India: Defining Women and Culture

The Dadri incident, in Greater Noida where a certain Mohammad Akhlaque was killed by a lynching mob for apparently consuming beef (which anyway was a wrong information) has been creating quite a buzz. The union culture minister of India, Mr. Mahesh Sharma in the mean time had expressed his love for the cows and termed the mishap as a reaction to the inhumane slaughtering of the animals. However, what did not catch many eyes is the later part of his valuable comment which said “You must also consider that there was also a 17 year old daughter in the home.Kisine use ungli tak nahin lagayi(nobody even tried to touch her).” Indeed, it is surprising in India that a girl actually went scot free even when a gang of goons had invited themselves to her house and she had only to endure the shock of watching her father die. For people were busy smashing her father’s head rather than pulling out her entrails.

Well, this is not the first time, many eminent members of the parliament have earlier commented on how the derogatory state of women’s position in our society is being instigated by women themselves. According to many of them, women are being victimized and harassed only because they do not wear clothes which comply with the culture of India. Respect and adoration should be accorded to people who do not show any amount of skin. This obviously should be followed owing to the fact that it is the moral duty of a woman to help keep the animalistic desires of a man in control, even if he is a passerby on the road. A girl wearing a normal T-shirt and jeans is clearly responsible for titillating a man and as a result should be showered with lewd comments and obscene gestures. A woman of forty, wearing a saree (apparently the national dress code of Indian women) evidently lures the bystander to pinch her on the butts. Since the honor of a family, class, caste, religion and nation as well are bestowed on women, they are supposed to be responsible for not being able to prevent someone from raping them. Not only that, women are supposed to consider men as their guardian angel and any unjust or vulgar behavior on their part is to be treated asKrishna’s Leela(playful activity) perpetrated with good intentions.

From time immemorial, Indian women have been denied their due freedom and choices through the location of “honor” in their being, especially in the vagina. In theRamayana, Surpanakha’s nose was mutilated in order to teach her a lesson for audaciously exhibiting her sexual desires. Whether the story is cliché, true or even considerable or not is not my concern, but the thought is definitely worthwhile. The concept of “teaching a lesson” is something that has survived the test of time. Similarly, a certain woman popularly known as “Nirbhaya” was brutally gang raped and had an iron rod inserted into her vagina for being out for a movie at night and precisely resisting the rape. She again needed to be taught a lesson by the upholders of the culture and “Sanskriti” of India, namely, a few bus drivers. At times, there are several layers of oppression faced by them, for instance a Dalit (a lower caste which falls under Scheduled Tribe) woman was paraded naked publicly in Uttar Pradesh (India) by the people in a village because her son had eloped with the daughter of an upper caste man. In order to take a revenge the mother was attacked patently since the honor of the household is credited to her. Disrespecting women are by far the best antidote for any kind of violation of the laid out norms of our society.

No! I am not a feminist and neither am I interested in joining any league. I am an ordinary human being with a few curious queries which deny to leave their abode in my brain. Besides, being a sensitive member of the society I would like to present a humble question to the preservers of culture in India, what exactly is “Indian Culture according to you?”