The Bloody Sanctity

I enter temples during menstruation! Oh My God! Finally I have gathered courage to say it openly. And they ask, why were the women silent so long who are now coming out with their #metoo stories?

When your each step of courage is judged as a rebellion, when you are considered unprofessional for questioning the power centres, when majority of people around you believe in “silence is the best strategy”, when you following the age old traditions is way too easier and convenient for everyone around you, it takes time for the courage to reach your bones and compel you to bear it no more.

Where is the connection between temple entry during menstruation and “me too” movement?

When we as women are collectively fighting at different levels for temple entry, I wonder, are we the new untouchables who need emancipation? A woman belonging to any caste is untouchable in certain matters. Any woman of a menstruation age could not perform Pooja at my home when I was a young girl. Either the men in the house or my grandmother or we kids had to do that in the order suggested here. As time passed, men got busy, grandma became too old and we were no more just kids, so the time demanded some change in the values, customs and traditions of our home. Women of menstruation age started doing Pooja but only when they were not menstruating.

The stigma attached to menstruation was introduced to me as a child through stories. When I first got my periods, I was hiding myself from the men in the house. I was told that they will become dogs in their next life if they saw me during those days of my first periods. Of course, I was horrified. I really loved my grandfather, father and brother and didn’t want them to be dogs in their next life. So I obeyed. The seclusion was still unbearable to a small girl. Though I could not voice it,I knew something was terribly wrong in the whole arrangement. After introduction to all this shame attached to the periods, there was a ceremony to announce my periods to the close relatives. I enjoyed the gifts and new dresses I received but nothing else. I just wished to disappear or run away from everything. The strange ways of elders confused the child about whether to hide the shame or celebrate it.

By the time I started preparing for civil services, I had developed a strong sense of right and wrong for myself. Of course, even then I was not allowed to touch the temple at home during menstruation but I didn’t care. But when we visited our kuldevi temple in Rajasthan and when my periods were not a secret to my family members who were with me, i had to finally face the issue and decide my course of action. I decided to enter the temple and do the Pooja. It was the first time I had visited our kuldevi and I rationalised that it is the mother goddess and she will understand and would definitely love meeting her daughter in any form whatsoever than worrying about non issues like periods. My family, including all women were disturbed to the core. Their belief about women during menstruation being impure was so strong that they tried to dissuade me, saying I will fail civil services examinations if I entered the temple during menstruation. I entered and yes..I cleared the exams the same year.

Changing the mindset of people including women in every home is a bigger challenge than temple entry in Sabarimala or shani shinganapur, though both are equally important in our fight for equality. Why differentiate between a woman before menstruation age, during menstruation age and after menstruation age? Why not just see her as a whole, complete human being?

Why should a society as a whole worry about a woman’s periods? It’s a woman’s personal business. But woman’s business has never been just a woman’s business. Women have been honour or shame for men and families. Women have been properties of men for centuries. It’s high time we demand our individuality, free ourselves from the clutches of narrow mindedness of laws, traditions and people. Our identity as human beings is the most important identity. We need to make our men understand that we are independent. Please do not attach your ego and honour to us. We are more than your daughters, sisters, wives and mothers. We are human beings demanding equal rights. Equal rights at home and equal rights in social and political space. We own our bodies and we are proud of it. We need freedom to deny a religion if it does not respect what we are.

The same society which had section 497 in IPC till recently, thinks of women as men’s property. That society is the reminiscent of the society which thought of women as permanent children who did not know what was right or wrong for them.  Only a man could take legal action for adultery and even then his wife was treated as a victim who was lured into it because it was presumed that the wife could not understand the repercussions of her actions. Here husband was considered to be the owner of the body of his wife. The violation was treated as the violation of the private property of the man. A wife could not take the same legal course under section 497 against her cheating husband and the another woman involved. Yes..because the another woman, being a woman was incapable of understanding the repercussions of her actions and the husband, being a man was an independent entity. He was of course not the property of his wife. Thankfully Supreme Court of India has done away with such discriminatory section of the IPC.

