All posts by Nivedita Menon

Centre watch, Culture, Debates, Feminism, Sex, Violence/Conflict

The Politics of Raid Governance – Aam Aurat v. Khas Aurat: Pratiksha Baxi

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Guest Post by PRATIKSHA BAXI

Following the terrible gang-rape of a Danish woman in Delhi, Chief Minister Mr Kejriwal castigating the police for dereliction of duty pronounced his theory about how rape tendencies form. We are told that rape tendencies flow from drug and sex rackets; and when police corruption sustains these rackets, rates of gangrape are bound to escalate. Rape in this formulation is not an expression of sexualized power or preferred and targetted male violence against women. Rather it is linked to a series of vices located in certain geographies, circuits, substances and bodies, which produce a specific form of sexual venality. And, the technique of “raid” is a privileged form of sexual governance.

To sustain the technique of raid (or sting operations) as the privileged form of governance to stem sexual violence, a certificatory genealogy is instituted. A leader of AAP recites his gender credentials by tracing raid governance to the “damini” protests and experiences of state violence during these anti–rape protests. Mallika Sarabhai’s gender credentials are now interrogated by citing her purported absence from the “damini” protests. Some of us who did not experience police violence during the protests are now vulnerable to the charge of faking our commitment to the anti–rape movement, since certification comes from one kind of participation in the “damini” protests. However, can the badge of being invested in the kind of transformative politics required to challenge rape culture be so easily earned? When men participate in anti–rape protests, we are expected to applaud them and not feel offended when they deride women like Mallika Sarabhai who risked their being to speak against rightist manifestations of sexual impunity and immunity in Gujarat. Continue reading The Politics of Raid Governance – Aam Aurat v. Khas Aurat: Pratiksha Baxi →

Centre watch, Debates, Government, Politics

Of AAP, dreams and nightmares: Nityanand Jayaraman

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Guest post by NITYANAND JAYARAMAN

I am avowedly anti-police. I am only half-convinced when I say that they are a necessary evil. The “necessary” part is what I get doubtful about. This last Saturday was different. I found myself uncomfortably on the same side as the police as I read the newspapers about Somnath Bharti’s self-righteous and racist escapades. To tell the truth, I did not immediately believe what I read. That was not because I had some personal knowledge of Bharti’s antecedents. But because, AAP was a phenomenon that I wanted to work.

These last few weeks, ever since AAP’s dramatic rise to power, I have been wafting in and out of mental states, between dreams and wakefulness. Dreams are fragile things. For me, AAP’s upsurge was a dream coming true. I come from a generation of Tamils that takes joy no matter whether AIADMK or DMK wins as long as the ruling party loses horribly. Ditto with Congress and BJP.
Now, this AAP thing was an early morning dream. I could see it, feel the joy of seeing disbelief and confusion writ large in the faces of BJP and Congress wallahs. I loved it. I did not know whether I liked AAP or not. But I liked what they did, how they did it. In terms of what they proposed to do, I had questions, suggestions and critical comments. To me, the stated lack of ideology – to begin with – was both an opportunity and a challenge. Continue reading Of AAP, dreams and nightmares: Nityanand Jayaraman →

Centre watch, Feminism, Government, Identities

Letter to Arvind Kejriwal: Women against Sexual Violence and State Repression

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Women against Sexual Violence and State Repression condemns the racial profiling, sexual violence and vigilantism by AAP against Ugandan women.

Women Against Sexual Violence and State Repression (WSS) is a network of women’s rights, Dalit rights, human rights and civil liberties organizations and individuals across India. It is a non-funded grassroots effort by women to stem the violence being perpetrated upon our bodies and on our societies by the State’s forces, by non-state actors and by the inability of our government to resolve conflict in a meaningful, sustainable and effective manner.

Women against Sexual Violence and State Repression strongly condemns the illegal raid conducted by the AAP cabinet law minister, Somnath Bharti and his mob of supporters, on the premises of the Ugandan women on 17th January 2014 residing in Khidki village, New Delhi.

One media report states that four women who were kept in a taxi for 3 hours were accused of conducting ‘drug rackets’ and ‘sex rackets’; and were terrorized by your cabinet minister and his mob. The women, who were eventually helped by the police, have registered their statements. Two of them have stated that they were physically assaulted by the mob and were also subjected to intense racist abuse – “black people break laws.” Continue reading Letter to Arvind Kejriwal: Women against Sexual Violence and State Repression →

Government, Politics, Violence/Conflict

Kunan Poshpora – The Other Story : Shrimoyee Nandini Ghosh

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This guest post by SHRIMOYEE NANDINI GHOSH is based on two essays about the men and women of Kunan Poshpora, that appeared in the Kashmir Reader dated 1 September 2013, and 13 January 2014. 

