Chandigarh: In the June of 2015, the then sarpanch of Bibipur village in Haryana launched a campaign that would snowball into a country-wide phenomenon — ‘Selfie with Daughter’.
On 9 June that year, Sunil Jaglan had posted a selfie with his daughter Nandini on social media, urging others to follow suit to help change attitudes towards gender issues in their community. What followed was a remarkable response, with thousands of people across the country, including celebrities, posting their own selfies with their daughters. Jaglan’s campaign even caught the attention of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who mentioned it on his monthly radio show ‘Mann Ki Baat‘.
Now, as the show gears up to air its 100th episode, Jaglan has been invited by Prasar Bharti to speak during the weeklong programme beginning 26 April to mark the show’s centenary. Other guests include celebrities like actors Aamir Khan and Raveena Tandon, Grammy award-winning musician Ricky Kej, Indian paralympian Deepa Malik and Padma Shri Awardee TV Mohandas Pai, among others.
The 40-year-old had also launched a Hindi version of the selfie campaign — titled ‘Beti Bachao, Selfie Banao’ — to give impetus to the Union government’s ‘Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao’ (save daughters, educate daughters) initiative. The government-led campaign was launched in January 2015 and aimed to address the skewed gender ratio in some Indian states, including Haryana.
According to the 2011 Census, Haryana’s sex ratio is among the lowest in India — 879 for every 1,000 boys.
Speaking to ThePrint, Jaglan talked about the several initiatives he has launched in his village to help women be part of the governance process. “(Under my watch), the first mahila gram sabha was organised in Bibipur, women’s participation was ensured in khap panchayats, and a laado (girlchild) panchayat was also organised. My efforts got me recognition from the state and central governments. We also decided that 50 per cent of the Panchayat’s funds will be spent on whatever was decided on by women,” he said.
Jaglan, founder of the Selfie with Daughter foundation, is currently also a senior advisor for Pranab Mukherjee Foundation.
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The beginning of the #SelfieWithDaughter
With a master’s degree in Science, Jaglan had briefly worked as a school teacher in Delhi before taking the plunge into village politics in 2010.
“My mission was to make villages more beautiful than cities so that the exodus of villagers stops,” he said.
However, the turning point in his life, he said, was the birth of his daughter on 24 January, 2012.
“The nurse who came to inform me of my daughter’s birth seemed downcast. When I offered her money to organise sweets to be distributed among hospital staff, she refused saying that the doctor will not like the idea of bringing sweets to the hospital at a time when a girl child is born in the village Sarpanch’s home. I was struck by just how unfortunate it was considered to be a parent to a girl child,” said Jaglan. “The skewed gender ratio in Bibipur was apparent without any formal survey.”
Determined to bring about a change in people’s attitude, he worked to make women part of the decision-making process within his village, but it was his selfie campaign that catapulted him into the national spotlight. The campaign not only caught the attention of PM Modi but also earned repeated mentions by him on several platforms. Jaglan’s efforts and initiatives have since become synonymous with the fight for gender equality in India.
After the first mentioned in June, Modi talked about the campaign again on 20 September in his Mann Ki Baat episode and said that a “silent revolution” was on in the country over gender issues after Jaglan’s call for “Selfie with Daughter”.
A week later, Modi spoke about the campaign during his address before a gathering of Silicon Valley CEOs at San Jose, US, on 27 September, 2015. Then, less than a month later, on 15 November, Modi made a mention of the campaign during his address at Wembley Stadium, London.
In 2017, during a Mann Ki Baat address, Modi once again praised the campaign, and then again on 25 November, 2018.
Meanwhile, thousands of people were posting their selfies with their daughters on social media under the #SelfieWithDaughter, many of them celebrities, including Ajay Devgan with his daughter Nyasa, Sachin Tendulkar with his daughter Sara, Mahesh Babu with his daughter Sitara, and Allu Arjun with his daughter Arha. Badminton player Saina Nehwal, too, posted a selfie with her father Harvir Singh Nehwal.
On 9 June, 2016, Jaglan’s online museum — www.selfiewithdaughter.org — was launched by Haryana Health Minister Anil Vij. A year later, in 2017, then President of India Pranab Mukherjee launched the “Selfie with Daughter App” and “Selfie with Daughter Foundation” in Rashtrapati Bhawan.
“I congratulate Shri Sunil Jaglan while launching the Mobile App ‘Selfie with Daughter’. Shri Jaglan’s efforts in initiating this campaign in Haryana are praiseworthy. Selfie with Daughter has become a worldwide movement against female and sex selection. I hope that this would eventually help in dealing with the problems arising out of gender imbalance,” said Mukherjee.
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