NEW SOVIET WOMAN

Evening Star, Issue 19588, 21 June 1927, Page 4

NEW SOVIET WOMAN

CAMPAIGN FOR RIGHTS. Russian Central Asia, where the native population, almost 100 per cent, illitera’e. has lived for ten centuries in strict obedience to the precepts op Mohammedan law, is now the scene of an energetic “women’s rights” campaign, carried on under ihs leadership of the Communist Party. Nowhere in the Soviet Union, probably, is there more unoropitious soil for the cultivation of the “ delegatka,” the new typo of Soviet woman who is supposed to take an active part in the woik'of Soviets, co-operatives, and other public institutions. . . . .

Tho campaign of emancipation is in full swing. Some time ago the Soviet Government, forbade under heavy legal penalties the traditional custom of buying and selling wives, together with the practice of polygamy. Now there is a strong drive to persuade Asiatic •vomen to cast off their heavy veils \nmilies of native Communists are first ipproached: and husbands who. for regions, social, or traditional reasons, ppose unveiling are liable to expulmu from the party. The movement has spread beyond the tanks of tho parly, and on March 8, which was celebrated all over the Soviet Union ns Woman’s Day. more than 6,000 women in Central Asia are reported to have discarded their veils. On the other hand, women who gave up their veils, and’active organisers in t.lie campaign, have been murdered in ,-orae localities. Near Samarkand .->ome workers accidentally discovered a woman who was •liaincd up in the courtyard of a former bey, or wealthy landlord. It ttneins that several years ago this woman attempted to put off her veil and go into the oily, and her husband had kept her in chains ever since. The bey wifi now be given over to a public trial, while tho Zbenotdel, the women’s department of the Communist Party, is undertaking to care for tho woman, who had become half wild and mentally unbalanced _ during her long period of savage captivity. Women’s clubs have been established in tho several autonomous republics and territories into which Russian Centra! Asia Is now divided, and these plubs chum 30,01)1 members. Dndor the now land regulations 1,500 women Lave received land of their own-—an unprecedented development in Centra) Asm The Communists say they are convinced that time is on their side, that the old world n- Islam is dying, and that obstacles of religion and tradition which might have been 1 invincible half a eenimy ago can now be removed bv vigorous and determined pioneer educational work.