Information and updates about the campaign for justice and truth for the survivors of Mass Rape and Torture in Kunan Poshpora are available at https://www.facebook.com/KunanposhporaCampaign.

Beneath the horrors of the mass rape committed by  Indian troops in the twin villages that night in February 1991, lies the untold story of systematic torture of men, carried out by the same forces with the precision and deliberation of a planned military operation.

In June 2013, a Public Interest Litigation filed in the  Jammu and Kashmir High Court,   by fifty Srinagar based women, supported by human rights group Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil society (JKCCS) had resulted in a Magisterial order for the  further investigations of the mass and gang rape by Indian army personnel of the women of Kunan, and neighbouring hamlet Poshpora, in Kupwara District of North Kashmir on the night of February 23rd-24th 1991. The police, it appears from the lack of any remotely investigative activities in the villages to have done little if anything, by way of following the court order in the last six months. On 14 September, 2013 they asked for and were granted an additional three months time for further investigations, without notice to the survivors who are legally represented in the case.

However, the closure report, which police had failed to file for twenty – two years, and which had been presented before the Magistrate of Kupwara just weeks before the Public Interest Litigation, in March 2013, had yielded several important previously unavailable official documents. Continue reading Kunan Poshpora – The Other Story : Shrimoyee Nandini Ghosh →

Capitalism, Centre watch

Cooking gas subsidy and the myth of market distortion

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Have you been receiving SMS’s saying:

Dear XXXgas Consumer, to avail LPG Subsidy in your bank account, kindly submit your Aadhaar to your Distributor and to your Bank immediately

These SMS’s are being sent by Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL),  India Oil Corproation (IOC) and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) to its consumers, in violation of the Supreme Court’s interim order that no one can insist on Aadhaar for any government schemes like ration card, bank account, cash transfer or issue of LPG subsidies.

This has been confirmed today by Oil Minister M Veerappa Moily. The unique identification card will no longer be mandatory for giving subsidies unless Supreme Court gives a clearance.

What ‘cash transfer’ essentially means is that instead of paying less at the point of purchase, the higher price must be paid, and the difference will be paid into your bank account.

The neoliberal theology against subsidies is that “Subsidies Create Market Distortions”. The unquestioned assumption we are supposed to accept here is that the market is  a natural phenomenon, like rain or snowfall, and that any state intervention will distort its finely tuned natural functioning. (And we all know how strongly capitalism and economics stands for preserving “other” natural entities like forests and rivers and mineral resources!) Continue reading Cooking gas subsidy and the myth of market distortion →

Debates, Feminism, Sex

The Conundrum of Agency in Sexual Violence

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This is a revised version of an article that appeared in Seminar January 2014.

The past year is bookended by two extraordinary moments, both of them inspired by the courage and determination of young women who refused to take sexual violence as routine.

December 2012 – a young paramedic fought till her last breath for justice.

November 2013 – a law intern exposed the sexual assault she faced from a retired Judge and a Tehelka journalist taught Tarun Tejpal a long deferred lesson – No Means No.

The massive mobilization of public opinion around these incidents has reopened the question of ‘agency’ in familiar and unfamiliar ways.

Feminists have long asserted women’s agency in contexts of sexual violence by attempting to desexualize rape – in law and in everyday life. Taken out of patriarchal discourses of honour, rape is merely an act of violence that violates bodily integrity. This delicate balance between two opposing notions – on the one hand, that sexual violence has a distinctive character, it is more humiliating, more paralyzing than physically less harmful actions; and on the other, that sexual violence is merely another kind of physical violence – this is the razor’s edge occupied by feminist understandings of rape. Continue reading The Conundrum of Agency in Sexual Violence →

Feminism, Politics

Anatomy of a Take Back the Night campaign : Nandini Rao

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Guest post by NANDINI RAO 

Picture credits: Rakesh and Alana

TBTN

 “I want to break free…”. The Freddy Mercury anthem rang out in the cold winter night, in the middle of a busy marketplace in Delhi. One by one, a group of women appeared out of the crowd and started dancing to its compulsive beat. People gathered around, cheering them on and some women from the audience joined in too. Synchronising steps, the dancers swayed to the medley of music as it moved on to Hindi songs, a snatch of Spanish and finally, the compelling Punjabi phrase “Sadda haq, aithey rak!”. This was officially the first flash mob (or “mob dance”, as we call it) of the members of the Citizens’ Collective against Sexual Assault (CCSA).