Laws can be changed and judgements can be pronounced very quickly. They work like beacons to keep us in right directions. But it takes a long time to change the minds of people. When centuries have taught you to treat women as your properties, your possessions, your honour, your ego, you tend to forget their individuality at home and at workplace. You have never learnt to think of women as separate from and more than their vaginas. You feel entitled to their bodies every time they are around you. You tend to associate her success and her failure with her gender.It is no wonder, men feel entitled to the bodies of women. We as a society have never taught our children to keep the respect for bodies of women in their mind before, during and after the intercourse. We talk of sex in hushed voices. Sex is a taboo subject. Sex is treated as a ritual for procreation.

Our religion and culture has taught us to treat a woman as a goddess and a mother. We have no education in how to treat a woman as a companion, as a colleague and as a separate individual. Consequently, women are disrespected in everyday life. They are violated and raped and are largely equally unsafe at homes and in public places. The degree of mental and physical violation at workplace may change for every woman based on her financial status, her rank in the hierarchy, her outspokenness and her ability to create some damage and based on the level of real education of her family members in her personal life but every woman has to fight for her equal rights every moment. It is a breathtakingly tiring struggle. But it’s a struggle worth living and dying for. It concerns our identity. It concerns our self respect. We, all women and also men who believe in justice, who believe in the free spirit of every person, who believe in the dignity of individual as the highest value, need to stand with every courageous voice who says me too.

The modern times when a new glass ceiling is being broken everyday, more and more women are entering the workplace, we need to reevaluate our value systems. We need to create women friendly environment. As an IPS officer, I have done horse riding during menstruation. I did not mention my menstruation while doing so lest I should be perceived as unprofessional. If I can overcome the physical and mental barriers relating to my menstruation, why can’t the society overcome the mental barriers it has created for us in our path towards equality. When it comes to our contribution to our country, our organisations, our companies, we deliver. We take our jobs seriously. But We have to work more to get equal appreciation. We have to remain serious to be taken seriously. Only getting work done is not enough. We have to put on a face which means business. We do not crack jokes with our juniors just to sound professional.There are many such subtle challenges we face everyday everywhere.

We are there in every home but we are still not respected. We are the second sex. We are also in the loved ones of the people who discriminate, who violate, who Rape but we have not been able to stop it because we do not speak up. We do not raise our voices.

Probably We will never go to Sabarimala temple in our lifetimes but we need the right to enter nevertheless because we assert our right as equal human beings. Probably We would have never needed a section like 497 to prosecute our dear husbands for adultery but we need the equal right to prosecute nevertheless because we assert our right as equal human beings. And Probably many of us would never say me too but we need a positive atmosphere of trust to say so when needed nevertheless because we assert our right as equal human beings.

Shobha Bhutada IPS
21st October,2018.
Patan.

P.S
. - While writing the above blog I thought finally I had gathered courage to say some uneasy things but that was not true. It took me almost 10 days after penning this down to finally publish this. When the fight for equality of women will be discussed in India in future, I do not want to be counted in the silent spectators, and so here it is..

Loud and Clear

Loud and clear

"Offred" stands for 'of Fred' and "Ofglen" is 'of Glen'.
This is the way handmaids are named in the Margaret Atwood's "Handmaid's Tale." The book is categorised as a speculative fiction. It is a dystopian novel. The secondary and inferior status granted to women in subtle ways in our society is made evident in it. The fertility of a woman decides her social status. Birth control and abortion is illegal and the woman and her body is property of the father, husband or the male guardian.Women are neither allowed to read nor allowed to work. Basically, they are not supposed to think and they can never dream to be independent.All intelligent and free spirited women are left with no choice but to be "Jezebels", that is prostitutes. Handmaids are the women used  solely for the purpose of reproduction for the high ranking commanders whose wives are infertile. (the belief is that men can never be infertile.)

I think it is wrong to call it a "speculative fiction" because the secondary and the inferior status of women described in the novel is the reality of our social mindset even today. Just visit any social media and read the comments section under the topics such as virginity, marital rape, working women, right to abort etc.It will make you feel like a slave if you are a woman.

