Why Must Poo Become Parvati? - A Deep Dive on the Intersection of Indian Feminism, Its Disavowal and Nationalism

According to Maitrayee Chaudhuri’s introduction to her collection of volumes on Women’s Studies in India, it was found that when it comes to the  acceptance of Feminist thought in India there are two primary problems. Firstly, feminism is often associated with Westernism and a dilution of Indian traditional ideals. Secondly, there is also an ambivalence towards the terms “feminist” and “feminism”, with many prolific women like Sarojini Naidu and Madhu Kishwar refusing to identify themselves as the former, probably due to a perceived lack of applicability in the Indian context. While it is true that a lot of Western feminism cannot be applied to the Indian society, (they may be more similar than we think as income disparity, working attitudes and intersectionality are fault lines along which even Western feminism is divided), it can be said that a lot of the Indian disavowal of feminism comes from nationalist and cultural anxiety.

Our connection to feminism, in recent public memory, is a colonial one, where our erstwhile imperialists did away with practices such as Sati and child marriage, but also necessitated the upliftment of women to join the nationalist movement in our fight for freedom. This can be a reason why there is a hesitation to fully understand and engage with the concept of female liberation and feminism. While it cannot be said that Indian feminism should begin with colonialism, it cannot be ignored that through the modernization and information imparted by colonialism, many Indian practices have been recast and questioned, and changed the understanding of autonomy, agency and liberty of women. 

To counteract the anxieties arising out of the seemingly Western influence of feminism, there has been an essentializing of “Indian culture” (put in quotes because Indian culture is diverse and cannot be defined under one homogeneous banner) by many Indian feminists who have used Hindu iconography– like that of Kali Mata and Sanskrit idioms denoting female power to display the ‘Indian empowered women’. This has inadvertently strengthened the communal idea that ‘Indian’, ‘Hindu’ and ‘Sanskrit’ are synonymous. It must also be noted that this colonial anxiety leads to a solidification of majoritarian communal thought in feminist theory – which doubly marginalized women from other minority religions and those from lower caste leading to further exclusion.

It is interesting to learn where this colonial anxiety comes from. In India, feminism and nationalism have been closely linked, because the liberation movement revolved around freedom for both men and women. However, there is another dimension that relates it to the question of women which is that of a national personification. To quote Charu Gupta, a Reader at the University of Delhi, who wrote an article in the Economics and Political Weekly -  “In the construction of nationalism, the modern nation has often been explicitly imagined through gendered metaphors, particularly that of the female body”. Like The French have the Marianne, the Greeks have Hellas or Elada, the Germans have Germania and we have Bharat Mata.

It is important to note and analyze the role of the ‘mother’ given to our nationalist personification as compared to The Marianne is a symbol of liberty, freedom and reason during the French Revolution, while Germania is depicted to be a heroine who stands guard with an imperial sword and protects her nation. Both of these are political concepts, so why is it that the Bharat Mata is a mother? While it can be said that since the mother is responsible for the survival and nurture of her progeny, Bharat Mata is given the role of both the protector and nurturer. This has positive and heartwarming connotations and is a product of its time, a time when Indians were called upon to fight for their freedom, this emotional connection aroused by projecting a human relationship onto the relationship between nation and citizen was effective. However, this has seeped into the post-colonial consciousness of our country, and tends to have negative impacts on the women of India, as the identity of India itself is projected onto every individual. Not only that, but due to patriarchal traditions, the honor of every household is also said to be in the hands of the women of that household.

These undue and unnecessary projections enable people to question and even limit the actions of women who are repressed and their agency as a human are severely limited. Instead of being seen as humans, having their own identity and freedoms, dreams and principles, their decisions and goals are questioned and labeled as “modern” or “Indian” as they are seen as extensions of the cultural identity of India itself.This labeling of women as “modern” in a derogatory way and “traditional” in a positive way, is an insidious form of control and repression and is a repercussion of the cultural anxiety of keeping Indian tradition alive, even the traditions that aren’t exactly beneficial. These labels are also seen in mainstream media and are a way of making these ideals more attractive to younger women, to encourage conformity. This is done by making the “traditional” soft spoken, self-sacrificing sari clad women more attractive, and the final subject of the attraction of the male lead, or by making them the symbol of “real” femininity which nurtures, by making them the foil of the westernized, English speaking, shorts clad girl who is narcissistic and immoral, whose life is ruined due to her bad (western) ideals. The reformed western girl who comes to her senses and learns that true satisfaction for a woman is sacrifice and nurturing those around her is also a favorite.

An example of this phenomena is the dialogue “Poo bani Parvati” in the Bollywood movie “Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham” where the character ‘Poo’, who is known to be flamboyant and fashion-forward, not caring about modesty when it comes to her style, dresses up like a chaste Indian woman, in a traditional outfit. When another character calls her out for this change in her personality as she acts coy for her love interest she says “It’s the Indian touch”. Her acting as a coy, shy and traditional woman to be more “Indian” and attract her love interest. This dialogue has become embedded in the consciousness of the audience, with people using it as a joke to display their outfits on social media, but the true implications of this term are limited due to the context in which it occurs in the film.  

Why must Poo become “Parvati” to have the “Indian touch”? Her being characterized as western when she is bold and confident whereas being shown as being in touch with her Indian roots when she acts coy and covers her head with a dupatta is troubling, implying that a true Indian woman is not bold or confident and openly loving of herself.

These portrayals of the “real” Indian woman comes at a cost, for those who do not fit in these criterias:the non Hindus, those whose personalities clash with the patriarchal standard, those whose goals and principles are not buried and sacrificed to fit what is dictated. It causes women to bring down women, while patriarchy is all the better for it.It is important for people to realize that women are fundamentally human beings, who are more than just symbols of honor of the household, the clan, or the country, who deserve to assert their personal liberties or freedoms without worrying about how they fit into the mold of a “good Indian woman.”