The Citizens’ Collective against Sexual Assault (CCSA) is a Delhi/NCR-based group of organisations, individuals and activists from women’s movements and progressive movements. It works towards addressing issues of sexual violence against women, girls and transgender people. It raises awareness among the public, media, administration and the police on issues of gender rights. It works collectively to build an environment of safety in Delhi, Noida and Gurgaon. Continue reading Anatomy of a Take Back the Night campaign : Nandini Rao →

Centre watch, Everyday Life, Government, Identities

Enumerative Practices of the Indian State and the Disabled: Avinash Shahi

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Guest post by AVINASH SHAHI

The 2011 Census release on disabled population in India is shocking, exposing the fallacious methodology and technique used by census enumerators while counting the disabled population in the country. According to census figures, the population of disabled people has gone up to 26.8 million in 2011. In the last decade the numbers have increased just below six million from 21.9 million in 2001. Surprisingly, these low numbers follow the collaboration between the Census Commission, NCPEPD and Diversity and Equal Opportunity Centre (DEOC) for sensitizing, and imparting training to census master trainers.

The idea was to frame questions on disability and include these in the Census questionnaire. Nonetheless, millions have yet again been rendered invisible.  In 2001, the Census Commission collected data on five categories of disability among different disabled groups, and found that visual disability emerged as the top category at 48.5%. The other disabilities population enumerated by the census were as follows in descending order: In movement (27.9%), Mental (10.3%), in speech (7.5%), and in hearing (5.8%). In contrast, the 2011 Census initial release percentage among different disabled categories has changed drastically. The persons with blindness now stand at third place.  Continue reading Enumerative Practices of the Indian State and the Disabled: Avinash Shahi →

Feminism

Bar Association in Kerala suspends woman lawyer…

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…for her Facebook post on the “silly” behaviour of her male colleagues, who

address women as ‘sugar candy’ ‘dear’ and follow them with comments such as ‘you are so beautiful’ and the like. All of them follow the ‘Prem Nazir’ style of old Malayalam films. They dont seem to be familiar with newer films. It’s the same old way of making women either lovers or sisters; destroying them either by ‘caring’ for them or ‘keeping’ them. I pity all those who follow such a style.

Anima Muyarath’s Facebook post in Malayalam here.

Ah, would that Calicut Bar Association had acted with such alacrity to discipline and re-train its male members.

Debates, Everyday Life

Of Indians and Justice – The Khobragade Affair: Godfrey Pereira

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Guest Post by GODFREY PEREIRA

Devyani Khobragade was arrested on December 12th on charges of visa fraud and misrepresentation. At the time of her arrest, she was functioning as deputy consul general at the Indian Consulate in New York.

Soon after her arrest, the Indian government hastily transferred Khobragade to the permanent mission of India to the United Nations (UN), hoping that that this would give her the necessary Diplomatic immunity from arrest. Diplomatically this move was a “by the book” maneuver.

Question: If she had Diplomatic Immunity, why was she transferred to the permanent mission?

Question: If she had Diplomatic Immunity, why was a formal official application forwarded to U.S. authorities for full Diplomatic immunity AFTER she was arrested? Legally the Indian government should have, could have stood their ground, if they really believed that she had diplomatic immunity in the first place; because that’s what they were shouting about through their malfunctioning megaphones from the beginning. Right…Yes…No….Maybe… Continue reading Of Indians and Justice – The Khobragade Affair: Godfrey Pereira →

Bad ideas, Culture, Everyday Life, Genders, Identities, Law, Sex

Why I prefer the company of homophobic people: Anonymous

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Guest post by ANONYMOUS

It may be a strange thing for a gay man to say, but I welcome the Supreme Court judgement re-criminalising the sexual acts I feel naturally inclined to engage in.

As someone who chooses to admit to his sexuality only before other gay men, and that too very selectively, you could call me closeted. Which means that I don’t feel as unfortunate as the ‘out’ lot which feels as though Indian law is asking it to go back into the closet.

