Why the Shani Temple Row doesn't Stir Me As a Feminist?

I believe firmly in the idea of gender-equality. Yet I am not too exercised by the latest row between the Shani Shingnapur temple authorities and a group of female activists that go by the name of Bhumata Ranragini Brigade (BRB). In order to defy the centuries old convention that prohibits women to enter the inner sanctum of the temple, members of this group tried to march into the temple on 26^th January. The group had to be hemmed in by the police.

Ideally, as a feminist, this regressive practice should have me outraged. But, leaving politically correctness aside for a bit, it doesn’t. Because this ostensible discrimination isn’t universal. It isn’t as though all the Hindu temples disallow entry to women. Only a very few temples do. There are also temples and rituals which are meant only for the women-folk, and men are disallowed to participate in them. For every temple where a woman isn’t allowed, there are fifty where she is.

The idea of gender-based discrimination on the basis of allowing/disallowing entry in the area of worship is complicated by the polytheistic nature of Hinduism. Unlike other monotheistic religions that believe in concept of only one God, Hinduism has an assortment of Gods and Goddesses. There are sthal-devtas, gram-devtas, kul-devtas etc. and corresponding devis (demigoddesses). And like us, these gods and goddesses have their own set of idiosyncrasies and preferences. Shiva is offered Bel-patra, while Vishnu is offered Tulsi. To say that in a Shiv temple Tulsi is being discriminated against, because Tulsi is feminine, may sound a bit odd. Many of the temples are centuries old and have legends and myths associated with their respective deities and their origins, owing to which there are different rituals and traditions, some of which may favour men while others may favour women.

This is not to shy away from the fact that religion is been historically used as tool by the dominant sections of the society force the rest into submission. Many of the religious practices are blatantly patriarchal and utterly regressive (say, Karwa-chauth). And they must be questioned and fought against, by all means. But to squabble over such issues as trying to gain entry into an area which is not designed for one’s gender may actually seem like a waste of one’s energy. Why should you as a girl demand a right to enter an all-boy’s school? This by no means should sound like a defense of gender-specific institutions. My submission is that we must try to channelize our energies in trying to build and promote gender-neutral institutions, rather than trying to demolish the few antiquated ones that exist. But let us not take away the right of people to engage with a gender-specific institution. They are as much entitled to be part of one as you are entitled to build and promote a gender-neutral one.

And if this issue were actually about barring of women in a school, or any other institution (say, the parliament or the judiciary) that could really empower them, I would have fervently denounced such a practice. But does entering a temple whose God isn’t too fond of you (as the priests would have you believe) really empower you? We need to step back and reassess the whole argument. If it’s about the right to pray, then I would ask: why do you even want to pray to a God that isn’t willing to grant you an audience because of your gender? Aren’t there other more inclusive and friendlier Gods? We are Hindus—we have no dearth of variety of Gods to choose from. If my God/Goddess doesn’t like me, I don’t like them too. I go to the one that likes me. As simple as that! If you say that it’s not the God who is disfavouring you but the priests (who are almost always men) and that you want to explore the spiritual connect you feel with that God, then I would say, that’s how religion has always worked. What your Gods wants will always be told to you by someone acting as an interface. You will always get mediated and filtered responses/commands from your Gods(/Goddesses).

 And in such case there’s little point in seeking an entry in such a system to become a part of it. You will instead be better off questioning the very system and breaking away from it. You don’t have to physically enter a place to explore your spiritual connection— if you believe in such a thing, and if you don’t, then why fuss? 

Can we, as feminists, not focus our energies on educating our daughters and instilling a rational temperament in them, if they are not killed in the wombs, that is?

My Bookish Woes(3): Of Literature Festivals and Book Launches

My Bookish Woes(1)

My Bookish Woes (2)

It’s the time of the year when there are literature festivals galore. These festivals bring writers face-to-face with their readers or, sometimes, just readers. You have your favourite writer sitting right before you, reading out his/her own work or talking about it. Not only their own work, writers could also be asked to pontificate about a wide range of literary issues (say, the future of novel) and non-literary issues (say, the rise of ISIS). We expect them to have an opinion about all these matters, and all that matters.  How well a book does now does not necessarily depend on how well-written the book is, but on how well-marketed it is. The publishing industry is not any longer untouched by (the much aggressively) rising consumerism. 

