Of women, by a woman

Writer Dominique Hoeltgen chronicles the lives of Indian women in her book, Inde, La Revolution Par Les Femm

Dominique Hoeltgen has lived and worked in Algeria, Japan, Italy and the U.S.; she has toured extensively across Asia and Africa as a freelance reporter. But, the women she met during her four-year stay in India moved her more powerfully than any others in all her travels. So much so, indeed, that her fifth and latest book, Inde, La Revolution Par Les Femmes (India, the Revolution by Women) is devoted entirely to them.

“There's a big, big difference in India — the women here have a dynamism I haven't seen in any other country,” says the journalist from France, who was in Chennai recently to discuss her book at the Alliance Française. The event itself was almost entirely in French, but she shifted to fluent English for the chat afterward (no sweat for someone who also speaks Italian, Spanish, Japanese, Arabic and Hindi).

“I believe that women have the power to bring about social change,” says Dominique, who has been working as the correspondent for L'Expansion in Mumbai for the last four years. “They are more philanthropic than men — a man in charge of a company will speak first of budgets and numbers; all the women I met who are heads of industry spoke of their team before their turnovers. See the difference?”

Full report here Hindu