"सभी अचानक गुनगुना उठे" - सस्सून

"सभी अचानक गुनगुना उठे 


और मैं भर गया ऐसे उल्लास से 


जो पाए एक बंदी पंछी आज़ादी में 


उड़ता जाये उन्माद में, सफ़ेद 


बागों और हरे खेतों के पार .. आगे ही आगे , नज़रों से दूर 






सभी की आवाज़ अचानक उठी 


और खूबसूरती ढलते सूरज की तरह आई 


मेरा दिल अश्कों से कांपा , और डर 


दूर बह चला … ओह ! मगर सभी तो 
पंछी थे , और गीत निशब्द था , गायन कभी हो न पायेगा."


A Loose Hindustani Translation of Sassoon's 'Everyone Sang' by me. Original reproduced below.

Everyone suddenly burst out singing;
And I was filled with such delight
As prisoned birds must find in freedom 
Winging wildly across the white
Orchards and dark green fields; on on and out of sight


Everyone’s voice was suddenly lifted,
And beauty came like the setting sun 
My heart was shaken with tears and horror 
Drifted away…O but everyone
Was a bird and the song was wordless, the singing will never be done.

Learn to Live As Equals for Your Children's Sake

No man, who has witnessed inequality in the relationship between his own parents, can treat women as equals. Rebellious women are bad mothers? I say, submissive women do not make good mothers by presenting a skewed idea of gender relations in the household. Family is the first school. This is where you learn. So, what do you want to teach your girls, that men are in control of their destinies? That no matter how educated, talented (insert more adjectives) you are, eventually it is you who will submit to another person's will?

 
And sons? You want to produce some more control freaks? Each of your tears dropped in silence will bolster the idea in their minds that it is the men who have "power:" to cause pain and to protect. Don't be too happy if your son wants to "avenge" the wrongs you have suffered at the hands of your husband. It is just the same. You, my dear woman, are not seen as an active agent.

There are many brilliant minds who call women as the worst enemies of women. I will just say to them, insensitivity has no gender. In the first year of my undergrad, a senior started a discourse on how gender inequality is perpetuated by women. After all, how many times do the fathers tell their daughters to dress up “modestly” or follow the curfew timings? I could not answer him then, as I did not understand what being a wife or mother meant. Now I do and I have the answer to the idea “women eat women.” Why do fathers even need to involve themselves, when mothers are there to pass the message? And the mothers do it because they are the victims of the violence of inequality, and not perpetrators.

Women are fixated with sons, they discriminate against their daughters, they treat daughters-in-law as sub-humans and all that. With one stroke we absolve the men of the household of all their sins. Certainly, it is much easier to shoot the messenger, rather than attempting to question the issuer of household fatwas. And it is a very convenient situation for the men. Let women fight amongst themselves while their own status remains invincible. The irony is, many women still wilfully become the accomplices in perpetuating gender inequality.

As any regular eleven year old, I wanted to wear short skirts. Too bad, that I grew up in one of the most backward districts in the country. Thankfully, I was blessed with an educated and somewhat ‘modern’ family. I did possess a mini-skirt. The rules, however, were very clear. I was NOT allowed to wear it outside the house. Or, I could wear it in Delhi (then seen as the land of all things progressive) when we visited Naani. Once we were supposed to go to a local wedding and I got ready in my beloved denim mini-skirt with an orange floral-print top. My father saw me and said nothing. A few minutes later, mother told me to change into something ‘modest.’ (What exactly is modest attire for an eleven year old?) I refused. She said, if I did not change, daddy will not take us to the party. I refused again and that night all of us sat sulking imagining the fun and frolic at the wedding that we missed because of my stubbornness.

Father had a frown and he kept grinding his teeth. I encountered this expression many times after that evening. The last time was when I wanted to get married to the man of my choice. After that, I became my husband’s responsibility. My father is your average man, with his beliefs and prejudices. However, I have seen him evolving. With three strong women (wife and two daughters) in the household, he could not continue to behave in a manner that was seen as “normal” by the society around him. Today, he does not object to my sister wearing teeny-weeny off shoulders dresses and partying late-night with friends. He will not object to her choice in matrimonial manners.

My mother always taught us to be strong, though she wasn’t a formidable opponent to the oppressive systems of our society. Her gentle manners and her reluctance to offend those she respected can be seen as her weaknesses. Nevertheless, she posed a threat to the totalitarianism that prevailed in our town, and to an extent in our own family. Drawing strength from her and learning from her weaknesses and failures, I have become the feminist “bitch.” I am sure there are some people who have prophesized that my marriage will break down soon. After all, how can I make my husband do the kitchen-work when ‘my’ friends/relatives call on? And why does ‘he’ change the daughter’s nappies?

I’m not sure if my mother has led a more comfortable life than that of the good submissive women of our town. However, she certainly made sure that her children understood the idea of equality. Upholding equality, I don’t know if my own life is better than my “pampered” neighbours. I catch a bus to save the petrol money because I do not “earn” at the moment. I do not shop at fancy stores because every time I use his credit cards, a part of me dies. Whenever he settles my magazine-related bills, my resolve to make the project self-sustainable toughens. I may not have the riches but my soul is intact. There is no pact with the devil. Penury (if it comes to the worst) and not greed will undo this Faustus. The husband promises to continue supporting my whims financially and emotionally but I do not take it for granted. He is no saviour. Love and respect are not to be exploited.

