Women Of My Billion: A Poignant Journey Addressing Gender Violence and Inequality

There is a moment in Women Of My Billion when a roomful of women, sitting in a workshop, are asked to close their eyes and imagine that they are back to being their 11-year-old selves. “Think of yourselves playing in the courtyard of your childhood home, your parents being in the vicinity, think of how carefree you were, of your dreams and aspirations and what you wanted to become,” Shrishti Bakshi, who drives this documentary and around whose selfless efforts Women Of My Billion is built, tells her audience. As this seemingly innocuous activity gets deeper into the psyche of these women and delves into the days left behind in their lives, the tears start rolling.

To my surprise, I found myself tearing up too, as my thoughts rewound to what it was and what could have been. For someone, who is unmoved at the movies — and that includes sitting through Rose “letting go” of Jack in Titanic, the boys going down to bullets at the end of Rang De Basanti and Hazel and Gus’s love story cut short by death in The Fault In Our Stars — this was perhaps a first. But that is what Women Of My Billion does. It makes the story of every woman — irrespective of class and circumstance, status and situation — your own. It is a heartbreaking watch but one imbued with immense hope and courage.

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