I personally welcome the Supreme Court judgement because it will drill some sense of reality into my straight liberal friends who keep pestering, taunting, hinting, trying to make me say, ‘I am gay’. They will realise that there’s enough homophobia out there, enough of it for the Indian Supreme Court, considered a liberal institution, to re-criminalise ‘unnatural sex’. That gives me some semblance of an excuse, or so I hope, to remain closeted. Continue reading Why I prefer the company of homophobic people: Anonymous →

Debates, Genders, Sex

Homosexuality and Islam – Indian Muslims’ Responses: Abhay Kumar

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Guest Post by ABHAY KUMAR 

No sooner had the Muslim minority of India come to terms with a sudden surge of the Hindu right BJP in four assembly elections, seen as the ‘semi-final’ ahead of the General Election scheduled for early 2014, than their attention was gripped by yet another controversy. On December 11, 2013, the Supreme Court recriminalized homosexuality, overruling the three-year old  judgment of Delhi High Court.[1] The bench comprising Justice G.S. Singhvi and S.J. Mukhopadaya ruled that homosexuality or unnatural sex between two consenting adults under section 377 of Indian Penal Code (IPC) is an offence.[2] The judgment has evoked mixed response. The political elites and parties[3] along with religious leaders have responded in more than one way and some have supported the Supreme Court judgement while others are against it.[4]  But a strong protest against the verdict has been lodged by progressive, left circles backed up by English language media.[5]

Contrary to this, Muslim religious leaders and those politicians whose primary constituency is the Muslim belt, have wholeheartedly welcomed the ruling. While the English language media has acted as a ‘torch-bearer of liberal’ values, the Urdu press, on the other hand, has fought a spirited battle against the western ‘disease’. [6]

However, unlike these ‘guardians’ of the community, there are some other Muslim voices, who have broadly opposed criminalising people on the basis of their sexual orientation. This paper attempts to discuss the responses of Indian Muslims on the question of homosexuality. Continue reading Homosexuality and Islam – Indian Muslims’ Responses: Abhay Kumar →

Countryside, Politics, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

Independent inquiry into Muzaffarnagar ‘Riots’: Mohan Rao, Ish Mishra, Pragya Singh, Vikas Bajpai

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Press Statement on the Report  prepared by Mohan Rao, Ish Mishra, Pragya Singh and Vikas Bajpai                                                                                

December 30, 2013

A team of independent academics and a journalist carried out an inquiry into the communal violence that shook Muzaffarnagar district in UP this past September. The report is based on the findings of the team during its visit to Muzaffarnagar district on the 9th and the 10th of November and again on the 27th November. The members of the team were:

  • Dr. Mohan Rao, Faculty, Centre for Social Medicine and Community Health, JNU.
  • Mr Ish Misra, Faculty, Department of Political Science, Hindu College, Delhi University.
  • Ms.Pragya Singh, Journalist, Outlook, and
  • Dr. Vikas Bajpai, Ph.D. Scholar, Centre for Social Medicine and Community Health, JNU.

The team also drew upon the assistance of Dr. Subhash Tyagi, Professor of Geography, Machra College, Meerut, and Praveen Raj Tyagi, Principal Greenland Public School, Duhai, Ghaziabad, in the collection of some data and the conduct of the visit.

OBJECTIVES OF OUR ENQUIRY:

  1. To investigate the role of state agencies in either preventing or containing violence, in taking appropriate punitive actions against the guilty and also to investigate some incidents of communal violence.
  2. To investigate the role of the government in providing relief and rehabilitating the displaced and the progress made in displaced people going back to their villages and homes.
  3. To understand economic, social and political reasons that led to the recent spate of communal violence in this area of Western Uttar Pradesh. Continue reading Independent inquiry into Muzaffarnagar ‘Riots’: Mohan Rao, Ish Mishra, Pragya Singh, Vikas Bajpai →
Culture, Education, Images

Freezing History in a Pedagogy-proof Textbook: Kishore Darak

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Guest Post by KISHORE DARAK

In the current academic year, the fourth grade history textbook in Maharashtra titled Shivchhatrapati depicting the valiant life of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj (1630-1680) completed 43 long years of its existence, this being in itself a record. More than 3 million children in the 75000 plus schools affiliated to the Maharashtra State Board follow the textbook presently. It is probably the only example of textbook in the world which teaches the life of a single historical personality to 9 year old pupils.

The textbook shows remarkable similarity with a 1952 Marathi film, Chhatrapati Shivaji, directed by Bhalji Pendharkar who is known for his support of right wing ideology. The original version of 1970 and subsequent editions of the textbook follow an exact sequence of scenes and contain similar visuals as we see in the movie, as the first two images demonstrate.

