# IMPERFIX: Dr. Kiran Martin - Leadership

An episode of [The Imperfects](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1476501557), 17 May 2024, 11 min.

Audio: https://enrichment.soundstack.com/4vjqq8/episode.flightcast.com/s1t99lo282xx3svboji5mlle.mp3

We mean no disrespect to any of our other guests, but when Hugh says that Dr. Kiran Martin, is the most impressive person he has ever met, it’s hard not to agree. Dr. Kiran Martin is the founder of ASHA in India. It’s a not for profit, that for over 35 years, has provided healthcare and education to millions of people living in slums in India. In this clip, Dr Kiran tells us of the time she decided to wash the feet of a Dalit woman (an ‘untouchable’ in the caste system of India) in order to demonstrate humility. And it was this moment of true leadership that lead to a feet washing movement throughout ASHA, breaking down caste barriers in the process. You can learn more, or support Dr. Kiran Martin and ASHA’s work here. https://bit.ly/44Fl1WP. To listen to the full episode with Dr. Kiran Martin, click here https://apple.co/4hUYThh See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:00] My name's Ryan Shelton.
[0:01] I'm a co-host on The Imperfects, the Jewish grandson of Austrian and English immigrants.
[0:06] And I grew up on, and I'm now currently living on Wurundjeri country.
[0:10] I'd like to recognise the traditional peoples of this continent whose land was stolen nearly 250 years ago.
[0:16] In particular, we at The Imperfects would like to acknowledge the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation as the traditional owners of the land on which this podcast was recorded, and we extend our respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
[0:29] The rich storytelling history of the world's oldest living culture is what we proudly pay homage to when we share stories on The Imperfects.
[0:36] Hi there!
[0:38] I'm like The Imperfects.
[0:40] Oh yeah, sort of.
[0:41] But I'm a quick fix.
[0:42] Yeah, if you're in a hurry or something.
[0:43] I'm a helpful mix of archival tips from episodes past.
[0:47] You can listen to me fast.
[0:48] Da-da-da-da-da!
[0:49] Get ready for this.
[0:51] Yeah, why not?
[0:51] It won't take long.
[0:52] I'm an episode of The Imperfects.
[0:54] Hi, everyone.
[0:55] This is Hugh here, just Hugh, because it is an Imperfects today, F-I-X, where we go back into the archives and we find a moment that we found particularly moving or helpful.
[1:04] And today is with someone who I described in the intro as the most impressive person I've met in my entire life.
[1:10] And I think that episode was a couple of years ago now, and I still stand by that.
[1:14] Dr. Kieran Martin has set up education and health support for people living in slums in India.
[1:21] She's done so for a very long time.
[1:22] I was so lucky a few years ago now to be invited over to one of the slums she works in.
[1:28] I spent time in the school and saw the impact she has on
[1:31] the entire community.
[1:32] She's an extraordinary person.
[1:35] The little grab we've chosen here is her talking.
[1:38] It's really, it's about leadership.
[1:40] It's an incredible example of leadership.
[1:43] A foot washing movement that she started where she began washing the feet of someone in a class that
[1:49] Well, I think it's in a class called The Untouchables where they rank these people as just basically being not worthy of even touching.
[1:56] She washed this person's feet and started this whole feet washing movement.
[2:00] Anyway, it's a beautiful story.
[2:01] I won't spoil it here.
[2:02] But if you would like to learn more about her charity, which is called Asha, we'll put a link to that in the show notes.
[2:08] There'll also be a link to the entire episode.
[2:12] Yeah.
[2:12] So we hope you really enjoy Dr. Kieran Martin.
[2:14] We'll be back after this short break.
[2:20] In 1988, there was a cholera outbreak in one of the slums in Delhi.
[2:25] And you, as a paediatrician, you quite literally jumped over the fence and just started treating people.
[2:32] Is that right?
[2:33] Absolutely.
[2:34] But there was no Asha back then, you know.
[2:37] It was just you.
[2:38] It was just me, a pediatrician who really wanted to make a difference.
[2:44] You know, you have about 16 to 18 million people living in Delhi, and about 4 million of them live in these kind of shanty colonies where every hut is made of discarded material, you know, a roof being held together with stones and sticks and cycle tires, anything heavy that they can find.
[3:00] You said 4 million people, is it?
[3:02] Yeah.
[3:02] Yeah.
[3:03] It's a huge number.
[3:04] It's like a quarter of the city for sure, or even more.
[3:07] So, you know, and there were so many doctors available for those who were from the middle classes, you know, the elite of the city.
[3:16] And I was really drawn to these communities because you see them from outside, you know, when you drive around or walk around, but you know,
[3:24] I'd never really gone in.
[3:26] So I actually chose a Dalit community, you know, you have a caste system.
[3:31] Yeah.
[3:32] So, you know, you have a caste system in India.
[3:34] So you have the Brahmins, which are the top caste.
[3:38] Then you have the Kshatriyas, which are the warriors.
[3:41] Then you have the Veshias, which are the traders.
[3:44] And then you have the Shudras, which are the gardeners and carpenters and, you know, cobblers and that.
[3:51] And then you have the untouchables, which are outside the gas system.
[3:55] Wow.
[3:56] The untouchables.
[3:56] Yeah.
[3:57] So the untouchables are the ones who only clean toilets or pick up garbage.
[4:04] So they don't have any other kind of work that they're allowed to do.
[4:07] Even when they go and work as domestic helps in people's homes, they're only allowed to clean toilets.
[4:12] They can't really, you know, cook, for example.
[4:15] And who decides that rule?
[4:18] I mean, this is a very old system.
[4:20] The caste system of India is many, many, many hundred years old.
[4:24] This particular slum that I started working in had these people called Dalits living in it, which were, they were untouchables, basically.
[4:32] And so they only swept and cleaned and picked up garbage.
[4:36] That was the only work.
[4:38] And I felt that, you know...
