Stories of conviction and contribution of Indian Muslim women, who “gave up the purdah” and were at “the forefront of the nationalist and feminist discourse” in the past century are on display here.
The exhibition on 21 “pathbreakers” opened for public view on Saturday.
Organised by Muslim Women’s Forum at the India International Centre (IIC), the show “Pathbreakers: The Twentieth Century Muslim Women of India” features women who remain largely unheard of and unsung in the mainstream narrative.
During and after the freedom movement, a note on the exhibition said, many Muslim women shed the ‘purdah’ and became partners in the project to build a new India.
They went on to become writers, teachers, artists, scientists, lawyers, educators, political workers, trade unions, MPs, and MLAs.
“With a few exceptions, most of them have been forgotten in time.”
The show, inaugurated by author-filmmaker Syeda Imam (granddaughter of early 20th century writer-educator Tyaba Khedive Jung), embodies the spirit of the active contribution of these women, and as Imam said, “were not in the recesses of home and kitchen”.
Far from the commonly-held impression of silenced, cloistered and acquiescent women, ‘Pathbreakers’ narrates the stories of strong, determined and engaged women, the note said.
Some of these women include Qudsia Aizaz Rasul, the only Muslim woman member of the Constituent Assembly and author of “From Purdah to Parliament: A Muslim Woman in Indian Politics”; Assam’s first woman MP Mofida Ahmed, elected from Jorhat in 1957; and Aziza Fatima Imam, who served in the Rajya Sabha for 13 years starting 1973.
Why Muslim women?
The exhibition of photographs, text and video installations, points to their significant contribution towards the building of the nation, along with their sisters of other communities, through its freedom struggle, independence and beyond.
“A multiplicity of stereotypes are constructed by diverse actors regarding Muslim women. But the fact is there is no undifferentiated amass’ of Muslim women. Like women of all socio-cultural groups, they too are a divergent, shifting composition of individuals, often dumped in popular parlance into one single heap. This homogenisation has to be rejected,” the note read.
The show also projects video recordings of readings from writings of some of the featuring women.
The organisers, however, said while the participating women might seem elite, it is only the first step in identifying and recognising pathbreakers from all sections.
Muslim women who were at the forefront of the nationalist and feminist discourse in the country, during and after the independence movement, were eventually overlooked or excluded from the mainstream narrative.
MWF exhibition featured 21 Muslim women who contributed to nation-building during and after the independence struggle. Credit: Khushboo Kumar
New Delhi:
Most Indians today may not be aware that the national flag was designed by a Muslim woman, Surayya Tayabji, an active member of the Indian National Congress. Jawaharlal Nehru assigned this task to Tayabji, and it was her idea to replace the symbol of the charkha used and popularised by Mahatma Gandhi with that of Ashoka Chakra at the centre of the flag. Tayabji felt that the charkha, a symbol of the Congress party, might appear partisan.
Narratives like this – often forgotten or lost in public memory – were the central theme of a colloquium that was organised by the Muslim Women’s Forum (MWF), an organisation engaged in the advocacy of Muslim women’s rights. Titled ‘Pathbreakers: The Twentieth Century Muslim Women of India’, the colloquium held in partnership with UN Women showcased the achievements of 21 Muslim women in various spheres of public life during and after the independence struggle.
Other women who featured in the exhibition included Saeeda Khurshid, Hamida Habibullah, Aziza Fatima Imam, Qudsia Zaidi, Mofida Ahmed, Zehra Ali Yavar Jung, Razia Sajjad Zaheer, Tyaba Khedive Jung, Atiya Fyzee, Sharifa Hamid Ali, Fathema Ismail, Masuma Hosain Ali Khan, Anis Kidwai, Hajrah Begum, Qudsia Aizaz Rasul, Mumtaz Jahan Haider, Siddiqa Kidwai, Attia Hosain, Saliha Abid Hussain and Safia Jan Nisar Akhtar.
The speakers participating in the discussion talked about the need to reclaim the lost narratives of Muslim women and take control of their representation.