My husband and I cannot pamper our daughter with exotic holidays, fancy schools, designer labels etc. She travels with me in trains and dilapidated buses because I refuse to spend her father’s hard earned money on air-tickets for my work. He thinks that I am touching extremes. Obviously, he can support the family single-handedly, and I need not observe “austerity measures.” But I’m sure that one day my daughter will see the point and become an even bigger “bitch,” if that is what we like to call the women who dare speak for equality. She will neither take anybody nor be taken for granted.

Do yourselves and your children (of both sexes) a favour and learn to live as equals.

Slut Walk to Chhattisgarh to the Streets of Guwahati

That morning, I could not find the most appropriate attire to befit the occasion. SLUTWALK, arthaat Besharmi Morcha. Besharm is a relative term, with a nuanced understanding spread across space and time. To be besharm, I settled for a pair of denim shorts and a blue T-shirt. I was staying in the Officers’ Mess of National Security Guard at Manesar. As ‘memsahib’ is not supposed to dress like any other girl, and not at all like a SLUT, I decided to wear a skirt to cover the legs. The skirt was supposed to be removed later.

The husband volunteered to drop me and our daughter, less than two years then, at the venue. It was an extremely uncomfortable weather to be outdoors and I immediately regretted bringing the daughter along. But then, it was for her sake that I was participating. Blame it on my hyper enthusiasm, we reached the venue before time. And after the husband left, daughter and I tried to make sense of the scene around us. I also had to get rid of my ‘modest’ avatar. Those now famous denim shorts had to be revealed. But how and where? There were no ‘green rooms’ at Jantar Mantar. Carrying the already flushed daughter to a relatively cool and shady spot, I spotted some minarets of chairs leaning precariously against the wall. So, this was going to be my little dressing (down) room.

A few steps away was a bevy of camerapersons and reporters from all the possible newspapers and TV/Radio channels. One of the camerapersons noticed our presence and kept shooting me while I took off my skirt. Others followed suit, obviously, and zoomed in. It is because of their dogged determination to find the ‘slut’ at the otherwise modest walk at Jantar Mantar that the trio, daughter-denim shorts-I, shot to fame. When I got back home that afternoon, the husband greeted me with a mixed look in his eyes: appreciative and yet confused by my dare-to-bare act on national TV. What?

The ‘media’ had done it again. The story had to be sold and it was important to focus on the ‘sellable’ aspect of the entire ordeal. The mundane act of getting ready for the walk received more attention than my reason to be a part of it. Runs and reruns of the footage did wonders. The men and women from national and international media houses hounded me for ‘bytes’ and would not relent even when I requested them to leave us alone. My two-year old was not comfortable with microphones thrust upon our faces. Thanks to their desire to develop a sensational mother-daughter narrative, I became the face of Slutwalk, Delhi. And yet, the skirt-dropping footage was what people talked about, on and off-record.  Actions speak louder than words, certainly.

I am reminded of my Slut Walk experience today but not only because it remains forgotten after a year or that it failed to achieve anything substantial for the cause of women empowerment. I’m compelled to rewind the happenings of that day to be able to understand the pain of girl from Guwahati. She, unfortunately, has clearly suffered much more than I did. In the Slut Walk case, I was perhaps a victim of the misplaced sense of support. The Guwahati girl, on the other hand, has suffered at the hands of unabashed pursuit of sensationalism. Now that it has been proved that it was the cameraperson who instigated an aggressive and hair-brained mob to molest this hapless girl, one wonders what do the upholders of “media as a pillar of democracy” have to say? To stoop so low to look for a scoop, and to create one when not finding any, is that what has become the norm? Yes there is outrage against such a barbaric act, and the strongest criticism has come from the journalist fraternity. Yet, there is no denying the rot that is weakening this fourth pillar. Only a matter of time when the collapse happens.

I do not wish to launch a tirade against paid-media, sensationalism and other such things. Yet, there are a few questions that I’m compelled to raise on behalf of every individual who has suffered because of media’s insensitivity and ethical malpractices. The business of news seems to be overriding everything else, even human life. Nobody should be allowed to forget about the death of Tarun Sehrawat, the young Tehelka journalist. The Frankenstein’s monster has begun feeding off itself. Many people blamed the young man’s act of bravado for his tragic demise but few raised questions pertaining to the pressure that he must have had to face, to prove his worth. A daring story from the forests of Chhattisgarh was perhaps going to be his ticket to fame. At what cost, though?

While the rot in media needs to be addressed pronto, it is hypocritical to blame the media for desperately trying to feed a gargantuan appetite that the readers and viewers exhibit all the time. The demand and supply dynamics cannot be wished away. Yet, we need to be constantly reminding ourselves that there is a limit to which one can ask for ‘news.’ Nobody deserves to die to fulfil our cravings for some piping hot news on the platter. Nobody deserves to be molested either.