HVK Archives: Why housewife Rabri is outclassed; and a comment
Why housewife Rabri is outclassed; and a comment - The Times of India
Sanghamitra Chakraborty
()
3 August 1997
Title: Why housewife Rabri is outclassed; and a comment
Author: Sanghamitra Chakraborty
Publication: The Times of India
Date: August 3, 1997
The outrage against the new Bihar chief minister has more to do with gender
and class prejudice, finds out Sanghamitra Chakraborty
So the urban middle-class is outraged at the journey that Rabri Devi has
made from her kitchen to the CM's office. What exactly is going on, they
want to know. A mere housewife plonked on the chief minister's chair?
Fifth standard, nine children and no experience out side the rasoighar'?
Put Malai in place of Rabri and you won't know the difference. With this
precedent, which way could gender politics in India be headed?
"I think this outrage is extremely hypocritical - it's shameful the way
educated people are flinching at Rabri Devi's kitchen-to-CM transition,"
says Brinda Karat, of the All India Democratic Women's Association (AIDWA).
She and a host of others concerned with gender issues are reacting sharply
to the typically "upper-class, patriarchal responses" to the entire episode.
They do not, for a moment, support the politics of proxy and are almost
certain it is incidental that Laloo chose a woman to sit in for him. What
disturbs them are the elitist responses to her entry into the CM's office.
Asks Karat: "How can you question anybody's right to share political power
or where they came from in a democracy? There are people who have come in
from the fields or elsewhere. Why is it that an issue is being made of the
kitchen?"
Sure, Rabri Devi has been the talking point everywhere this past week. As
news of her ascent to power spread, she became top-ofthe-mind entertainment
for TV-watching Indians, as though Laloo's ventriloquism act was actually a
medley of sorts - nautanki, striptease and circus rolled into one. Nobody
pulled their punches when it came to Laloo Prasad's politics. But
somewhere along the way, Rabri Devi became the protagonist of a freak-show.
"The bias is against the Rabris of the world - not the Sonias and the
Priyankas," says Indu Agnihotri of the Janawadi Mahila Samity (JMS).
"Indira Gandhi was an enlightened woman leading a hoodlum brigade, but
clearly there is a class bias here. The public outcry is somehow stronger
when it comes to people from Rabri Devi's background."
Sushila Kaushik, of the Centre for Women's Development Studies at Delhi
University, goes one step further. She sees this as exploitation of the
worst kind, wondering if Rabri Devi's husband even offered her a choice
when he had decided on his successor. "Unlikely. Laloo Yadav knows he can
get her off the seat if/when he returns, which he cannot do to his son or
nephew," she adds. Like Kamal Nath did to his wife Alka and Kalpanath Rai
to Sudha.
But could this kind of proxy rule, where the man holds the remote control
key, become rampant when the women's Bill comes through? Is there a danger
that men like Laloo Yadav will put their womenfolk as stooges in Parliament
- whereby they would have paid lip service to gender politics, while
retaining control? Wouldn't this negate the whole purpose of reservation?
Agnihotri, a strong proponent of the women's Bill, answers: "I do not
believe in a biological notion of empowerment. It's not as though women
should speak for women and men should mind their own business. How
representative of the people are our MPs anyway? How representative is Uma
Bharati of the women's cause?"
So the question here is nor how representative Rabri Devi is of the gender
cause, but to what extent she can exercise her authority as a CM, as an
individual, as a woman. "Exactly," says Chhaya Datar, head of the women's
studies unit at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai.
"While I agree that this is a patriarchal strategy, you can't view this
case in isolation. It doesn't concern gender politics alone, it has to do
with the entire Indian political scenario and its debasement."
In fact, Anand Patwardhan, activist and documentary film-maker finds the
Rabri-Laloo imbroglio less dangerous than "the things we tolerate in this
country, such as the fascist government in Maharashtra". Patwardhan too is
annoyed at the class bias that is evident in our body politic. That
Mumbai's elite will not speak up against politicians in Maharashtra because
they are more sophisticated than Laloo and his wife, according to him, is a
manifestation of the same ill.
"Nobody minds Harshad Mehta and Narasimha Rao but Laloo is intolerable
because of the way he looks and speaks," says Patwardhan, hastening to add,
"This is not a defence of Laloo - I have no love lost for him. He should
certainly go to jail for his misdeeds, but then everyone else should go in
as well. Let Narasimha Rao have pride of place and the rest follow."
Meanwhile, a& MPs strive to block the women's Bill and haggle over the
share of seats in Parliament, Mrs Laloo Yadav will keep her husband's chair
warm for him. Or will she? Mr Rabri Devi may just find himself badly
surprised.
(With inputs from Radha Rajadhyaksha in Mumbai)
COMMENT
Articles like there are a sample of the level of intellectualism in India.
Back
Top
|
