Dreams for India : E to W

“Be to her virtues very kind,

Be to her faults a little blind.”

~Matthew Prior

On most days when I take the C-52 Express bus to college, I often find myself to be the only woman on the bus. And my mind goes, “It’s a man’s World”. Sigh.

Wo(e)men.

In a disclaimer sort of a sense, I’d like to clarify, I am not a feminist. I’m not the one to go form those women's groups & wear pixie hair with no makeup & no jewellery. I’m your minimal jewelry & make up types. Like a bit of length & volume in my hair. Prefer being the change than protesting about one.

So this post comes from an urban girl who loves being one and has big dreams for the women kind -for the nation. There is a necessary, almost –obvious- in -the -21-st –century- hyphen between those words in the preceding sentence. Because No, they are not two separate things. Anyone who thinks otherwise isn’t ever going to be sharing a coffee with me. And I think this bluntness is the strength of feminism, not what the opposite sex feels an unnecessary layer to our species. But you know Us, we HAVE to talk. And me, well, I HAVE to write.

It’s weird how easily I’ve come to use the word species to refer to my kind. We normally say species when we talk of a newly discovered bunch of animals/plants, or when we refer to the extinct ones. Are you reading between the lines already? Tsk.

Just around 145 kilometers from where I live, there are only 801 females per 1000 males. This was around 795 a few months ago. Welcome to Beed district, Maharashtra. What a way to put yourself on the map!

This district is from the state which gave us,“Mulgi Shikali, Pragati Zaali”. 
 My question is -“Pan Muli aahet kuthe?” And a piece of cheeky advice to the State Government & Beed’s Municipality & its people that I’d give, “Please start embracing homosexuality. With a ratio like that, it’s either polygamy or that for your boys! ”

I read this Tweet about an ongoing socially loved TV talk show hosted by one of India’s leading male cine artists‘ about its first episode (which incidentally was on female feoticide) : “India’s female feoticide situation is so bad that our Oprah Winfrey is a man.” And with the above statistics, isn’t it appallingly the truest thing ever?

So now the government pushes the panic button. There is a crackdown on medical centers which determine the sex of the feotus, which is illegal in this country. We are the largest democracy in the world. But we probably have the largest number of prohibitions & rules. Why because we are like that, we want to have our cake and eat it too. We want progress & development, but we are corrupt. We want change, but we are frightened to start being it. We want to be able to enjoy some drinks with friends on weekends and let our hair down, but we have “culture issues”. We want to get great jobs, but we don’t study. We hit panic buttons, but we murder whistleblowers. We blog, but we don’t believe.

 The United Nations and every person of sound and visionary idealisms would agree and emphasize that the crying need of the hour is women’s education and overall development. Yes we have schemes, yes we have success stories. And oh yes, we also wake up to read in the newspapers that according to a G20 poll by Trust Law, Thomson Reuters Foundation in 2012,India is the WORST place to be born as a woman. My heart sinks. On reading that the cynic in me screams out, “Nothing will change here. Don’t foolishly dream for your kind.”

The feminists & social activists must be pulling their (already short) hair out when they hear about such catastrophes in modern day India. But is creating a hue and cry and protesting about it the solution? Never! Changing the mindset of this country’s male dominated society is not the easiest job in the world. I agree. But can’t we make a conscious effort to start with a better plan than the already existing ones? Can’t we try and make everyone realize the importance of the womankind to this nation and its future? Can’t we especially ensure stricter laws and the severest form of punishment to those who treat our kind wrong? Can’t we make ways for faster and improved justice and pathways towards the developing 591.4 million of the total 628.8 million of this country? Can’t we above all understand that if we don’t respect womankind and give Her the love, the respect and the opportunities She deserves, there won’t be mothers, teachers, nurses, wives, friends, lovers, daughters, ministers, CEO’s etc. for us? There won’t be that woman wearing green bangles in Beed or any other place who sports red powder on the space between her partitioned hair over her forehead who toils hard as a farm help or house help, or maybe even as a sex- worker and brings home money to the drunkard whom she calls husband, and who physically and verbally abuses her, and still lives with him and wakes up early the next day to provide for her children and the man who doesn’t realize and thus doesn’t value the extent of what she’s doing  for the family.

I’m quite sure women are not asking for a superior position in this country, Nor are they asking for a revolution. My voice is their sound. And my words now are their thoughts. Give them some love. Treat them, if not as equals, at least as humans. Give them they the respect they deserve. Please Educate them. Give them a chance to opportunities. Most importantly, firstly just give them a chance to enter this world. Because I, and I’m sure many others don’t want to ever hear: “It's a miracle a woman survives in India. Even before she is born, she is at risk of being aborted due to our obsession for sons.” Nor do we want to hear the words: Rape, Dowry, Domestic Violence, Sexual harassment and Abuse.

I can’t predict about the future. I am saddened when I hear about how my kind is being ill-treated. Fed to dogs, burnt alive, left to die; literally. I am frightened like most others about my safety. All I know is that I love being a woman and am proud of it. I know that we deserve better. And I also know that we are the future. And that we are fighters. Fighters for a better Future. OUR better future.

 My mind most often has its opinion out first while in retrospect.  So it is definitely not the nicest thing travelling with around 20 or more strange men in a bus for 45 minutes. But when I see that I being the only lady, who steps off the bus to step into the process of a higher education degree, a better future not just for me, but the benefit or society at large, contributing in my own little way, I look at these laborers and small time office goers’ and my heart says:” It does look like a man’s world. But here I am on my way towards success and I know, without my kind; this world would so be incomplete.”

Wo(w)men.

Sources: TOI, June 2012