A three-day state-level conference of the Rashtriya
Sevika Samithi, women’s wing of RSS, in connection with the centenary of its
former President Saraswathi Tai Apte was held at Erode last week. Where is this
organization?; has to be detected with a microscope. Nonetheless, the reported
objectives and programme of action announced by the organizers warrant
attention. The Samithi has appealed to people, especially women, to protect
‘the ancient culture, heritage and tradition’ of the ‘country’! The samithi’s
state general secretary Gomathi Naveen told reporters that, ‘our main aim is to
consolidate women power to protect our ancient culture and tradition, as it is
at stake due to the invasion of alien culture through the media. We have been
campaigning among girls not to wear T-shirts, jeans, other modern dresses and
cut their hair according to western style.” She asserted that the samithi’s
members will not stage any agitation in this regard but just campaign in a
peaceful manner in their respective areas.
Firstly, even in a broader perspective, there is no
uniform or monolithic culture, tradition and heritage in this country, India. It is
the constitutional recognition of the presence of various cultures and
traditions and a categorical assurance to preserve and enrich each one of them,
that constitute the national fabric. Alternatively, it is the declared
objective and design of the RSS – inspired Sangh Parivar to impose a monolithic
Hindutva culture on all communities and nationalities in the country. It is this
perverted ambition that is being voiced by the Erode meet of the samithi.
Inasmuch as the point is made out by the women’s wing of
the RSS and leaving aside other aspects such as casteism, what do the Hindu
culture, tradition and heritage have in store for women?
What is the status accorded to women in Hindu society by
Manu dharma, that zealots of Hindutva cherish as guiding principle. “A woman
should obey the father as an infant, obey the husband in her youth or and obey
the children when widowed. A woman cannot at any time exercise her will
independently.” (chap. 5.s.148). “Even if one’s husband has bad character, bad
behaviour, illicit relationship with other women, a woman should worship her
husband as god” (chap. 5.s.154). How abysmally the Hindu dharma assess woman? “Bed,
seat, beauty, pregnancy, anger, lie, betrayal were created only for the sake of
women” (chap. 9.s.17). And still worse, it treats women as machines destined to
reproduce. “If a family suffers on account of not having a child, the woman
could obtain the consent of the father-in-law and the husband and have
intercourse with the brothers-in-law and close relatives of the husband and
give birth to children.” (chap. 9.s.59). In a Hindu society, if any man is a
slave (sudras are considered slaves of brahmins), his wife is a slave’s slave.
And what more the medieval period handed over to women? ‘Sati’,
the cruel practice of self-immolating in husband’s pyre, the bane of child
marriage, dowry system, prohibition of widow re-marriage, subhuman widowhood, no
right to property, extremely circumscribing social customs etc., And still
women are being worshiped in the forms of god. They did not want to be
worshiped but only wanted to be treated as human beings. This urge emanated in
the forms of various social reformers like Raja RamMohan Roy.
Two great champion of women’s emancipation in Tamil Nadu
in the twentieth century were Mahakavi Bharathiyar and Thanthai Periyar. While
the service of Bharathiyar was limited to idealist expositions, that of Periyar
was materialistic in the forms of movement, mobilization and struggle. He
relentlessly campaigned against obnoxious practices of the society that
enslaved women and gave concrete slogans for their emancipation. The
resolutions adopted at the conference of women organized under aegis of Self
Respect movement under the inspiration of Periyar at Chengalpet in 1924, were
far reaching at their point of time. One of the resolutions calling for
inheritance and property rights for women was made a law by Kalaignar during
the 1989-91 DMK rule. Again it is Kalaignar who provided 33 percent reservation
for women in local bodies, government jobs etc. leading to significant progress
in the status of women in Tamil Nadu.
Periyar fought against and educated the Tamil society
against all obscurantist perceptions and ideas about women. Some of his
drastically radical views are still unpalatable to many; but those which were
considered undigestible in those days
have become way of life now, proving how farsighted his ideas were. For
instance, when Periyar called upon women in 1920s and 1930s, to throw away
traditional eight yard saree that kept her constrained (as male supremacy
wanted it) and opt for cozy wear like men and cut off lengthy hair, the then
generations could not easily assimilate the prescriptions which sought to do
away with gender disparity. But today girls prefer to sport easy and
fashionable wear and freely move about to the broad acceptance of the society, thanks
to Periyar processing and seasoning social mentality over the time. As a whole,
women in Tamil Nadu are far more liberated, emancipated and enlightened and
free from the fetters of social obscurantism than their counterparts in the
rest of the country, thanks to the unyielding and uncompromising life-long
struggle and service of Thanthai Periyar.
Hence the sangh parivar, in whatever form they come, cannot
penetrate – leave alone succeed – in selling their reactionary and retrograde
ideologies in this land
of Thanthai Periyar and
Dravidian movement.
However, we cannot afford to be complacent or oblivious
to the moves of these communal forces. Thankfully the impact of rationalist
movement underlies in every stream of social and political life in Tamil Nadu
and all that is required is to alert the organized opinion against seemingly
innocuous but nefarious moves such as ‘campaign against girls wearing T-shirts,
jeans, other modern dresses and cutting their hair according to western style’,
announced by the women’s wing of the RSS. Although they have claimed that it
will be a peaceful campaign, experiences of such campaign in other parts of the
country show that they always end up in violence and vandalism. They will come
in many forms – VHP, Bajrang Dal or Senas of different type like the Ram Sena attacks
on pubs in Mangalore in Karnataka or the vandalizing of the paintings of
renowned artist MF Hussain, or theatres exhibiting films such as ‘Fire’ or the
sets of shooting of the film ‘Water’. An eternal vigilance has to be maintained
to ensure against such reactionary forces from taking foothold in this state.
Any attempt to glorify Hindutva ideology and perpetuate
its decadent culture, tradition and heritage by whomsoever, will meet its Waterloo in this Land of Periyar!
(03-01-10)
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