The VEILing Woman

Every holy books advocates modesty and decency. But who gets to interpret these religious books which teach/tell you how to live your life? The higher caste Brahmin Pujaris who exploited and discriminated against the people belonging to “lower castes” thanks to the status they had in society? Or the mullahs and imams who were all prominently MALE? Does god say women aren’t “pure” enough to be allowed to certain temples or that they have to cover themselves in a burqua in order to be modest? If yes then either god is wrong or the interpreters are!

These biased interpreters have been spreading the “lord’s word” for centuries! And they have quite successful in making billions of people believe that their path is the righteous one that will lead them to salvation. Will the Holy Quran which tests a believer’s limits of self restraint in the month of Ramzan tell women to cover up from head to toe in order to not “provoke” men. Men who are strong enough not give in to their hunger and thirst from dawn to dusk cannot control their sexual desires on seeing a woman without an added layer of clothing? I disagree, give men some credit they are surely not animals who do not know what constraint is.

I am not here to say why men don’t have to wear a certain garb to look decent. Because we need to go forward not backward. Now Men wearing a burqua isn’t going to help is it Today on Barkha Dutt’s debate show about Shabana Azmi’s comments on the
Hijab, Mr. Owasi said “To wear or not to wear the hijab is a completely personal choice”. But I fail to see where wearing it is a “choice”. I know quite a few girls who do not wish to wear the hijab. But they do. Where is the choice Mr.Owasi when a young girl is gifted a burqua on her 13th birthday? Isn’t it a not so subtle order from her mother, who herself had detested the hijab when she was a young girl but is too afraid of her daughter not being accepted into their “society”. I have worn the burqua quite a few times to get a view of some of my friends worlds. I felt in a single word “restricted”.

I fail to see how a woman entering into a temple can make the god impure? The same women who till not very long ago were considered goddesses? Laxmi, Devi, Saraswathi are now worshipped only on occasions like diwali, Dussera! What happened to the teaching in the Bhagvad Gita which rightly said a man will never prosper unless he worship the goddess who lives in the house in other words the wives/daughters/sisters.

Let us ourselves be the interpreters of religion. Let us all be the messengers of equality and humanity!