I am an IPS officer in India. I was an IPS officer for seven years before my marriage. I cannot think of my identity separate from my name. I have been using my maiden name for all the purposes. I have made it a point to not remain silent when someone calls me "Mrs. Shejul ". But alas! Most educated people find it quiet  normal to introduce a woman as Mrs.so and so. Isn't it the same as "Offred" and "Ofglen"? Where is the independent identity of the person standing before you. The person is not an attachment to another person. This has happened with me in the form of name on the invitation cards as "Mr.and Mrs. Shejul" and I have made it a point to not to attend such functions and convey the reason for it. The invitations came not from some uneducated people but from Navy's highly educated and civilised high ranking officials. They gave me the explanation that this is the way they have been doing it since they remember and no one objected to it. Yes,I certainly object. My name is an integral part of my identity. I won't allow anyone to strip me off it. I insist on being called by my maiden name. Is it "stretching it too far"?

I get an invitation for an event in the campus of a paramilitary organisation. The commandant in charge is junior to me in rank. We both being in uniform service, the form of greeting between us is saluting. When my husband and me get down from our vehicle, he gets a salute and I get a hand folded "Namaste". In another instance, one of our juniors visits us at home. My husband and me both are batch mates and senior to him. My husband is greeted with a crisp salute and I get a "Namaste".  Salute is absolutely not an important issue here, but the discrimination certainly is. What should I do? Not make a fuss of a "small issue" or raise my voice every time. I prefer the second option.

Just a few days back I went for a social event. My parents accompanied me. The organisers wanted to welcome my parents. When I heard the announcement, my father was introduced with his full name and my mother was introduced just as my mother. What about her other identities and most importantly, her name? Why do I have to point it out every time, everywhere and everyday? It is so ingrained in our minds that we have forgotten ourselves.

A few days back all the senior officers and their families gathered for an event. I am always confused whether to be with the officers who are almost all men or with the wives. I preferred being with the wives so that I could hear something apart from work and anyways I keep meeting officers during my work. I was amazed at the way the ladies introduced themselves. The Colonel's wife called herself "Mrs.Colonel" and the captain's wife called herself "Mrs. Captain" and so on. I kept smiling and I didn't know what I was smiling at. (The designations I have used here are only for illustration purpose.)

One of my Police Inspectors retired recently and we gave him a farewell. I asked him about his children and he said he had two sons and a daughter. The next thing I asked was what do they do and he said the elder son is an engineer working with a corporate company, the younger son is a chartered accountant and the daughter is "married". The daughter who was present interrupted and said she used to work with a company before marriage and because of the responsibilities of child she was compelled to take a break. She also added in the same breath how boring and frustrating it was to stay at home all the time and how much she was looking forward to working again. I loved the welcome interruption and the spirit of standing up for self. Being married can't be the end of our identities.

I certainly know that in all the incidents I have mentioned, the secondary or inferior treatment doesn't come out of chauvinism. Most of the men and quiet a few women may not be even noticing the discrimination. But exactly that is the point to be worried about. Identifying and raising the issues is the first step towards an equal world.

It is heartening to see the new glass ceilings being broken by women everyday. Motherhood adds to the strength and beauty of Serena Williams but it cannot and does not define her. In 1990, Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto had to travel incognito to hospital, undergo a caesarean to deliver a baby and return to her job the very next day to silence the chauvinist male in the opposition who questioned her ability to run the country while being pregnant.It is sad that even in 21st century, the issue of motherhood is raised when the subject matter is the capabilities of Theresa May as a Prime Minister. She is thought of as a lesser woman for not being a mother. We need to assert that we are much more than our fertile wombs. Successful women in different fields improve the overall picture of gender equations but equality is a distant dream even today.

From simple remarks like "even a woman can do it", "crying like a woman", "fighting like saas-bahu", "she is better than most of the men" to actions like sitting in a religious ceremony and performing the rites by touching husband's hand, everything is a gender biased act. If we remain silent in these "small issues", we will lose our voice when it will come to the larger ones. Our silence has the ability to transform Margaret Atwood's "Handmaid's Tale" in reality. Let's speak loud and clear.

Life In Context

Helen Keller was a writer, lecturer and a political activist. This piece of information doesn’t inspire me. But when I read it in the context of the additional information of her being deaf and blind, it makes me sit tight and concentrate. Context is a simple word but it’s relevance is insurmountable. Context converts a story into history.

