isabel Allende.

Viji never expected international fame, even in her wildest dreams. “I’m just a tailor who has always fought for the rights of women in the unorganised sector — for people like myself — because no one else stands up for us,” she says. Her fight for women’s workplace rights got her a place on the list. “My mother was a housemaid. She was the only earning member of our family. My father would physically abuse her,” she says. It was her mother’s struggles that made her see that women contribute a lot more to families than they are even given credit for. “I’m just one of those people who stand up for what is right,” she says. “I can’t stand it if people are being treated unjustly.”

When Viji worked as a tailor, she realised that women who worked in shops couldn’t go to the toilet because shop owners didn’t have the facilities for them. “Women who came to me to get their blouses or nighties stitched or those who were my neighbours told me about it,” she says. This meant that many women suffered from severe urinary problems. “When we first took our demand for toilets to shop owners, they refused. They told their women employees to not drink water. That was their solution.”

Eventually, Viji’s efforts paid off. Building owners in Kozhikode now construct toilets for women.

There are also a number of e-toilets for women in the city. Viji’s fight came to be known as Moothrappura samaram, struggle for toilets.

“This victory was a drop in the ocean compared to what women go through. The housemaids, tailors, women who do laundry, textile workers, women labourers on daily wages — they have absolutely no rights,” she said.

In 2009, Viji set up a women’s collective, Penkoottu, which translates in English as women for each other.

“I made that my surname. People started to know me as Viji Penkoottu — even the BBC,” she said. The BBC recognised Viji as the person who made it possible for women who worked in shops in Kerala to have the right to sit. “Can you imagine not being allowed to sit for eight to 12 hours a day? Can you imagine standing on your feet for that long? Can you imagine not being offered a chair just to rest during your break,” Viji adds.

Viji and her fellow workers started Irikkal samaram, the struggle to sit. The women in the unorganised sector formed a trade union, Asamghatitha Mekhala Thozhilali Union or AMTU. “Finally, we won the right to sit,” Viji says. In 2018, the Kerala government made it mandatory for shops to have toilets and sitting facilities for their female staff.

Viji is not a tailor any more. She doesn’t have the time. She is invited as guest speaker at events to talk about women’s rights. “I’m a full-time activist now,” she laughs. Her husband and her two children are supportive. While tailoring would have brought in money, activism doesn’t. “Now I don’t even work,” she says. But her days are packed. She starts her day at 9 am and finishes at 9 pm.

Viji’s dream is for women in the unorganised sector to be treated fairly. “The day that happens, I will open up my tailoring shop again. Hopefully one day soon.”