Books, too, like movies, are now released and launched with much fanfare. There is a great deal of emphasis on visibility. The writers have to be visible to be able to sell. To sell well, at any rate. The writers are now accessible through Twitter, Facebook, their own websites—which could be run by the writers themselves if they are not well established or by a professional if they can afford to hire one—and the literary events too. They write articles on popular web-platforms, and in return their latest or upcoming work gets a precious mention.   

But there was a time when writers thrived behind the veil of obscurity. Readers rarely had direct access to writers. Historically, we have never really known much about the writers and their world-view. How much do we know about Vyas, Homer, Kalidas, Virgil, Sapho? Very little. And most of it is speculative. Despite the humongous research and scholarship that Shakespeare has invited over the centuries, there are huge gaps in his life story as we know it; and we certainly don’t know what Shakespeare’s views on the subjects he wrote about were or what his politics was. One can venture to make inferences based on the works of these greats, but such an exercise is highly vulnerable to inaccuracies. Not always do the views of the writer and those expressed in a text match. The work produced may not always be an extension of the writer, as we generally tend to believe. T.S. Eliot famously called upon his fellow and future writers to shed the burden of personality in their works and thereby only propagated the cult of impersonal. In the Regency and Victorian era, many women writers took to writing under fictitious names, adding another layer of obscurity.  Even much after trend of using pseudonyms phased out, we had writers who were notorious for being reticent and unapproachable.

Samuel Beckett, for instance, never gave the kind of lengthy interviews that we see/read today. He was always the most evasive about his most evasive character: Godot. He never cared to freely explain away or comment on significance of Godot. Yet the popularity of his work has endured even after half a century. Take another example, the literary sensation, the voice of his age, J. D. Salinger. In his most loved work, The Catcher in the Rye, Salinger ascribes the following lines to Holden: ”What really knocks me out is a book that, when you're all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn't happen much, though.” However, Salinger himself remained quite an inaccessible recluse all his life. He himself would never entertain the kind of phone-call Holden might want to make to his favourite writer.

  I attended the book launch of Amit Chaudhuri’s Odysseys Abroad last to last year. After the presenter was done asking her set of questions, the audience were given a chance to shoot questions, as is the custom in such events. When a lady asked Amit what books does he read, she was scandalised to hear the answer. Amit very nonchalantly said that he doesn’t read. After a moment or two of surveying the audience which sat aghast in utter silence, he smiled and said that he meant he doesn’t read fiction anymore, just poetry. Order was restored in the universe. Everybody started breathing normally again.

Whenever I attend such an event I have two major fears in my mind.

First, what if I end up asking the same cliché questions that the writer must be tired of answering? All the other questions that don’t pertain directly to the book being discussed, are attempts to understand the mind of the writer. We want to know how it is done. What books has the writer read? (Could I also read them and write as well?) What do they think of a particular book? (Do their views match mine?) Where did you grow up? (From where does he get his characters?) What was your childhood like? (Did he have a miserable childhood?) Does your spouse read your book? (Is their marital life blissful?) Most of these questions, perhaps unwittingly, aim at undoing the mojo of the writer at one level, and establishing a correspondence between the curious reader and the revered writer, at another level. We believe that the writer is endowed with a kind of insight that we are not, and that they have the remarkable quality of distilling that insight in from of words.

Second, what if there is a huge gap between the person I see on the stage and the image of the writer I have built in my head based on his/her book(s)? Perhaps, the writers too have this fear. J.D Salinger may have known that he could never talk in the same gullible and disarmingly amusing manner as Holden Caulfield.  The phenomenal Chimamanda Adichie confesses that it’s unfair for people to expect that she would fully be able to explain the motives of her much loved character Ifemelu, because her own life hasn’t been half as interesting as Ifemelu’s. In fact, she admits to discovering similarities between herself and Obinze. Perhaps, Beckett did not know any more about Godot than we do. This would mean that writers also can not know. And this thought makes me uneasy.

