T. Jwahir Muthoo
If I die tomorrow,
Will I have every thing
In the world
I’ve ever wanted?
No. But I will
Have everything that
Made me happiest.
Sandra Bullock
The term ‘Feminism’ was first utilized as a part of the last piece of nineteenth century and was characterized as having the traits of females. When I say Feminism it ensures the belief system of women’s freedom in all its methodologies as a woman who perceives herself and is perceived by others as a feminist. By and large, the feminist awareness is the cognizance of exploitation. As a theory of life, it restricts women’s subordination to men in the family and society, alongside men’s cases to characterize what is best for women. It is also characterized as a method of presence in which a woman is free of the dependence disorder whether it is the spouse or the father or the community or religious and ethnic group. During the British Raj, many reformers such as Ram Mohan Roy, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar and many others fought for the betterment of women. The steady change in the position of women can be highlighted by looking at what has been achieved by women in our country:
1848: Savitribai Phule, along with her husband Jyotirao Phule, opened a school for girls in Pune and became the first woman teacher in India.
1927: The All India Women’s Conference was founded.
1936: Sarla Thakral became the first Indian woman to fly an aircraft.
1944: Asima Chatterjee became the first Indian woman to be conferred the Doctorate of Science by an Indian university.
No doubt India has got the highest number of female politicians in the world. Women have held high offices in India including that of the President, Prime Minister, Speaker of the Lok Sabha and Leader of the Opposition. In 1991, the Kerala High Court restricted entry of women above the age of 10 and below the age of 50 from Sabarimala Shrine as they were of the menstruating age. On 28 September 2018, the Supreme Court of India lifted the ban on the entry of women. It said that discrimination against women on any grounds, even religious, is unconstitutional.
Indeed, even today a normal woman feels indeterminate about her identity as a social being and she is altogether focused on the battle of balance for her rights verifiably and politically. People many a time consider the term “Women writers” as slanderous, taking ceaselessly their imaginative self-rule and identity and categorizing them by sexual orientation. They say art and creativity has no boundaries and one should be fearless in depicting art. It’s an oft quoted conventionalism that Art endures beyond human life. If we discover ideas, concepts and principles through exploration and application, we learn the best which makes learning a joy and enduring experience but at the same time becomes an eye opener too. One such experience I had while reading Mahasweta Devi’s Dopdi, in a short story as a “racialized recreation” of the Mahabharata tale who looks like a victim but acts like an agent. Indeed, the binary of victim and agent falls apart as Draupadi effectively separates violation from victimhood. As she stands insistently naked before her violators, this modern story as a refutation of the ancient Mahabharata depicts Dopdi (as heroic as) Draupadi. She is also what Draupadi-portrayed into the patriarchal and authoritative sacred text as proof of male power-could not be,” The rewriting of the Indian epic through the recreation of Draupadi as Dopdi can be understood as Mahasweta Devi’s tribute to Tribal women. Also until I managed to read Anita Desai’s both creation Cry, the peacock and Voice in the city, ironically so many myths were bust about the issues of correspondence between a couple. In the conjugal connections of Gautam and Maya, Jiban and Monisha,, she lays the truth bare and paints the mental enduring of women (spouses) because of the inactive detached and insensitive demeanor of men (husband). The fact remains that women often look for genuine fellowship from their life accomplices here in our society. On the contrary we shouldn’t be worried about the emancipation of the women, but the emancipation of their souls inside the corpus of wedding bonds. More or less the status of women in India is strongly connected to family relations. In India, the family is seen as crucially important and in most of the country, the family unit is patrilineal and usually multi-generational, with the bride moving to live with the in-laws that has to be hierarchical, with the elders having authority over the younger generations and men over women where in women are asked to draw the line and guard their actions.
Crime against women such as rape, acid attacks, dowry killings, honor killings, and the forced prostitution of young girls has been reported in India. Most of the time, it happens that restrictions are thrust only on women since childhood. From Tehran to Tilak Nagar, women killed for exercising choice. If a particular section of population especially women don’t feel any significance in wearing Hijab, why silence when they denied the choice? Trust Law, a London based news service owned by the Thomson Reuters Foundation, ranked India as the fourth most dangerous place in the world for women to live based on a poll of 213 gender expert. Earlier, many crimes against women were not reported to police due to the social stigma attached to rape and molestation. Recent study on official statistics shows a dramatic increase in the number of reported crimes against women. Women are raped, molested set ablaze and even minor girls assaulted.
The purpose of such talks and frightful abnormalities, often postulate it as a farce and gives me a chill sensation that nearly over balance my ardor for strange delving. I stand speechless to witness that women are considered being mere sex commodities and are still subjugated, dependent, neglected women due to their silent suffering and become victims of harsh criticism. However the irony is that few people for the greed of power in the name of politics creep into such heinous crime just to cover the whole deed and project their clear image in front of public. It’s a wrong notion to exhibit women in the view of sexism, stereotyping, sacrifice, social and psychic pressures. Global or transnational problems of the Indian women to get existence in their own life are the struggles every day they face and this can be vividly seen in their daring expedition to overcome all their hurdles of existence, fight for identity and gender equality. Women today want to be the independent individuals as they are educated, employable, professionals and accustomed to face the situation of struggles and evolve as ethno-centric.
“Eloquence so soft the persona sublime
Bestow her respect and dignity
Embraced ornaments with chime”
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