Ms. Nicole Pillay, First Secretary of the High Commission of South Africa, spoke at an event organized by Global Youth India about India-South Africa ties. She discussed the 1965 march of South African women against pass laws, which was an early act of revolution against oppressive circumstances. Ms. Pillay then answered questions from the audience, noting exchange programs between the two countries through ITECH and addressing issues of caste and color from her perspective as a child of post-apartheid. The discussion also covered BRICS economic cooperation and trade between India and South Africa, which Ms. Pillay hoped to increase to $18 billion by 2018. She concluded by discussing representation of India and South Africa in the

1. ‘’Youstrike a woman,youstrike a rock”, empoweringwordsthat were quoted by our guest speaker
Ms. Nicole Pillay,FirstSecretary,High Commission of South Africa on the 20th
of August 2014 at The
Indian International Centre. She found herself rather overwhelmed by the predominantly female
participation in the interactive event organized by Global Youth India on the topic “India-South
Africaties”;Ms. Pillaymade ita point to enlighten us about the National march of women of South
Africain1965 to petitionagainstthe passlaws.Thiswasseenas the firstrevolutionarystepmade by
the womenof that countrylivinginoppressive circumstanceswhichset agreatexample worldwide.
Ms. Pillaywaswelcomed by a room filled with exuberant young recruits eager to question and get
what was for many their first taste of a Global Youth India Event. The event was chaired by Sumati
Bajaj and Fatima Farooqui, both of whom did a great job at targeting many aspects of India’s ties
with South Africa. After a brief welcome, the floor was then open to questions. Among the first
questionswasone enquiringaboutexchangeprogrammesbetween the two countries to which Ms.
Pillay replied that ITECH had come up with quite a few opportunities and as they come up with
more, we will be kept informed about them. Referring to herself as a child of post apartheid, Ms.
Pillayanswered our questions about the problems of caste and colour that exist in both countries.
She stated that none of us would see it like our parents did of course and that all we have is the
image that’sbeencreatedwhile theyhave real life memoriesthatthey’vehadtodeal with. The only
solutionshe seesisreconcilingwiththe issue andgetting intermswith the fact that caste actually is
a ‘’problem” in the country. To this, one eager speaker suggested that we go back to our roots and
study the subsequent developments in the field of caste oppression over the years.
The discussionthentook a more economic turn with questions being raised about BRICS when Ms.
PillayveryenthusiasticallyinformedusthatitwasactuallyIndiathat hadencouragedSouth Africa to
get involved in this association. “It is a bank that is funded by developing countries and that is
funding developing countries” this according to our guest was what made BRICS so appealing. Did
you know that the trade between the two countries is somewhere around 15 billion and not
somewhere inthe earlymillions? Yes, neitherdidalotof the participantsinthe room.Ms. Pillayalso
mentioned that South Africa was pushing for 18 billion by 2018. While she was all praise for India
she also declared that India’s changing gold regulations did affect their trade adversely.
A diplomatic twist of events led us to the UN Security Council. “Those with biggest guns have the
most to say” was according Ms. Pillay the reason why neither South Africa nor India was a
permanentmemberyeteventhoughtheyrepresentedtwodifferentcontinents. She felt that South
Africa was just seen as an over sized mine waiting to be tapped and spoke about how South Africa
sought to be much more in world politics.
Last of All Ms. Pillayspoke about how most of the schools and colleges including the one she went
to, University of Cape town were white schools, which basically meant that they had a dominant
number of white kids. So for her to have attended a college like that after going through public
schooling was a stark change and she mentions the standards of education at different levels of
SouthAfricanot oftenmatchingwith one another as it is in India. The unfairness of the reservation
systemwasa topic thatwas well quite more thantouchedduringthe discussion but what Ms. Pillay
very rightly explained was that the hardships faced by those sections of societies that have
reservationcannotsoeasilybe wipedoutof ourmemoriesand hence compensation needs to paid.
The event came to an end with a short but thoroughly inspirational speech by Ms. Pillay
summarizing all that was discussed, a vote of thanks and a bouquet of flowers being presented to
the guest of the hour.