Pressing for Progress, Physics Department

 The department of Physics in the University of Hyderabad and the Indian Association of Physics, organised a very unique programme, Pressing for Progress, 2019, a three day Conference on Gender Equity in Physics, where a large number of physicists from abroad and India came under a roof to discuss gender issues. Prof. Bindu Bambah is a rare physicist who is now the Dean of the Physics school and she is very much interested in Gender questions. She was a joint faculty in the Centre for Women's Studies and had  earlier taught a course on Gender and Science to our Women's Studies Students. She is also guiding a Women's Studies student for her Ph. D. It was really nice to see a main stream discipline like Physics talk of Gender issues. The highlight of the Conference was, the honouring of Prof. Bimla  Buti the first Fellow of Indian National Science Academy, INSA. Prof. Bunti  had also received the Vikram Sarabhai Award for Planetary Science and  did her Ph. D under Prof. Subramaniam Chandra Shekhar from the University of Chicago, who had won the noble prize in physics in 1983. It was a very emotional moment  when Bimla Buti cut the cake as it was her 86th birthday today and the whole hall exploded with singing a happy birthday song. Thanks a lot Bindu for bringing out gender issues related to science   and in this Conference  organising workshops under the themes of, Gender Equity, Barriers, Bridges and stepping stones, Understanding sexual harassment dynamics and exploring personal agency and power, Challenging gender stereotypes in daily living. Indeed our Universities are now changing. Few years back gender issue was one concerning only social scientists by and large and Humanities scholars and it was believed that Sciences are gender neutral. We need more such programmes. Met many earlier students and faculty. Prof. Bhatnagar who was also our VC and very sensitive to gender issues. Indeed a great and unique Conference.