Meeting between Afzhal Khan and Shivaji Maharaj 

In the 1952 film

Untitled 3In the text-book (Republished 2000)

Untitled 4

Continue reading Freezing History in a Pedagogy-proof Textbook: Kishore Darak →

Bad ideas, Debates, Everyday Life, Identities

Cultures of Servitude and the Khobragade-Richard Issue: Nissim Mannathukkaren

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Guest Post by Nissim Mannathukkaren

When the great lord passes the wise peasant bows deeply and silently farts. (Ethiopian proverb)

When progressive politics finds itself in agreement with Arnab Goswami, then it is time for the alarm bells to ring. What has been unfolding over the last week has been nothing but spectacular: a wronged and humiliated ‘Third World’ nation (finally) standing up to the imperialist Satan over the Devyani Khobragade episode. A story supposedly fit for lore. But in reality it would have been comical only if it did not have serious consequences.

What is comical is a nation whose elites and middle classes are perfectly in sync with the American worldview (India is among the top America-loving nations in the world) and think that America is the epitome of democracy (a survey from a couple of years ago showed that Indians, more than any other people in the world, think that the United States is a multilateral rather than a unilateral actor), whose students and youth dream the American dream (the largest number of foreign students in America are from India), whose rulers salivate at the prospect of an eternal soiree with the American establishment (after all, the Indo-American strategic partnership has been called the ‘defining alliance of the 21st century’) have suddenly woken up to the rude reality that maybe the Americans do not think about us in the same way! Hence our petulant reactions – like a spurned lover.  Continue reading Cultures of Servitude and the Khobragade-Richard Issue: Nissim Mannathukkaren →

Everyday Life, Feminism, Sex, Violence/Conflict

Ganguly Must Go – Chairs of Rights Bodies Must be Above Reproach

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Statement from Women’s Groups Across India on 16 December 2013

Exactly one year ago, the gang-rape of a young woman triggered immense outrage across the board, putting freedom from rape and sexual assault at the forefront of public debate. From law reform to overhaul of institutions of justice delivery, from media sensitization to public awareness, women’s safety is now squarely on the public agenda, thanks to mass protests. Ironically, during those very protests, on 24 December 2012, a young lawyer revealed that a retired judge of the highest court in land had sexually harassed her while she was working with him as an intern, and that she was unable to speak about it only ten months later.

According to her statement, Justice (Retd) A.K. Ganguly currently the Chairman of the West Bengal Human Rights Commission said, “’You know that I’m attracted to you, don’t you? You must be thinking, what, this old man is getting drunk and saying such things. But I really like you, I love you’. When I tried to move away, he kissed my arm and repeated that he loved me.” This is not merely inappropriate behavior by a senior over junior staff or interns; it is not merely over-stepping of boundaries; it is not merely friendly overtures: such acts constitute a clear case of abuse of power and sexual harassment at the workplace.  Continue reading Ganguly Must Go – Chairs of Rights Bodies Must be Above Reproach →

Debates, Feminism, Genders, Sex

Suresh Koushal v. Naz Foundation: Pratiksha Baxi

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Suresh Koushal v. Naz Foundation directs law’s violence on the body of the Constitution of India. Proclaiming colonial law as constitutional, the Supreme Court negates its role in the making of postcolonial constitutionalism. It departs from the theatres of comparative constitutionalism in the post–colonies, which used Naz to strengthen their battles against Macaulay’s legacies. Today the Supreme Court is cited amongst the infamous precedents of injustice that mark Indian legal history. Dubbed as ADM Jabalpur 2, the judgment declares sexual emergency on LGBT communities. By breathing life into s. 377, the Supreme Court attaches a badge of stigma on the body of Constitution.

Taking a jurispathic turn, the Supreme Court asserts that equality is subservient to scale by claiming that the LGBT community is a “miniscule fraction of the country’s population”. Inventing the category of a miniscule minority, the Supreme Court implies that equality provisions will apply only to numerically preponderant body populations. Thereby, overwriting equality jurisprudence by the insidious politics of numbers.  Continue reading Suresh Koushal v. Naz Foundation: Pratiksha Baxi →

Genders, Law, Right watch, Sex

Section 377 and India Shining: Pronoy Rai

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Guest Post by PRONOY RAI

It is 2004 all over again. India is shining. Such a difference a decade can make. BJP is on the verge of returning to power, Modi could be India’s next Prime Minister, and the many failures of the UPA could give a new lease of life to Hindutva, if it was dead at all. As India shines, the state (its judicial arm, in this case) has abandoned the queers, questioning their claim to the status of “minority”, rendering them vulnerable to brutality at the hands of the hetero-normative society and other arms of the state (police, for instance), in equal measures. Other minority groups, strangely, or perhaps not so strangely, fought against the claim to citizenship of a (sexual) minority group, decisively defeating them at the altar of justice. 

