Empowering Women for Social Change: The Gulabi Gang’s Journey

In India’s deeply patriarchal heartland, a group of women dressed in bright pink sarees has been challenging centuries-old gender norms, demanding justice, and rewriting the rules of social activism. The Gulabi Gang – literally the “Pink Gang” – is one of the most striking examples of how grassroots communication strategies can empower women and drive real social change. Their journey is not just a story of resistance; it is a powerful case study in Social and Behaviour Change Communication (SBCC), demonstrating how strategic messaging, visual symbolism, and community-level dialogue can dismantle oppressive structures from the ground up.

What is SBCC and why does it matter for gender equality? 🔗

Before understanding the Gulabi Gang’s impact, it helps to know what SBCC actually means. Social and Behaviour Change Communication is a systematic process that uses communication strategies to promote positive changes in knowledge, attitudes, social norms, and behaviours. According to the Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs, SBCC goes beyond simply broadcasting information – it coordinates messages and activities across multiple channels to reach individuals, communities, and policymakers alike.

When it comes to gender issues, SBCC plays a particularly crucial role. The SBCC Implementation Kits on Gender, developed under USAID support, explain that integrating gender into SBCC programs means identifying and then addressing gender inequalities during every stage of strategy design, implementation, and evaluation. The goal is not merely to accommodate existing gender dynamics, but to transform them – fostering critical examination of inequalities and shifting deeply held social norms.

The Gulabi Gang did not study SBCC theory in a classroom. But their methods – from visual branding to folk media to public confrontation – align remarkably well with its core principles. They are, in many ways, a textbook example of SBCC practiced instinctively at the grassroots level.

The context: Bundelkhand’s harsh reality for women 🔗

To understand the Gulabi Gang, you need to understand the environment they emerged from. The movement was born in Banda district, located in the Bundelkhand region of Uttar Pradesh – one of the most impoverished and socially backward areas in India. The district was ranked among the bottom 200 on India’s Planning Commission index of backwardness. Over 20% of its population belongs to lower castes, particularly Dalits, who face severe oppression and discrimination.

Uttar Pradesh itself has some of the highest rates of domestic and sexual violence against women in the country. Child marriage, dowry demands, female infanticide, and extremely low female literacy rates are widespread in this region. As Al Jazeera reported, Bundelkhand is one of India’s most impoverished regions, with over 40% of the population living below the poverty line. Domestic violence was typically considered a private family matter, leaving women with virtually no recourse. And when women did try to approach the police, they were often dismissed, shamed, or simply ignored.

It was in this deeply hostile environment that Sampat Pal Devi, a woman who was herself married off at the age of 12, decided that enough was enough.

The birth of the Gulabi Gang 🔗

Sampat Pal Devi was born into a poor shepherd’s family. She taught herself to read and write, and despite limited schooling, she developed a fierce sense of justice. According to documented accounts, the origin moment of the movement came when Devi intervened to stop a neighbour from beating his wife. She gathered a group of women armed with bamboo sticks, or lathis, and confronted the abuser. The intervention worked. The husband stopped the violence. More importantly, Devi realised the power of collective action.

In 2006, she formally founded the Gulabi Gang in Banda district. The group’s mission was clear: protect the powerless from abuse, fight corruption, ensure basic rights for the rural poor, and discourage harmful traditions like child marriage. By 2014, the movement had grown to an estimated 270,000 members spread across multiple districts in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. Some estimates later put the number at around 400,000.

The pink saree: SBCC through visual symbolism 🔗

The single most powerful communication tool of the Gulabi Gang is the pink saree. Every member wears one, and it serves far more than an aesthetic purpose – it is a carefully constructed visual symbol that operates on multiple levels of communication strategy.

Reclaiming femininity as strength 🔗

Pink is traditionally associated with softness and passivity – stereotypically “feminine” qualities. By choosing pink as their uniform colour for fierce activism, the Gulabi Gang turned this association on its head. Their pink became a symbol of defiance, not submission. This act of reclaiming a gendered colour and imbuing it with new meaning is a powerful example of what SBCC practitioners call norm transformation – changing what a symbol or behaviour means within its cultural context.