Context alters the characteristics of every outcome. Context has the ability to make us more understanding and empathetic. Context adds value to a situation. In context, lies the real story of life. If only, life would have been a collection of few memorable moments, context wouldn’t have mattered. But life is also what happens between two memorable moments.

The story of Arunima Sinha, first female amputee to climb Mount Everest is glorious with its context. She was thrown out of a moving train because she bravely fought the thieves. Consequently, her leg had to be amputated. To overcome the pity in the eyes of people, she attained the extraordinary feat. Of course, climbing Mount Everest is a challenge for any human being and it is probably the ultimate test of your determination and perseverance along with physical strength, but the context as in the above situation adds value to the success and assures of glory to every individual who dreams.

The story of Phoebe Snetsinger, an American birder, first in the world, to see more than 8000 birds is more inspirational if we look at it in the context of her life. She was a mother of 4 children. Her first birding tour was in her thirties. She was diagnosed with terminal melanoma at the age of 50. This did not deter her. In fact, the diagnosis compelled her to concentrate on her own life and her own wishes. Her happiness paid off and she lived for 18 years after diagnosis. She died in an accident while birding. So, an American woman seeing a record number of birds can be a good story but a housewife, a mother of four, a cancer patient who found her passion quiet late in life, but who also alongside found courage to pursue that passion makes the story extraordinary.

Participation in Olympics is itself a dream for any sportsperson. Winning there must be beyond the dream world. But when athletes from USA and New Zealand help each other to reach the finish line after a collision, their story attains greater height than the story of the winner.The grace in the face of defeat made their story, history.

In today’s competitive world, we concern ourselves only with the winners. We are not interested in the reasons for failure. But we need to understand that though the end point and the finish lines are important, the point where you started is, if not more, equally relevant. Success of a millionaire and a poor can be equally important but we cannot turn a blind eye to the context of poverty and the resultant additional obstacles that had to be overcome. Context is of utmost importance here.

Oscar Schindler was just a German industrialist who saved lives of 1200 Jews working in his factories. The extraordinary characteristic of this feat achieved is not highlighted as long as we do not look at it in the context of the horrors of the Holocaust and the courage it demanded of the Oscar Schindler.

The superficial division of people based on the criteria of winners and losers will make Hillary Clinton look like a loser in the 2016 Presidential elections. The context of her being the first female presidential candidate nominated by a major party in the history of the USA highlights the different shades of her defeat.

When I read about the slow verbal development of the great Einstein, the “too stupid to learn anything” comment of the teacher of the Thomas Edison and his unsuccessful 1000 attempts at inventing the light bulb, the story of Stephen Hawking overcoming depression after being diagnosed with motor neurone disease, I find the context more appealing than the ground breaking work they did.

The context of all these people and the situations, gives me a renewed sight to look at my present. Today’s difficulties and obstacles are the context of my glorious tomorrow. A story without context doesn’t amount to much. But with context, if I win, it will be a story in itself and even if I lose, it will be a story worth cherishing and worth telling. It strengthens me. The understanding of the context inspires me to be less judgemental, to face adversity bravely, and to be a better human being.


Shobha Bhutada
24th JAN, 2018
Porbandar.

An Affair With The Tea

In general, I love food but tea has a special place in my heart. It has been associated with so many different emotions at different stages of my life, that I cannot tell the story of my life without mentioning my relationship with tea.

In childhood, I was told that children were not allowed to drink tea. So, I associated tea with being grown up. I also associated it with an adventure. They said, tea could make your complexion dark. In a society obsessed with fairness, this was enough to terrify a little girl. But this did not deter my obsession, rather it made tea a symbol of rebellion for me.There were special occasions when we were allowed to drink tea e.g. when We were down with fever or viral, we were given an Ayurvedic Medicine called Tribhuvan Kirti with tea. I loved the special treatment and wished not to get well soon.

As I grew up, tea break during study was an event in itself. My mother took special efforts and woke up early morning to provide the most important tea motivation. When I went to Delhi for study, the winters in the capital made my favourite drink further tempting. Adrakwali chai in Delhi winter is a poetry in itself. You literally look forward to that evening hour, when students make friends, find the love of their life and if time permits, discuss studies over a cup of tea. Tea gave us a moment of relaxation in the present, when we were bogged down with the worries of future.

