False Gender Consciousness

In my present charge in a remote block of a backward district in the state of Madhya Pradesh, I received a complaint from a woman. The complaint pertained to a sexual assault done on her by a man who is presently in jail and there is a compensation amount that he is to pay her. The woman carried a letter from the Jail which required her to furnish her a few documents to claim that money. One of the documents that she was required to produce was a certification of her Photo Identity card by the Gram Panchayat. I had no jurisdiction over either the case of sexual assault nor over the payment of the compensation. The complaint also did not pertain to either of them. The complaint was against the Sarpanch of the village for denying to certify the Photo Idenitification card. I, in my present role, looking after village panchayats, was expected to ask the Sarpanch to do what he is obliged to do.

In an attempt to provide speedy relief to the aggrieved woman, I decided that rather than writing a letter to the concerned Sarpanch or the Panchayat Secretary, I would rather talk to the Sarpanch and get done with the issue. I had my office call up the Sarpanch who turned out to be a lady. I thought my job would be easier as a female Sarpanch would understand the agony of another woman. I thought that probably the husband of the Sarpanch may have denied signing the certificate, assuming, that like many other villages, the lady Sarpanch must have become a rubber stamp in front of her husband. I saw this as an opportunity to help two women simultaneously; helping one get a certificate and helping the other assert her political power to help a fellow woman.

I called up the Sarpanch and was shocked when the lady on the phone told me that the complainant is characterless and is wrongly implicating the man, who turned out to be a member of the Sarpanch's family. Between choosing to side with an assaulted woman and a man of her family, her choice was natural. She pleaded that I should ask the complainant to settle the matter out of legal boundaries. I denied doing any of those and told the Sarpanch that neither I nor she has the jurisdiction of deciding the case of sexual assault on its merits. All she has to do is to certifiy the Photo Identity or else I shall be forced to take action against her for misusing her political authority to favour or deny rights to individuals. Despite my initial reluctance to do paper work on such a minor issue as to get a signature, I was compelled to issue a show cause notice to the Sarpanch to do her duty or to face legal expulsion by the competent authority.

What left me disturbed was that our understanding of women and villages is so distant and unrealistic. I have often been criticised as a chauvinist when I point out that most cases of physical and mental torture against women in their home is done by a woman of the husband's family and that there is no such thing as women solidarity in our existing society. Most of the abuses of being characterless are being hurled upon women from fellow women. The hatred that sex workers face mostly come from house wives. Despite being given political power in form of reservations and local governance, women are not able to think beyond the boundaries of family, clan, caste etc and their decisions are marked by these prejudices. 

For a brief time that I had to take statements of rape victims in my earlier assignment, I saw that while the mother of the victim was mostly the person who gave her courage to file a complaint, I also saw that the accused was either from the victim's family or a known person and in almost all cases, the wife or mother of the accused blamed the victim to be characterless and wrongly accusing the man. At these times, one gets confused when all women are termed as victims of violence or assault by men. That is too simplistic an understanding of the problem. Women are segmented into as many divisions as men are. The economic and physical exploitation of domestic servants (mostly women) also happen at the hands of women home owners. 

This is not to say that patriarchal mindset is not the root cause of women related problems. It definitely is. And the prime reason of a woman's exploitation in most of the cases is a man. What is disturbing is that patriarchy is not being kept in operation just by men alone. The women too have a 'false gender consciousness' and are as much a carrier of patriarchy as men are. The cases of mother-in-laws torturing daughter-in-laws are so common that the television is full of soap operas on the subject. The cases of female foeticide and female infanticide are also mostly occurring either with the will of or due to silence of the grandmothers of the babies. The fact that the power of mother-in-laws over their daughter-in-laws is mostly exercised through the 'man-in-between' speaks about an undisclosed facet of Indian patriarchal family.

Thankfully the tribal societies fare well when it comes to gender equality, at least statistically. The block that I am posted in, has a Sex ratio of 1000 plus as the societal culture of the tribes in this area does not differentiate much between men and women. Drinking is common between both genders but the problem of drunkardness is predominantly male. Similarly, the gender ratio in schools is again in favour of girls. In most of the political bodies at the village or the block level, women have started exercising their powers themselves, not asking their husbands anymore. Yet I do find incidents of sexual assault on women and in such cases the victimised woman is mostly left alone to fend for herself, the rest of the women immediately blaming her as characterless. It is no wonder that in urban educated class as well, the moment a woman complaints of sexual harassment in office, 'slut' is the first remark that fellow female workers pass on that woman. Most women refrain from complaining just because they are too scared to face the judgemental looks of the fellow female employees.

I know I am soundning chauvinist again, but that's not the point. The solution to women's problems can never be found with men. They have to be found with women. Women need to feel more connected to other women. From a 'false gender consciousness' of beauty, 'laaj-sharam' and family duties, women need to gain a 'true gender consciousness' of their real existence and the reasons for their exploitation. Or else a man will always exploit the animosity of a woman against the other. 

Afterword: apologies in advance for simplistic and sweeping arguements.