P S. Around writers, I behave like a gushing fourteen year old—too excited to be around them, and too dumbfounded to ask anything. All I can do is asking for an autograph.

 

Happiness

All that they tell you

about happiness is

shit

it is not found under ancient trees

nor in the caves of lofty mountains

or on the banks of pious rivers

happiness is to be fished

from the filth of your

everyday life

It is to be found in

clean, sun-dried underwear

(and stained too);

in the release

of a painfully full bladder;

in a person

humming the song

you were trying hard

to recall;

in clean and cold

water to drink on a

hot summer afternoon;

in looking at a photograph

in which you’re grinning

into a camera, wide-eyed,

when you’d no clue

what a camera is;

in sleeping, knowing

that the alarm won’t

go off in the morning;

in waking, knowing that

there’s another hour

for alarm to go off;

in a condom

that fits your size

if not your ego’s;

in dreaming about

the house where you’d spent

your childhood;

in seeing someone you love succeed

and someone you hate fail;

in eating first mango of the

summer

and first gazak of the winter;

in finding a comfort in a

a tale that you’ve read/heard

hundreds of time and knowing

its details like you know all

the arbitrary shapes on the

cemented floor and walls

of your old house

that you dream about;

in the shade of gray clouds

that have wafted over

out of nowhere

on a scorching May afternoon;

in thinking about home

when at school/work.

happiness is not an illusion

grandness is

infinity is.

2015

Your story is written

by an unseen hand

in a long-winded sentence,

which doesn’t really say much.

Year-ends come

like commas, marking

a pause, to allow

you to catch your breath;

But then some

are like semicolons:

you know

it might as well have ended

here;

but it didn’t;

it won’t;

it

just

won’t...

~ aviD

Naivete

For an irrational moment
I had thought our fates
have been sealed,
among that multitude
of books, some as old
as civilisation, and some
new as your youth.

A quiver of thrill ran
through me as I introduced
Odyssey to you.
Even Homer would have seen
the affection that glazed
my eyes as they darted
from the book to your face.

“Iliad too must be about!”
I’d said looking away impulsively,
eager to conceal that very affection.
Would I sail the Aegean sea
to reach you? Would I launch a thousand
ships to have you?

No! But I was willing to share
my books with you. And my food.
And, believe you me,
that’s a bigger endeavour on my part
than the ones epics exalt.
All the while we walked
those semi-lit alleys
of Connaught Place,
I’d secretly hoped that you’d
place your hand around my waist,
or plant a kiss on my cheek.
All the while we talked
in the frail chill
of an early December evening
I’d secretly hoped that you’d
tell me one thing that you like
in me.

When I dared to probe your feelings
you said that you’ve been
meeting other people, and that
you treat all of us equally.

Never had egalitarianism
sounded as ridiculous and offensive
to me before.
What was I to put it down to?
Your naiveté or mine?
Yours could still be extenuated by
your age. But mine should only be
damned.

~ aviD

Why Am I Not Buying A Kindle Yet?

As someone who always carries a book in my bag (yes, I always carry a bag too), I am often advised to buy Kindle. I have myself toyed with the idea of buying one often. Kindle is lighter, can store many books at once, has a great battery life, saves paper etc. But there’s something that holds me back every time my fingers hover dangerously close to the ‘Add To The Cart’ when I visit the Amazon website.

So what are the reasons one may not want to buy Kindle, despite being a book-lover? I am sure, you’ve heard the “Oh, it doesn’t feel like a real book!” argument. So I won’t go there. Let’s explore other reasons.

Books make for great conversation starters: You’re reading on the metro, lost in the magic of words, oblivious to the world around you. You don’t realise that there’s a pair of eyes secretly watching you. No, actually, it’s the title of the book that’s caught their attention. The observer comes up to you and interrupts your book-induced revery saying, “hey! That’s an amazing book you’re reading. I re-read it last week. How do you like it?” He smiles at you. A disarming smile. The Jay Gatsby kind of smile. You smile back, happy with the realisation that there are still things in the world that are prettier than the book you’re holding, and share your impressions of the book. For all one knows, few minutes later, you two may be walking off into the sunset discussing books and quoting your favourite lines. Now, can this happen with Kindle?

