In 2011, the number of rapes amounted to almost one every hour, for the whole year. This is a horrendous fact and it’s something that should make us all think about what we can do. We have to understand how it is that we allow this to happen, and why it happens, and what can we as citizens do to make it happen less often. We cannot prevent it altogether so at least a decrease in numbers will be an achievement.
To understand why rape is so prevalent in our society, perhaps we should discuss some of the more obvious aspects of the phenomenon—in particular two crucial aspects. : one, the creation of the general mindset in relation to women in our country, which is extremely important particularly in terms of how we use the past to create this mindset, and then in turn use it to influence the present; and the second is the present situation and what needs action.
I would like to begin with discussing the mindset. Unfortunately, it requires repeating yet again, that the attitudes of those who claim to be the leaders of our society—politicians in high office and the so-called ‘god-men’ are often the most influential in creating an unacceptable mindset. And what some of them have said in public and in the media, about women being raped, was I think, outrageous. This is why I think that the mindset is extremely important and needs attention, in addition to whatever we choose to do about what is currently happening. I think the statements that were made again and again were bizarre, thoughtless, jejune and frequently inane. Examples of these are that young women must be incarcerated at home after dark, girls must be forced to wear overcoats to cover themselves from head to foot, girls must not be allowed cellphones because they can then contact boys, a woman about to be raped should recite the Sarasvati mantra, and women must observe the Lakshman Rekha to avoid trouble—and of course we all know who marks the Lakshman Rekha. The most disgusting was the statement that, a raped woman is like a ‘zinda lash’, a living corpse. Little in all of this was said about the kind of men that rape women, and how they can be stopped from doing this? It is almost as if the men are invisible and rape somehow happens on its own. These attitudes assume that rape is inevitable if women are liberated. So the best way to avoid rape is to oppress women. This is the prevalent view in a society that is conditioned by the belief that men make the rules and women cannot question them. There may be something ridiculous about this lopsided view of society, yet it is the mindset of many.
How the mindset spills out into action was recently demonstrated in the riots of Muzaffarnagar. Ostensibly the call to rioting and violence was to object to ‘love jihad’, the fear that Hindu young women were falling into the clutches of and marrying Muslim young men. The other slogan was ‘bahu-beti-bachau’, but in the process of protecting the bahu and the beti, raping women was considered perfectly in order. Raping women is the age-old method of certain kinds of men asserting power over women, especially if the women belong to a community that they wish to humiliate. In communal conflicts it is resorted to as a weapon and a trophy of victory. Inevitably the easiest targets in situations of civil disturbance are Dalit women and those of the minority communities, since they have the least protection from the agencies of law and order, and belong to the subordinated sections of society.
It is nevertheless crucial to the discussion on how we visualize the kind of society that we want. The oppression of women has been characteristic, let me add, of most pre-modern societies the world over. As far as the past is concerned this is not an unusual situation. But we now claim to be a contemporary, modern society. We are in a position today to understand why this mindset came about and to change it in favour of a society governed by the rights that we think are essential. So let me revert to the mindset. What goes into the making of a mindset? We refer to cultural traditions from the past. Do we even examine the implications and nuances of what we assume these traditions to be? Let’s just look at some of them in relation to attitudes to women, or of why they came into existence because of how society was constituted at a particular time. Or whether, given that social norms now endorse the equality of men and women, should we not change the mindset to accord with the new social requirements? If the norms of a tradition no longer hold, the question to be debated is why this is so, and if the norms need to be changed then this should be advocated, even if it means the earlier ones being jettisoned.
We are told that in the Vedic period women as a general category had a high status and were greatly respected. The Upanishads are quoted which refer to brilliant women philosophers such as Gargi and Maitrayi, Vedic rituals are referred to in which the patron of the ritual had to have his wife beside him otherwise the ritual would not be effective, and so on. Such actions underline status. But historians, such as Uma Chakrabarty and Kumkum Roy, have asked pertinent questions about the other women so frequently mentioned. For instance, what happened to the Vedic dasi? Why does she never come into this picture? She was the slave woman, the servant in the household, who is mentioned frequently in the Vedas, Mahabharata and Ramayana, but seldom features in our current picture of the utopian past. What was her condition? She is repeatedly listed in these texts together with the animals—cattle and horses—as chattel. They are all the property of the owner to do what he likes with them. The larger numbers of women therefore are treated as commodities. Given the references to unnamed dasis who are the mothers of brahmanas—the dasi-putra brahmanas or students such as Jabala, mentioned in the Vedic corpus—it is clear that the dasi was expected to do more than just household chores. Such activities doubtless required of a dasi should at least be acknowledged wherever they apply, when referring to the pedigree of authoritative figures. The social values of elite groups in those ancient societies and the society of today are different. In earlier times the dasis are hardly visible. Modern society demands their visibility. We today maintain that all women have equal rights among themselves and with men, but this was not the prevalent ethic of ancient times.
From the Valmiki Ramayana the most frequently quoted reference is to Sita and to the Lakshman rekha; when she inadvertently crosses it her troubles start. Because she was kidnapped, the onus is on her to prove her chastity. And this is the prototype pattern: a woman has always to prove her chastity. This Sita does by going through an agnipariksha, the fire ordeal. When she is asked to repeat the same thing a second time, consequent on some gossip about her, she decides that enough is enough. The Valmiki Ramayana is in origin an epic story that became a sacred book of the Vaishnavas and is a powerful text in the propagation of Rama bhakti, the worship of Rama. There are passages of exquisite poetry that give it a high literary status. But at the same time we have to keep in mind that it is a classic text of Hindu patriarchy. The man is a god and the woman has to repeatedly prove her chastity. And do we today consider what might have been the thoughts of Sita as she experiences the testing of her chastity? Have we really thought about her side of the story?
Why do we also never refer to other versions of the story? Neither the Buddhist nor the Jaina version, for example, is centrally concerned with the chastity of Sita. Over the centuries there have been many versions of what has come to be called the ramakatha. Some followed the Valmiki narrative but others differed from it, as obviously his version did not appeal to them. And in some cases they even contested it. In medieval times, in what we today disparagingly call ‘feudal’ society, some people seem not to have approved of the fire ordeal because there was a well-known version in which that event was altered. When the fire was blazing forth Sita was made to step aside and the chhaya Sita, a shadow Sita, entered the fire and came out unscathed. The question one has to ask is why was a chhaya Sita invented? The answer usually given is that at this time the philosophy of maya, illusion, was at its height and illusory figures were popular. But perhaps one has also to see it more realistically. Why did the shadow Sita replace the earlier version of Sita in this rendering of the story? Did some people see the fire ordeal as craven, and as Sita having to submit to injustice?
~~The Past As Present: Forging Contemporary Identities Through History -by- Romila Thapar
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