[4:40] I always believed even when I before I walked into that slum and I said like these are the lowest of the low so this is why I want to start over here and I was confronted with this very very massive mountain of garbage I didn't even know how to get inside and so like you said I found a fence somewhere and then I just jumped it and I came inside and I couldn't even put my foot on any
[5:10] There were pigs everywhere.
[5:11] There were huge bandicoot rats everywhere.
[5:14] There were flies and mosquitoes.
[5:16] There were puddles of dirty water.
[5:17] I mean, it was not a place fit for human habitation.
[5:23] I felt that, you know, there's such a terrible caste system.
[5:26] And, you know, somewhere, you know, because there's so much hierarchy in India, you know, even your team members can sort of inadvertently bring it in to their thinking, you know, unintentionally even.
[5:39] If you have a new team member come in who's come from the world of, you know, hierarchy and power and all that.
[5:44] And while, of course, we've had people in Asia for years and years and years, you grow and you expand.
[5:50] So I decided that...
[5:52] That one of the things that I would really like to do, because, you know, there's so much talk around humility, you know, in churches or in Hindu temples or gurus and, you know, in school, you may have moral science lessons.
[6:05] I mean, like there's so much conversation around it.
[6:08] I mean, like, OK, we really need to do something to demonstrate it.
[6:12] So, you know, you get these sudden epiphany, you know, you get this light bulb moment.
[6:20] One day I was just sitting and I got a light bulb moment.
[6:24] I said, I'm going to go and wash the feet of a Dalit woman.
[6:31] So what happened was that this Dalit woman, these Dalit women, they never sit even on a mat because the belief is that if the shadow of a Dalit woman falls on an upper class person, that upper class person will have to go through a whole series of purification rituals in order to be able to enter their own home.
[6:52] So they get really upset, even if by mistake that happens, because then they have to work really hard to enter their own homes.
[6:58] I mean, so terribly have they been treated only having, you know, picked up excrement and all this.
[7:04] And they never dream of sharing water from the same common point.
[7:09] They would never dream of sharing food, you know.
[7:12] So while I was doing a lot of communal harmony activities, I felt now this is where, you know, we really, really have to get deep into the whole idea of the equal worth and value of every single human being that lives on this planet.
[7:26] So when I first said it, like, no, you can't do that.
[7:32] I said, no, I can and I will.
[7:35] So I went into this particular slum.
[7:37] I said, I just want a, you know, a tub, a little tub with another one with some water in it.
[7:44] And this Dalit woman sat there in front of me.
[7:47] I just sat there and very lovingly took her feet and I just washed them.
[7:53] with you know water and and I also made sure that my my the movements on her feet were filled with tenderness and filled with love and filled with kindness and then I took time to do it then I gently wiped them and then I kissed each of her feet
[8:13] And then when I finished the whole thing, then I laid all aside and I stood up.
[8:19] She couldn't stand on it.
[8:20] She was crying for so long.
[8:22] You know, first she was too shocked, you know, then she was crying.
[8:24] So even I started crying because it was a very emotional moment.
[8:28] It was a moment of real deep and rich recognition that, you know, we truly are brothers and sisters in this world.
[8:35] This is not just because you're not saying it for the sake of saying it.
[8:38] So she stood up and then we gave each other a loving embrace.
[8:42] I do believe in loving embraces because of a whole variety of reasons that we can go into if we have time.
[8:48] So and then after that, I kissed her on her forehead as well.
[8:53] And then, you know, we lit some candles also around while doing it.
[8:58] Now there's a feet washing movement going on in our.
[9:03] Everybody's washing feet.
[9:05] My manager told me when she saw, my manager said, I want to wash. My lab technician says, I want to wash. Before I knew, everyone wants to wash. Oh, God.
[9:16] Here we go again.
[9:17] There's like lines of hundreds of people lining up.
[9:20] Wash feet.
[9:21] Amazing.
[9:22] Can you imagine?
[9:23] And, you know, it is like such a beautiful moment between two human beings when they interact at that level.
[9:29] Really, every single barrier is gone.
[9:32] All that is there is a pure heart filled with love and tenderness.
[9:35] That's all that is there and filled with humility, too.
[9:39] Gone is the arrogance.
[9:40] Gone is the pride.
[9:41] Gone is all your position and your power and all of that.
[9:44] And not only were they washing feet, they're bringing, you know, generosity is also one of our values.
[9:49] So they realized how poor these people are.
[9:51] So they're just bringing people things from their homes, you know, slippers and bedsheets and, you know, whatever they could find, food.
[9:58] And like, so it became a huge generosity movement everywhere.
[10:02] Not just Asha spending money.
[10:04] Of course, Asha has always been spending money.
[10:06] But the whole idea was for every one of us to become generous individuals, you know.
[10:11] So even little kids got involved, you know, and they started collecting little amounts of money, whatever they could, you know.
[10:19] And then they would go to an old person and help her out in some way, you know, buy her a little glass of milk, even whatever they could do within their capacity.
[10:30] The Imperfects is not a licensed mental health service and is not a substitute for professional mental health advice, treatment or assessment.
[10:37] The advice given in this episode is general in nature, but if you're struggling, please see a healthcare professional or call Lifeline on 13 11 14.
[10:45] And as always, if you'd like to hear more from this conversation, you can find a link to the full episode in the show notes.

Shows are listed from Apple Podcasts' charts and directory, and Podcast Index where it is used. Every show and episode belongs to its publisher and plays from the publisher's own feed; this site hosts none of them.