Books make for pretty home decor: I am not sure how many of you realise the incredible power of books to render a dull and deserted corner of your house alive and welcoming. Just stack up a few books against the wall, throw in a large floor cushion or a beanbag, hang a pendant lamp—and you’ve just made your room awesome! Some book-covers are so exquisite that they can rival art objects easily. Use them well and see your space turn Oh-so-classy!  Can you do that with Kindle?

Books speak for you: When someone comes over to your place for the first time and looks at your books, they get a sense of person you are without your having to say it. Your books open a tiny window through which one can peek into your personality. Your taste in books speaks for your outlook towards life. Then by asking you which are your favourite ones, the highly recommended ones, the ones which you didn’t like as much, they can fine-tune their understanding of your weltenschauung. All the books laid out there on your shelf have a little bit of you preserved between their pages. If one is perceptive enough one can read into your personality, to a reasonable degree, by reading the titles gracing your book-shelf. I am not sure if someone on their visit to your house may want to ask you to open your Kindle for them so that they may see the titles you own. (On a related note, those who don’t notice your books, aren’t worth being invited second time round. Just saying!)

Kindle is expensive: Actually, I am poor. There! I said it. So maybe if you’re thinking what to buy me this Diwali, I have already made your life easier. You can thank me later. After I have thanked you for your generosity, that is. Don’t worry, I will make do with the amazing benefits that physical books come with. We HAVE to save trees. Remember!

The Morning After

Like a snake,

the night sneaked

into the burrow of oblivion,

leaving behind trails of 

fading purple that slowly

gave into a dim orange.

 

And now the sky looks

as if it has borrowed its hues

from the smudged kumkum

that adorns Her breasts.

 

The breasts are marked.

The previous night they were

marked with rich patterns

drawn with fine kumkum, and

this morning, with tiny crescents

(where His nails had dug into).

 

Faintly aware of the new morning, 

wrapped in the haze of memories

from the previous night,

She blinks and yawns,

fighting back the torpor, 

with a delicate stretch of hands  

(the fabric of time and space

 contracts and expands!).

 

Her locks, curly and black,

dishevelled as they are,

with lose mogra flowers

tangled in them here and there,

look ravishing. 

(Last night He had knitted

 these flowers in her braid.)

 

The surroundings look cluttered:

disarrayed garments (that had been carefully 

chosen the night before); the lose and 

scattered pearls that, till the last night,

had strung and swung on her bosom;

a forlorn flute and a few ruffled peacock feathers.

 

He is lying next to her.

His eyes, like the petals of a blooming lotus,

underlined with thick lashes, still closed. 

His eyelids are stained with the red

of her lips and her lips stained with

the black of his kohl.

 

On his nether lip sits a bite-mark

(She smiles shyly as she observes it);

the tilak mark on his forehead is half erased;

the pleats of his turban lose, almost about to come off.

 

His nearly undone turban is crimson-stained. 

She looks at it, confused, then, images flash in her head:

He is decorating her lotusy feet with mahaavar. 

She giggles when He praises his own artistry. 

He brushes her feet gently,

making her slightly giddy and tickly.

 

And He then implores her to place her right foot

on his forehead right betwixt his eyebrows. 

Reluctantly, she complies. 

Something like an electric current tunnels through him

the moment her sole touches his forehead. 

(Galaxies are shuffled;

 they spin and collide, 

forming galactic vortexes !)

 

He pulls it down slowly, 

feeling its softness and warmth on his face, 

and sucks her toe for while, 

before bringing it further down

and placing it on his broad chest 

and pressing her sole hard against it,

lost in divine ecstasy. (New universes are born!)

 

She had closed her eyes,

for she could not have dared to witness

the sacrilege, although she was the very instrument of it.

A moan escapes her lips (there come the Vedas!).

 

Now reminiscing about it,

in this serene dawn, 

she cannot seem to gather the details of what followed.

There were only signs and imprints

left now to tell the tale:

her body was now smeared with the chandan 

He had worn last night, and his body

had trails of scented unction that

She had anointed herself with.