The Hindu, Sunday Magazine, March 29, 2015

Thank you, Sharad Yadav…

Many women in India are really mad and irritated with Sharad Yadav. The Rajya Sabha MP, who belongs to the Janata Dal (United), thinks nothing of drawing comparisons between Indian women, their skin colour and shape and provisions of the Insurance Bill. Others might find it difficult to make the connect. But not Yadav. Nor some of his fellow male compatriots who were caught on camera laughing at his remarks.

Yet those of us who ‘know’ Sharad Yadav should not really be surprised at what he said. How can we forget his performance as a member of the ‘Yadav Troika’, that band of brothers who have fought determinedly and spiritedly against increasing the representation of women in Parliament? This is the same Sharad Yadav who, in the debate on the Women’s Reservation Bill, attacked Indian women with short hair, charging them with conspiring to increase women’s representation in Parliament.

Since then, there are probably more women in India who have short hair although this has not been the chief reason that the law that Sharad Yadav detests, also known as the 108 Constitutional Amendment Bill 2008, did pass in the Rajya Sabha. Again, we were not surprised to learn that certain members who objected to the Bill had to be physically evicted from the House.

Given his recent verbal history, we should not be alarmed at Yadav’s comments about women’s skin colour. He is being entirely consistent at a time when consistency is not a quality found in many Indian politicians. In fact, perhaps we should thank him. For without meaning to, Yadav has reminded us of something we forget: the fair-skin obsession among Indians. He has also nudged us to remember that the Women’s Reservation Bill still awaits a vote in the Lok Sabha.

Let’s take up the latter first. Much has been debated about the pluses and minuses of this Bill. Without going into that, we should remember that the party now in power, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) supported the Bill. There are memorable photographs of women Members of Parliament including Sushma Swaraj of the BJP in the company of Sonia Gandhi of the Congress Party and Brinda Karat of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) celebrating the passage of the Bill in the Rajya Sabha. Cutting across party lines, women politicians came together in support of the Bill.

Unfortunately, we do not see such solidarity among the women on other issues. Brinda Karat, in a recent comment on Sharad Yadav’s behaviour in the Rajya Sabha, lamented the absence of solidarity among the few women who were in the House the day Yadav held forth. She recounted how difficult it had been in the past, when such anti-women remarks were made, to get the attention of the chair. Surely, if one third of the House consisted of women, men like Yadav would not escape unscathed. That’s another reason to have more women elected.

In any case, the BJP government seems to have forgotten about this particular Bill. In its hurry to push through seven Bills, it has been afflicted by amnesia as far as the Women’s Reservation Bill is concerned. So perhaps Sharad Yadav’s soliloquy in the House will stir the memory of the party honchos that here is one more law that needs to be passed quite urgently.

And the other aspect of skin colour? We need not be reminded of that. Just turn on the television. There are plenty of reminders in the advertisements you see. If you want success, as a woman or a man, you must be fair and good-looking. No less than Shah Rukh Khan tells you this. Or read the matrimonial columns of newspapers. ‘Beautiful, fair, slim’, three words that are repeated. Or go to dating and marriage websites. The story never changes. The shape of the woman and the colour of her skin are essential qualities for ‘a suitable match’. Unfair, many women would say, but Indian society continues to plum for ‘fair’ over all else.

As a result, since they were first introduced in 1975, ‘fairness’ creams and skin-lightening agents have grown into an incredible Rs.3,000 crore business in India, expanding at the rate of 18 per cent a year. Their appeal has caught the interest of men since the introduction in 2005 of special men’s fairness creams.

Despite studies that reveal the harm these creams can do, their sales continue to climb. A 2014 study by the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) revealed that skin-lightening lotions contained harmful chemicals such as mercury. Far from lightening the colour of your skin, they can harm it and also cause other adverse reactions. The CSE tested 32 skin-lightening creams and found that 44 per cent had mercury content despite mercury being banned for use in cosmetics under the Drugs and Cosmetics Acts and Rules.

So thank you, Sharad Yadav for reminding us of a forgotten bill and a cosmetic that we ought to forget.

What should we expect?

The Hindu, Sunday Magazine, May 25, 2014

Photo: The Hindu photo archives

The shouting is over. The voters have voted. India has a new set of rulers. And for the majority, who did not cast their votes in favour of the party now in power, this is a time for reflection.

How do we weigh this outcome? How should we respond if we feel less than enthusiastic? Should we be resigned and say ‘the people’ have decided and therefore we must accept? Or do we, the majority that did not vote this party into power, take on the role of the real opposition — one that is as essential a part of any democracy as elections?

And then again, if we consider ourselves the real opposition, given the truncated elected opposition in the Lok Sabha, how should we conduct ourselves? How do we make our voices heard when an election has allowed one grouping to get what is termed a ‘brute majority’?

In the post-election euphoria, these might not seem the relevant questions to be asking. But this is precisely the moment when these issues should be discussed.

Let’s take the question of women, for example. Since the December 16, 2012 gang rape in New Delhi, India has gained the reputation worldwide of being a country where its women are under attack — in the public space, in their homes, in villages, in conflict zones. Some of the reporting in the western media is out of context, even alarmist. Yet no one will dispute the reality that violence against women is growing and that it ought to be an issue of urgent concern for any group that claims it will provide the country with good governance.

Every mainstream political party endorses ‘women’s welfare’. The much-overused term ‘women’s empowerment’ slips off the tongues of politicians of all hues with ease. Yet, the women of India know that there is a difference between rhetoric and reality, between promises and performance, between the ‘safety’ of being confined and the ‘safety’ of being free.

So as a new government takes power in Delhi, what should we as women be demanding of it and what should we expect?

The most obvious demand is likely to be the passing of the Women’s Reservation Bill. It has been passed by the Rajya Sabha and awaits the consent of the Lok Sabha and half the state assemblies before it can become the law. This ‘brute majority’ should have no problem passing the Bill. But will it?

Even if it does, will that establish the new government’s credentials as a supporter of women’s rights? Not necessarily because even the most vociferous advocates of this law know that political representation is only a very small part of the overall struggle to ensure that all women get equal rights.

A more important test, I believe, will be to monitor if and whether the party in power reins in members of its ‘Parivar’ who have little regard for women’s rights. We have seen these elements in action as they attack young women in pubs, stop films where they conclude without any evidence that ‘Indian’ culture is being demeaned, demonstrate the extent of their misogyny when they launch personal and vitriolic attacks on women who speak out, women like the actress Nandita Das.

These elements have in the past supported the barbaric tradition of ‘sati’ claiming it was part of ‘culture’, they have refused to condemn honour killings, they have looked the other way when men like Babu Bajrangi, now serving a life sentence for the 2002 Naroda Patiya massacre of 97 Muslims in Gujarat, forcibly prevented young people of different faiths getting married. According to such people, the rights of Indian women are confined within the definition of what they choose to call ‘Indian’ culture. The new Prime Minister of India has already equated Hindu and the nation in his self-definition as a ‘Hindu nationalist’. So women should worry as the line between ‘Indian’ and ‘Hindu’ has been erased.

The real threat to the rights of all women, irrespective of class, caste or creed is from these self-appointed defenders of ‘Indian’ culture — the likes of the Sri Ram Sena, the Bajrang Dal and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad —who will feel no compulsion to hold back now that their ‘family’ members are in power.