Building collective identity 🔗

The saree also creates a powerful sense of unity and belonging. A single woman confronting an abuser can be easily ignored or silenced. A hundred women in identical pink sarees, however, represent a visible, organised force. The uniform creates what communication scholars call group identity – it signals solidarity and makes members instantly recognisable, both to each other and to the outside world. As Sampat Pal Devi herself noted, the pink saree gives women a sense of community and ensures they are taken seriously.

Creating a recognisable “brand” 🔗

In SBCC terms, the pink saree functions as a brand. Just as a logo represents an organisation’s values and mission, the pink saree instantly communicates the Gulabi Gang’s identity and purpose. This visual consistency made the movement memorable and easily identifiable in media coverage, helping it gain national and international attention. It also made the brand accessible – every woman in rural India owns or can obtain a saree, so there was no financial barrier to participation.

Folk songs and community dialogue as communication channels 🔗

The Gulabi Gang did not have access to television studios, advertising budgets, or social media platforms. Instead, they turned to the communication channels that were already trusted and effective in their community: traditional folk media.

Bundeli folk songs with revolutionary messages 🔗

One of their most effective SBCC tactics involved adapting traditional Bundeli folk songs (known as lok geet) with entirely new lyrics. Instead of traditional themes about harvests or love, the gang’s songs carried messages about women’s rights, the importance of girls’ education, the evils of the dowry system, and the need to fight corruption. This is a classic SBCC technique – using a familiar and beloved cultural medium to deliver radical new messages. Because the medium was trusted and well-known, the content felt less threatening and more accessible. Crucially, it also bypassed literacy barriers, reaching women and communities who could not read written materials.

Public meetings and community gatherings 🔗

The gang also organised public meetings (chaupals) where women could share their stories of abuse and injustice in a supportive environment. This is a significant SBCC strategy: transforming a private, shameful issue into a public, collective grievance. When domestic violence was spoken about openly in a community gathering, it shifted from being an individual woman’s “personal problem” to a recognised social issue demanding collective action. This kind of community-level dialogue is at the heart of the socio-ecological model used in SBCC, which recognises that behaviour change requires intervention at individual, interpersonal, community, and structural levels simultaneously.

Direct action: linking communication to accountability 🔗

What sets the Gulabi Gang apart from many conventional SBCC campaigns is that they did not stop at messaging and dialogue. They backed their words with direct, public action, creating real consequences for injustice.

Confronting police and officials 🔗

When police officers refused to register complaints from women or Dalits, the Gulabi Gang would organise mass demonstrations at the police station. In one well-known incident, when police at the Atarra station refused to lodge a Dalit’s complaint, the gang organised a demonstration of over 200 members who stormed the police station – and brought along pink-painted dogs, declaring them more loyal and effective than the police. They had also invited the media, using public shaming as a strategic communication tool to force the authorities into action.

In the case of Sheelu Nishad, a 17-year-old girl who was gang-raped and then arrested when she went to file her complaint, the Gulabi Gang staged mass demonstrations both at the police station and outside the legislator’s home. This case brought them significant international attention and illustrated how collective, highly visible action can force accountability from powerful institutions.

Using media strategically 🔗

The gang instinctively understood the power of media attention. By consistently inviting journalists to their demonstrations and creating visually dramatic scenes – hundreds of women in pink sarees confronting officials – they ensured that their actions received coverage far beyond their local area. This media amplification extended their reach and put pressure on authorities who might otherwise have ignored their demands. An academic study published in Communication, Culture and Critique described the Gulabi Gang as a “counterpublic” that used both violent and non-violent resistive strategies to reshape public perceptions of women’s roles in activism.

Beyond protest: education, economic empowerment, and political participation 🔗

The Gulabi Gang’s SBCC approach was not limited to confrontation. They also worked systematically on the root causes of gender inequality – literacy, economic dependence, and political exclusion.

Education initiatives 🔗

Recognising that female illiteracy was both a cause and a consequence of gender oppression, the gang actively promoted girls’ education. In 2008, Sampat Pal Devi established a school in Banda where at least 400 girls were enrolled. Gang members regularly visited households to persuade parents to educate their daughters. They even managed to find a teacher for a school in a predominantly Dalit village that had been left unstaffed by the government.