At one point in life, tea became romance. From different canteens of college and University to taking long walks after dinner for a cup of tea on Mall Road in Mussoorie to namkeen chai on a shikara in Jammu and Kashmir, tea provided a story to a hopelessly romantic girl.

When I started working in Gujarat, tea became a social compulsion and of course, I loved it. Here people are offended if you don’t accept their tea. They pour it directly in a ‘rakabi’ (saucer) in Saurashtra. If you are a special guest, they make it ‘Kadak mitthi’ i.e. your tea has double the amount of tea powder and sugar than a regular tea. They serve it with lot of love and affection. On the other hand, in the marathon meetings, tea is the only saviour to keep you awake.

I have read about the side effects of tea on health and tried to limit it to one cup a day many times but I failed miserably. I tried to replace it with coffee and green tea, but alas! My life doesn’t feel right without it’s precious moments with tea. I have my special places in every town, city, on highways or even in jungles where I love to sit and cherish it. In some remote places where I can’t find my magic drink, I have a quick solution, I go there with a flask and disposable cups. It feels more romantic if you have folding stool with you.

Tea made on a chullha has a unique flavour and taste. During my dieting efforts to shed extra pounds post pregnancy, I waited the whole week for that one special cup of tea made on the chullha. Finally, the love grew by leaps and bounds and now I have got a chullha in my backyard where my weekends become special with the special drink.

I have few places close to my heart where I go for tea only with my soulmate. The places literally make me feel alive and truly happy.

A cup of tea on road side on a busy street, another in the middle of a jungle in the serene company of birds, yet another under a banyan tree, and a cup in mon- soon on a dam site is all that I need to feel loved, and special.

Shobha Bhutada 
18th JAN 2018 
Porbandar 

The World of Words

The other day I was in Jamnagar. There was a book sale near home. It was quite tempting. You could buy 1 kg books for Rs. 150. Yes, that’s correct! Books were be- ing sold by weight. Words have a sacrosanct quality in my world and so I won- dered, how do you weigh the words in a book.

A compact classic like George Orwell’s Animal Farm and some other thousand page trash of the second hand literature can not be and should not be weighed with a common unit of measurement. Every word not only has its height, depth and width, but it has its unique texture, smell, sound and most importantly the feel. Words have power to wage wars and to establish peace. Words are the powerful tools to express our deepest emotions. Words have the ability to transcend time and space and take us beyond. Words have the ability to change its weight with every reader. Perhaps this was the logic behind the sale.

Over the years, I have been listening and reading about the writing styles of different writers. Some writers like Alexander McCall Smith write around 2000 words everyday without break while others like Harper Lee become immortal with just one book over lifetime. Some go with the flow of the words while others are stuck on a particular word for days. Different words have different ability to convey the thoughts and feelings of the writer to the reader. Though to a large extent, the vocabulary of any language is finite, the ways of expression in the language are in- finite.

One life is not enough to comprehend and experience the different shades of this complex world. But words have the magical ability to make us experience a life we have not lived ourselves. Words are the magic wand which gives us the breath- taking experience of other people’s lifetime in a moment.

Thanks to the ability of words, in a short period of time, we can be the ‘out- sider’ of Albert Camus or be in the open sea with the inspiring old man of Earnest Hemingway. We can experiment with truth with Gandhi or experience the horrors of apartheid with Nelson Mandela. Isn't it just amazing? We may miss these lives and lifetime experiences if we don't love words with all our hearts. Life is to be lived and it is to be lived well. Reading enriches life in more ways than we can imagine.

A place called Stanford upon Avon is just another place, but for the words of the great Shakespeare. And the magic of his words made the experience of visit to this place extraordinarily life enriching for a small town girl like me. The emotions are beyond words but the journey of reaching to that extraordinary emotion takes place only in the great company of words.

The understanding of the power of words gave rise to great leaders and great writers. Words not only empower us with knowledge but provide the touch of ro- mance, adventure, meaning and value to our routine lives.

Let the strength of wise words strengthen us in difficult times and show us the path to an enriched life.



Shobha Bhutada 
16th Jan 2018 
Porbandar