Veiled implications

So now it's the "denim purdah" that is supposed to boost the confidence of Muslim women, according to a Kozhikode-based company that has proudly introduced the concept. The company's managing director says it is targeting "college-goers and young professionals".

Incredibly, the state president of something called the Girls Islamic Organisation of India (GIOI) has approved. She has deemed it "suitable dress" that would "make them look cute", according to a report. Also, we are told, the material for this outfit is made from denim that is 8 oz per square against the standard weight of 11 oz per square yard that is used for traditional jeans. How about that.

If anything reflects the confusion that lies at the heart of religious fundamentalism and women's rights, it is this concept. But let's assume that Messrs Hoorulyn Pardha Shop, to give the company its full name, has introduced this concept as a well-meaning gesture and really, truly thinks it is empowering Muslim women in some way. Maybe its management has noted the strictures that are issued from time to time by various university authorities (usually withdrawn after an uproar) to ask girl students - only girls, mind - to dress "decently", the most recent being in Aligarh Muslim University. Let's also assume that some Muslim women, especially members of the GIOI, which appears to be a "daughter organisation" of the Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, actually do think it is a great concept.

If that really is the case, there's a depressing message to be read about the state of women's rights in India. In case anyone thinks this is a problem confined to fundamentalist Islam, look only to the Ram Sene and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. Worthies of both these organisations appear to think that women drinking in bars and scantily clad shop-window dummies provoke depravity in women or encourage it in men. And the arbiters of women's behaviour and dress cut across both the religious and gender divide, since the proposal to cover up shop-window dummies came from a woman.

The odd thing is that none of these people and their ilk appear to have similar problems with the way men dress or behave. If women must be covered from head to foot or dress "decently" and behave in a certain way, according to seriously dated notions in religious texts and beliefs, it is somehow okay for men to wander about in public in shorts and banians - or less - as they appear to do with increasing frequency in a north Indian summer. Nor do the interpreters of religious texts demand that men not do the following in public: abuse in the most vulgar terms, leer, grope and scratch themselves, to name just a few habits.

The "denim purdah" reflects this dichotomy, though it is unclear whether Hoorulyn is turning out the head-to-toe garment (burqa) or the semi-circular veil (chador) or some variant thereof - probably the former, if Kerala's Gulf links are considered. Either way, it is ironic that the fabric that has long been the symbol of personal freedom in the western world is being leveraged to perpetuate a symbol of oppression in the name of progress. Purdah, after all, is not just a garment; it also represents an attitude of sequestering women. Nor is it an exclusively Islamic custom; it is still imposed in some Hindu families in the form of the ghoonghat.

Thanks to the efforts of western feminists, especially after the Taliban imposed its twisted version of Sharia law in Afghanistan, the burqa, chador and headscarf became potent symbols of women's oppression. But this, too, may not be a valid assessment. Indeed, when Mustafa Kemal banned the practice in Turkey, the reaction was ambivalent and the tensions between Islamisation and westernisation are visible in that country to this day. To be fair to Ataturk, his sartorial stricture also covered men since he decreed western-wear as the attire of choice of the progressive.

Western feminism's view that the burqa and so on be scrapped altogether is no more logical than the Taliban's view that it should be compulsory. In a progressive, secular country women should be free to choose to wear whatever they feel most comfortable in wherever they are, just as men do. In countries like Egypt (till recently at least), Malaysia and Indonesia currently the choice of garment rests with women.

That is why the "denim purdah" is a disturbing concept. It suggests that women will be allowed some degree of freedom - to go to college, work and so on - but within limits imposed by some arbitrary diktat that is not imposed on men. Commentators have sometimes pointed out that wearing purdah-like garments has not prevented Saudi women, for example, from being extremely accomplished professionals. True, but Saudi Arabia is hardly a beacon of women's rights either - it ranks 145 out of 186 countries in the United Nation's Gender Inequality Index. Not that India does much better at rank 132. Seriously, no matter how "cute" girls will look in "denim purdah", it is not a concept that should be encouraged.