Economic independence through small enterprise 🔗

The gang set up several small-scale businesses employing women – including organic manure production, candle-making, Ayurvedic medicines, pickle production, and leaf-plate manufacturing. One enterprise founded by Prema Rambahori employed as many as 500 women. They also trained women in wedding-related services like catering, tailoring, and henna application. This economic empowerment component is significant from an SBCC perspective: it addresses the structural barriers that keep women in abusive situations by giving them the financial independence to leave or change their circumstances.

Political empowerment 🔗

The gang also disseminated information about the Panchayati Raj Act, which reserves one-third of local government seats for women and marginalised groups. They assisted illiterate women in completing government forms and applications. The results were tangible: by 2010, 21 Gulabi Gang members had been elected to panchayat positions, giving the movement a voice within the very governance structures that had previously excluded them.

The Gulabi Gang as a model of gender-transformative SBCC 🔗

The Gender Equality Continuum, a widely used framework in SBCC programming, classifies interventions as gender-blind, gender-exploitative, gender-accommodating, or gender-transformative. The Gulabi Gang’s approach falls firmly in the gender-transformative category – the most impactful level. Rather than simply working around existing gender inequalities, they actively challenged and sought to change the underlying social structures, norms, and power dynamics that produced those inequalities.

They fostered critical examination of patriarchal norms through community dialogue. They strengthened positive norms by celebrating women’s courage and collective power. And they highlighted the position of marginalised women – lower-caste, rural, illiterate – and worked to transform the social structures that oppressed them. This is precisely what gender-transformative SBCC aims to achieve.

Challenges and legacy 🔗

The Gulabi Gang has not been without internal struggles. In 2014, Sampat Pal Devi was removed from the leadership amid allegations of financial impropriety, and the group elected Suman Singh Chauhan as her successor. The movement has also faced ongoing threats and opposition from local police and political leaders, with members being labelled as militants.

Nevertheless, the impact of the Gulabi Gang extends far beyond Bundelkhand. Their story has been captured in the award-winning 2012 documentary Gulabi Gang by Nishtha Jain, the 2010 film Pink Saris by Kim Longinotto, and the book Pink Sari Revolution by Amana Fontanella-Khan. Their visual identity and methods have inspired women’s movements globally, demonstrating that effective social change communication does not require massive budgets or high-tech tools – it requires cultural relevance, authenticity, and courage.

Key SBCC lessons from the Gulabi Gang 🔗

The Gulabi Gang’s journey offers several critical takeaways for anyone interested in using communication to drive social change. First, visual symbolism matters: a simple, culturally resonant symbol like the pink saree can create identity, unity, and instant recognition. Second, traditional communication channels are powerful: folk songs, community meetings, and public storytelling can be more effective than digital campaigns in reaching marginalised populations. Third, communication must be linked to action: messaging alone does not create change – it must be backed by collective, visible efforts that create accountability. Fourth, address root causes: sustainable gender equality requires tackling not just attitudes, but also the material conditions – literacy, economic dependence, political exclusion – that perpetuate oppression. Finally, grassroots movements can be SBCC powerhouses: the most effective communication for change often comes not from top-down campaigns, but from communities organising themselves around their own lived realities.

What do you think? Can grassroots movements like the Gulabi Gang create more lasting social change than government-led policy interventions? And in what ways could their SBCC strategies – folk songs, visual branding, public confrontation – be adapted to address gender issues in other cultural contexts?

References

1. https://www.gulabigang.in/
2. https://sbccimplementationkits.org/sbcc-in-emergencies/learn-about-sbcc-and-emergencies/what-is-social-and-behavior-change-communication/
3. https://sbccimplementationkits.org/gender/courses/gender-and-social-and-behavior-change-communication/
4. https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2014/3/4/gulabi-gang-indias-women-warriors
5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulabi_Gang
6. https://sbccimplementationkits.org/gender/sbcc-gender-models-and-frameworks/
7. https://academic.oup.com/ccc/article-abstract/9/4/558/3979343
8. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2196638/