Some of us queers, who stuck to every single word that was written in 2004 that went on to show how agrarian distress, farmer suicides, and saffronization of education didn’t quite add up to a shining India, were left puzzled by the reaction of the BJP to the Supreme Court verdict upholding section 377 in its original, pristine self. You’d think that the shrewd right-wing would take on the first opportunity to invoke a very obvious ancient Indian “culture of homosexuality” to make a progressive argument in favor of decriminalization. You’d assume that in a ravaging hunger to return to power, they would try to bring on board every single group that they can, maybe only later to abandon them, but at least carry them along through elections. Alas, no. For the BJP, India is still shining, and this shining confidence is perhaps sufficient to help them march into 7 Race Course Road, next year.  Continue reading Section 377 and India Shining: Pronoy Rai →

Debates, Genders, Law, Sex

An anti-constitutional judgement: Johannes Manjrekar

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Guest Post by JOHANNES MANJREKAR

The ruling by a two-member bench of the Supreme Court, striking down the judgement of the Delhi high Court which had held that Article 377 – a pre-Constitution, 19th century colonial-era law – violated the spirit and directive principles of the Indian Constitution, seems to break new ground in jurisprudence. In an era where governments worldwide have been engaged in systematically rolling back hard-won civil liberties and individual rights and violating constitutionally guaranteed freedoms and principles, one might be excused for believing that the most urgent duty of an independent judiciary endowed with a reasonable degree of conviction and courage, would be to curb the transgressions of governments against the principles laid down in their own constitutions. The recent ruling of the SC does little to encourage such a belief. Continue reading An anti-constitutional judgement: Johannes Manjrekar →

Debates, Genders

On the SC judgement on Sec 377: Statement from TISS teachers

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It is with deep shock and disappointment that we received the regressive judgment of the Supreme Court dated 11-12-13, on the reading down of Section 377 of the IPC related to the rights of queer (lesbian bisexual gay and transgender…) people in this country, which reverted the decriminalisation of non-normative sexualities following the Delhi High Court judgement in 2009.

The Delhi High Court had based its expansive judgement on the eloquent discussion of constitutional morality by the framers of our Constitution, especially Dr. Ambedkar. Constitutional morality, they argued is the basis for equality of citizens since public morality which is largely the morality of the dominant forces in society can never guarantee democracy, and perhaps even more importantly equality and dignity to its citizens, especially its most marginal citizens. Additionally, The Delhi High Court judgement evoked the spirit of dignity, inclusiveness and non-discrimination, thereby emphasizing equality of all citizens that Nehru spoke of during the Constituent Assembly debates, so necessary for the deeply hierarchical social fabric that our country represents. Continue reading On the SC judgement on Sec 377: Statement from TISS teachers →

Feminism, Sex

The Misogyny of India’s Cultural Elite: Kavita Bhanot

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Guest post by KAVITA BHANOT

Thanks to the brave actions of a woman who had the courage to speak out against her very powerful boss, something huge has happened in the last week in India. The very sophisticated, cosmopolitan English-speaking cultural elite of India has been forced, for once, to look at itself, to face up to the sexism and misogyny that it has long harboured.

For many years this elite has been protesting, exposing, judging, mocking the patriarchy of the lower classes – of the policeman, the religious fundamentalist, the ‘unpolished’ politician, the working class urban migrant, the eve-teaser on the street.  But rarely have the men, or the women of this class, looked, in public, at themselves – the men examining their attitude towards women and the women thinking about their own complicity, the ways in which they have allowed or turned a blind eye to the misogyny of the men of their own class.

Neither the incident, nor Shoma Chaudhury’s response to it, surprises me in the least. In the time that I spent in this world, it became quickly apparent to me that deeply entrenched in the suave, cosmopolitan world of English language media, literature, art – were problematic attitudes towards women that neither the men or the women seemed to question.

Continue reading The Misogyny of India’s Cultural Elite: Kavita Bhanot →