Speaking on the occasion, Seema Mustafa, an Indian print and television journalist, pointed out that these women would not fit even the current stereotypical representation of hijab-clad, oppressed and orthodox Muslim women, who need a messiah to rescue them. Mustafa, in her keynote address, said that these women had broken barriers and challenged patriarchal order in their time; they followed Islam in its liberal spirit, refusing to be shackled by societal norms. Most of them abandoned the purdah system, she said.
Speakers panel for the session ‘Recognising and Nurturing Pathbreakers’ at Muslim Women’s Forum colloquium. Credit: Khushboo Kumari
Stereotypes in modern India
The speakers insisted that the reality was and still is that Muslim women, just like women belonging to any other socio-cultural group in India, do not constitute a monolithic, homogenous entity. They come from diverse backgrounds and subscribe to varying ideologies. Muslim women have been and still are writers, teachers, artists, scientists, lawyers, educators, political workers, legislators in parliament and in assemblies. The speakers said clubbing them under the generic rubric of backwardness was a misrepresentation.
As the regular use of terms like triple talaq, halala and purdah has come to demonstrate subjugation of Muslim women, Islam has acquired the status of the most oppressive religion for women, the speakers said. Muslim women have become an object of pity.
Commenting on Islam and feminism, Farida Khan, former dean of education at Jamia Millia Islamia and former member of the National Commission for Minorities, pointed out that gender oppression is common to all religions. “Why should Islam have the burden of taking on feminism?” asked Khan. She further explained that Islam should be perceived and understood in the social and historical context of the day. Every religion has to and does evolve with time.
Referring to the exhibition, Khan said, “It makes me sad to think that you need to have an exhibition and you need to project these women in a country where they should be well known, where they should be part of the mainstream, where everybody should know their names and know the work they have done.”
Gargi Chakravartty, former associate professor of history in Maitreyi College and author, said, “Muslim women’s political and social contributions in the pre-independence period during the major Gandhian movements or in the field of spreading education, or in the sphere of literary activities, cannot be erased from history.” She shared many anecdotes that came up in her own research about largely unknown Muslim women who have extensively worked among the poor throughout the 20th century and still continue to do so.
An eminent speaker at the colloquium, Rakshanda Jalil, recently wrote a book A Rebel and Her Cause on the life of Rashid Jahan. Jalil spoke of the inspiring life of Jahan, who was a doctor, writer, political activist and member of the Communist Party of India.
Farah Naqvi, member of the Post-Sachar Evaluation Committee (Kundu Committee) 2013-2014, summed up the purpose of the colloquium and the exhibition. “This colloquium is a response. There is a nostalgia about it. But it is not just about the nostalgic nawabi Muslim. It has a political purpose, the colloquium, which is that you cannot allow any one strand of history to be obliterated from this country. Any strand. It could be Muslim women today. It could be someone else tomorrow,” Naqvi said.
Questioning if Muslim women needed to be forced into a separate constituency, Naqvi said it was indeed a tragedy that these women’s contributions were not a part of mainstream knowledge – and that reflected failure on the part of Indian historiography.
Naqvi also pointed out that the undercurrent of the entire exhibition was nation-building because they were “also responding to a moment when Muslims are repeatedly being told that they are ‘anti-national’”. She further explained that against such a background, the Muslim community in general should not take the bait of proving that they are ‘good’ nationalists. Instead they should take pride in the achievements they have made in their respective spheres of work – especially for those who stayed on in India after the Partition.
Wajahat Habibullah, India’s first chief information commissioner and the son of Hamida Habibullah, one of the 21 women featured in the exhibition, talked about Partition and how it divided his family. He said, “It is necessary to remember and nurture the memories of all those Muslim women who then very consciously, despite family pressure and contradictions within the family, opted clearly to be a part of India”.
Contribution to literature, politics and education
The exhibition showed how extensively Muslim women have contributed in the spheres of politics, literature, education and social work.
Many like Saeeda Khurshid, founder of the Muslim Women’s Forum, actively campaigned for the Congress party. Hamida Habibullah was the the president of the Mahila Congress. Few like Aziza Fatima Imam, Fathom Ismail, Anis Kidwai, Siddiqa Kidwai and Qudsia Aizaz Rasul were members of the parliament and legislative assemblies for years.
