Although I also do not appreciate the propensity of the Western
press to assign its own values on India, the fate of poor
mistreated widows in Benaras” is a historical reflection by one
of our own. I have not seen Deepa Mehta's movie, but I am
heartened by her bravery, by her willingness to take on such
social issues. When I was a student, I had assigned school
reading like Anna Karenina, Madame Bovary, The Awakening, and it
is very exciting to see a female tackling the issues of women's
place in society, rather than more men speculating on topics
with which they have no context, no empathy.
Indian culture in the 1930's was patriarchal. Though Mr. Shukla
indicates that he had foremothers who were allowed to be free
thinkers, examples abound from my family (orthodox Tamil
Brahmins) of quite the opposite situation. Several of my
great-grandaunts, married when they were barely nine and widowed
shortly thereafter, had to keep their heads shaved and wear a
brown wrap for the rest of their lives. Defiance of this
tradition came at a high price: my great-grandmother, widowed at
21, refused to parcel her four small children to various
relatives, refused to shave her head and be secluded from
society. She was ostracized, excommunicated from all her
husband's relatives. Uneducated and alone, she eked out a life
for her and her children in a time when it was frankly dangerous
for a woman to live alone. Widowers, however, could remarry and
lead normal lives.
The women of my grandmother's generation were all married by the
time they reached puberty. One of my grandaunts, wedded as a
child, ran away from her husband because she feared the idea of
sleeping with a stranger. Her parents convinced her to return to
my granduncle, who had remarried, making her an unwilling
participant in a polygamous marriage.
In my mother's generation, few women were allowed to go to
college. Several of my aunts were sold in arranged marriages for
family prosperity and ended up wedded to men who abused them.
They could not divorce—to do so would bring shame onto the
family.
Even in my generation, education for a woman takes second seat
to getting married. Two of my cousins were married against their
will, and have since left their husbands—they decided to brave
the social stigma of divorce rather than be fettered unhappily
like their mothers. These young women are barely 24.
The above examples are anecdotes of a wider and more pervasive
phenomenon that still exists today, even among the more educated
people. I call it the 'orthodoxy of Shiva Lingam.' When a woman
is pregnant for the first time, she might have a Seemantham,
where milk from a cow that has just given birth to a bull is
snorted through the expectant mother's nose. This is done to
pray for the child to be a boy. A standard blessing by elders
says, "may you have a thousand sons." A man who has sired a
direct line of three males is granted an automatic ticket to
heaven, an occurrence honored in South India with a
Kanagabishekam. And so on.
All this translates into an environment that allows and condones
male chauvinistic behavior. Every young Indian woman I know has
been the victim of ‘Eve-teasing’ and harassment when she dared
venture onto Indian streets by herself in broad daylight.
Families in India practicing prenatal selection abort more than
half a million female fetuses each year, according to a Jan. 9,
2006 BBC report. According to the Washington Post group on April
6, 2006, a textbook in western India says that a donkey is like
a housewife because donkeys "toil all day and…maybe give up food
and water…[except that donkeys are] a shade better, for while a
housewife may sometimes complain…you'll never catch the donkey
being disloyal to his master."
Let us not bundle the truth in a nine-yard sari. Women have been
and still are substandard citizens in Indian society. And if we
cannot be honest within our culture group, how can we expect
others, like members of the Western press, to accurately portray
us?
Mr. Shukla's comments disturb me because of its willful myopia.
Forget about how the press perceives us—if we cannot critique
are own culture and our own history, how can we progress as a
society? I get tons of Jai Hind e-mails from uncles and aunties
who want to remind the children of their friends and relatives
who live in the U.S. of the strength and power of India. India
invented chess, these e-mails say. India invented the number
‘zero.’ Though we comprise only 1.5 percent of the U.S.
population, 38 percent of doctors in this country are Indian; 36
percent of NASA scientists are Indian; X, Y, and Z Indians are
the leaders of Fortune 500 companies. These uncles and aunties
are quick to highlight what is good about India and the diaspora.
But any hint of criticism, and people like Mr. Shukla get
defensive.
Instead, they should see that it is a testament to the progress
of our culture that we are producing such free thinking women
like Deepa Mehta, who despite backlash from fundamentalists,
have persisted in telling stories that need to be told. It is a
testament to the progress of our culture that a female priest
will officiate the thread ceremony of Mr. Shukla's nephew. I
hope to see more examples in my lifetime of women exposing the
fallacies of orthodoxy.
Hindus wash their feet before entering a temple, a literal and
symbolic gesture to clean off grime and to purify themselves
before entering a house of God. Let us follow this example and
recognize that our culture and our history has stepped and
continues to step in muck when it comes to how women are valued
in society. Only then can we wash this filth away; only then can
the rest of the world see us as we want to be seen. Only then,
with clean feet, can we step forward.
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