Pink Chaddi Campaign (Pink Underwear Campaign) by Nisha Susan against Shri RAMA Sena violence against Valentine Day couples

The Pink Chaddi Campaign (Pink Underwear Campaign) is a nonviolent protest movement launched in India in February 2009 in response to notable incidences of violent conservative and right-wing activism against perceived violations of Indian culture, when a group of women were attacked in a pub in Mangalore.

Pink Chaddi Campaign logo

On February 6 2009 in an incident of moral policing a group of men who claimed to belong to Shri Ram Sena** attacked a group of women in Mangalore, India. Later that month Pramod Muthalik (Pramod is an activist in various right-wing Hindu groups in India, and is the chief of the Rashtriya Hindu Sena, the parent organization of the Sri Ram Sena. He is a former member of the The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh or राष्ट्रीय स्वयंसेवक संघ or National Volunteers Organization, the Bajrang Dal and the Shiv Sena) announced an action plan to target couples found dating on February 14, Valentine’s Day. He said "Our activists will go around with a priest, a turmeric stub and a mangalsutra on February 14. If we come across couples being together in public and expressing their love, we will take them to the nearest temple and conduct their marriage.

Pramod Muthalik

In the midst of the tension, a novel protest was started by four young women, self-styled "Pub-going, loose, forward women" called the "Pink Chaddi" campaign, where they urged a peaceful protest (described as Gandhian in the press) to all of India, by sending pink underwear ("Chaddi" in Hindi) to Muthalik’s office on Valentine’s day.

This novel form of protest is initiated by Nisha Susan
Nisha is a Tehelka (news magazine) journalist.

Pink Chaddi Campaign poster 1


Pink Chaddi Campaign poster 2

As the protest grew, underwear started pouring in from locations all over India in solidarity for the "Love Sena". Over 500 pink chaddis will be couriered on Valentine Day to Muthalik's office. Other cities have also collected hundreds of such chaddis and have decided to courier them directly. The Pink Chaddi Campaign received widespread media coverage, and the Facebook group saw numbers of members growing exponentially in the following days. There was also political reaction to the campaign as supporters of RSS objected to use of pictures of RSS members on the campaign blog. RSS had criticized the Mangalore attack and favoured ban on Sri Ram Sena. Shortly after the campaign took off, the campaign's Facebook group began to be attacked by trolls and was eventually broken into. Attackers renamed the group and included racist slurs and death threats in its description. The attacks continued despite appeals to Facebook's support department for help, and eventually Facebook disabled the account of the group's administrator and access to the group. The group has decided to avoid Facebook in future. Amul, the milk products company, also featured the campaign in it's advertisements.

Amul's Pink Chaddi Campaign advertisement 1


Amul's Pink Chaddi Campaign advertisement 1

The **Shri Ram Sena (also spelled as Shri Rama Sena, Sri Ram Sena, Sri Ram Sene and Sriram Sena) is an right-wing Hindu group founded by Pramod Muthalik, a former member of the RSS, the Bajrang Dal and the Shiv Sena.