Rasul was also the only Muslim woman member of the constituent assembly.
Sharifa Hamid Ali founded the All India Women’s Conference (AIWC), with the likes of Sarojini Naidu, Rani Rajwade and Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay, and was involved in its work alongside others like Masuma Hosain Ali Khan and Hajrah Begum – who also founded the National Federation of Indian Women.
These women actively worked with the poor and marginalised sections of society, trying to improve their access to health and education.
Zehra Ali Yavar Jung, who was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 1973, worked to improve the condition of women detainees in Hyderabad’s prisons and presided over a women’s workshop that trained and provided employment to destitute women. Fathom Ismail helped in opening rehabilitation clinics for children suffering from polio. Anis Kidwai worked tirelessly in refugee camps after Partition.
Surayya Tayabji and the Indian national flag displayed at the MWF exhibition. Credit: Khushboo Kumari/The Wire
Mumtaz Jahan Haider, who was appointed the principal of the Aligarh Women’s College in 1937, worked for women’s education her entire life.
Sharifa propagated legal reforms for Muslim women, including raising the age of marriage and drafting a model marriage contract ‘nikahnama‘.
In the field of literature and arts, these women won multiple awards. Razia Sajjad Zaheer, the recipient of the Nehru Award and Uttar Pradesh State Sahitya Academy Award, wrote novels like Sar-e-Sham, Kante and Suman. Anis Kidwai recieved the Sahitya Kala Parishad Award.
Attia Hossain used to write for Pioneer, Statesman and Atlantic monthly and wrote several novels, most notably Sunlight on a Broken Column and a short story collection Phoenix Fled. Aliya Fyzee wrote Indian Music (1914), The Music of India (1925) and Sangeet of India (1942) with her husband.
Qudsia Zaidi wrote and translated books for children, with Chacha Chakkan ke Draamae among the most loved ones. She also founded Hindustani Theatre in 1954, the first urban professional theatre company in independent India.
Khushboo Kumari has a BTech in information technology and is pursuing an MBA in marketing from MICA, Ahmedabad. She is an intern at The Wire.
source: http://www.thewire.in / The Wire / Home> History> Religion> Women / by Khushboo Kumari / May 30th, 2018
Mumbai (formerly Bombay), MAHARASHTRATA / and all over India :
Some months ago I was in Kolkata when news came of the death of Laeeq Futehally, a writer and critic I greatly admired.
Badruddin-Tyabji-the-first-great-of-his-family
Some months ago I was in Kolkata when news came of the death of Laeeq Futehally, a writer and critic I greatly admired. The friend I was with hadn’t heard of her, so I spoke at some length of Laeeq’s own work (as literary editor of the pioneering journal Quest, and as the author of many books on varied subjects), and of the larger family to which she belonged. ‘Laeeq was a Tyabji,’ I told my friend, ‘and you can think of the Tyabjis as being the Tagores of Western India — a family of men and women of real distinction in the arts and public life’.
A look of disbelief now came over my friend’s face. For which Bengali can countenance a comparison to the Tagores? I pressed on, offering some names in illustration. The first great Tyabji was Badruddin, a judge of the Bombay High Court and an early president of the Indian National Congress. Direct descendants of Badruddin included the tennis player and legal scholar AA Fyzee (author of landmark studies on Islamic law), the politician and social reformer Saifuddin Tyabji, the conservationist Zafar Futehally, and Badruddin Tyabji Jr., a distinguished Indian diplomat and author.
My friend Laeeq Futehally was herself a descendant of Badruddin’s elder brother Shumsuddin Tyabji. Shumsuddin’s only son was Abbas Tyabji; once Chief Justice of Baroda State, he later joined the freedom struggle, being appointed leader of the Salt Satyagraha after Gandhi’s arrest. A nephew of Abbas (and grandson of Shumsuddin) was the great ornithologist Salim Ali, the author of landmark studies of Indian birds and an inspirational figure for conservationists all over the world.
The women of the Tyabji family were likewise quite remarkable. A fine study by the late Salima Tyabji (see http://cinnamonteal.in/authors/salima-tyabji/) narrates how they were the first Muslim women in Western India to emerge out of purdah, to travel overseas, to go to school and college, and to write at length of their experiences. Later generations kept the family name flying. Among Abbas Tyabji’s daughters was the formidable women’s rights activist Sharifa Hamid Ali and the mystic and Meera bhajan singer Raihana Tyabji.
Such was the background to the comment I made about the Tyabjis in Kolkata, a comment that evoked dismay bordering on disgust. But I have since found confirmation of the validity of my comparison. Reading through Gandhi’s Collected Works, I came across a letter written by him to Abbas Tyabji on the 17th April 1920. Here Gandhi says: ‘Indeed the Tagores and the Tyabjis are the rarities for India and they are her friends’.
The contributions of the Tagores are of course colossal, as well as colossally well known. The most famous of the Tagores was Rabindranath: poet, novelist, playwright, composer, artist, institution builder, the first Asian to win a Nobel Prize, and one who profoundly influenced both Gandhi and Nehru.
Rabindranath was a giant who looked farther in part because he stood on the shoulders of those who preceded him. His grandfather, Dwarkanath, was a successful entrepreneur whose wealth laid the basis for the artistic pursuits of his descendants. His father, Debendranath, was a progressive reformer and editor.
Rabindranath’s gifted siblings included the scholar and composer Dwijendranath, the actor and translator Jyotindranath, the singer, editor and social worker Swarnakumari, and Satyendranath, the first non-white member of the Indian Civil Service.
The generation that followed was also not lacking in talent. Rabindranath’s nephews included the modernist painters Abanindranath and Gaganendranath. His nieces included Sarala Devi, a singer, writer and patriot who so entranced Gandhi that he at one stage intended to make her his ‘spiritual wife’.
Which was the greater of the two families, the Tagores or the Tyabjis? Rather than answer the question, let me introduce a third and scarcely less gifted family.
These were the Sarabhais of Ahmedabad. The patriarch, Ambalal, was a textile millowner and philanthropist who was an early supporter of Mahatma Gandhi. When, in 1915, Gandhi’s funders withdrew support because he had admitted an ‘Untouchable’ family into his ashram, Ambalal Sarabhai stepped in to save the project.
Ambalal’s sister Anasuya was herself very close to Gandhi. A pioneering feminist and trade unionist, she ran schools for millworkers and their children. In 1918 she led the workers of Ahmedabad in a strike for fair pay that pitted her directly against her brother, who was representing the millowners.
Anasuya never married, although, in a daring defiance of custom and convention, she had a live-in partner, a fellow Gandhian and trade unionist, Shankerlal Banker.
As for Ambalal Sarabhai, he had seven children — all were talented, and at least four were remarkable. These were Vikram, the polymath physicist who founded both the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad and the Indian Space Research Organisation; Mridula, who worked heroically to settle post-Partition refugees and, later, to bring justice to the Kashmiris and their leader Sheikh Abdullah (who had been incarcerated by the Nehru government); Gautam, a public-spirited entrepreneur who founded the National Institute of Design (NID); and Gira, a brilliant designer who assisted her brother in shaping the NID while also setting up the Calico Textile Museum.
Had Gandhi had the opportunity, he might well have added the Sarabhais to the Tagores and the Tyabjis as among the ‘rarities of India’. These three families had several things in common: the ability to defy social boundaries as well as transcend disciplinary boundaries, an apparently unending stream of creativity, and the striking independence of their women. A single column can scarcely do justice to their talents and achievements. While the Tagores have had their chroniclers, the Tyabjis and Sarabhais still await theirs.
Ramachandra Guha’s most recent book is Gandhi Before India
You can follow him on Twitter at @Ram_Guha
The views expressed by the author are personal
source: http://www.hindustantimes.com / Hindustan Times / Home> Opinion / by Ramchandra Guha / April 11th, 2015
