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CHUNGI, CHAI AND CHAUVINISM-THE ALIGARH QUINTESSENTIALS
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CHUNGI, CHAI AND CHAUVINISM-THE ALIGARH QUINTESSENTIALS
AUTHORED BY - TANYA PANDEY &
ZOHRA HAQUE
Abstract
The discussion around the development of the status of the women remains
a realm which has remained limited to the delineation over how far the
development has taken place in the educational, professional and service
sectors but there hardly exists any significant work showcasing the burgeoning
of the presence of the women in the traditional social places in the country,
which throughout the past remained the
centres having a preponderant presence of the male population ,and the society
have been conditioned to view such places as the spaces designed to facilitate
just the male section of the society, and the areas being considered as a NO
ENTRY zone for the female sections of the society owing to , at times an
anachronistic and rudimentary perception that sobre and decent women do not
even attempt at claiming presence at such places and at times a chauvinistic
and orthodoxical conception of such locations being just the male-serving areas
,where women should not be given the impunity to be at ! The article attempts
at highlighting the zilch presence of women at the social spaces as the
traditional tea stalls and dhabas in the city of Aligarh, which usually keep
bustling with the hyphy presence of people from across the city ,then be it the
students studying at the Aligarh Muslim University or be it the plebeian
population of the country who have been accustomed to the idea of seeing no
women at these places, owing to what has been the practice from the past or even if they have been a witness to any woman portraying
the audacity to take to such places, they have found the idea in itself to be
uncomfortable because of the vestigial perception they have developed with
respect to women in the society ,and some have not bothered to react to such
perspective because it has not concerned them as such ,and so they have just
acquiesced to such an idea lately and largely because women at large have
hardly made any significant attempts at improving the status quo via any
substantial means. The article discusses the ecclesiastical discourse which has
existed concerning the development of the status of women and how it has shaped
the struggle of women to reclaim public spaces in the city of Aligarh , also
shedding light on how the religious perceptions with respect to women have
largely dominated the view of the opposite gender in framing an opinion with
respect to their role and function in the society.
Keywords – women, chai, chauvinism, social spaces, fitna, tehzeeb
15 years from the present ,as
I’d be reminiscing my University days,
apart from the highly hectic yet gratifying academic life I witnessed, which
offered me the opportunity to quench my cravings for intellectual discourses
over the eclectic genre of realms and disciplines that enthralled me, my only
memories so far as my social life as a student I’d be concerned , would rather
be only a docket itemizing the various hankerings of a girl away from her home
who yearned to become a part of the city and someone who was desperate of
reclaiming the social spaces at and
around the University just like any of her male counterparts had the privilege
to, then whether that be by sipping in
the speciality of the city rather the
piece de resistance of the city of Aligarh i.e ‘tea' ,every Alig’s first
love ,at the traditional ‘chai ki tapris’ at the Chungi area
,which surround the pride of the city ,which is THE ALIGARH MUSLIM UNIVERSITY,
which keeps bustling with students and people from the city alike all day long
or whether it be by relishing my favourite ‘aloo
ke parathe’ at any of the dhabas in
the campus area and indulging into conversations and discussions with friends
and seniors over the subject of home,
politics, history or any thing highbrow , owing to the vigour produced by the
stimulated nerve cells after the satiation of taste buds or be it the urge to
develop a fellow feeling at all such places which have formed popular and
traditional centres of recreation and deliberation for the university students
at large but which unfortunately even until today have not been able to cross
the narrow domestic wall of gender and have been the sites predominated by
men and flabbergastingly even in the 21st
century , they continue being such sites, for the gentry of which, the presence
of women is still not acceptable or if at all anybody’s even fine with their
presence, there remain reasons which continue to dissuade them in being
comfortably able to take their friends from the opposite gender even for a
normal ‘chai par charcha’ kind of time.
Startling is the fact that people who apparently may seem to comply with ideas
of liberty, egalitarianism , gender
equality and a modern outlook towards society and things in general , are so
much constrained by the chains of patriarchy and chauvinism which have reigned
high throughout their life in their families or in their encircling areas where
they have been born and brought up, that their approach continues to be driven
by the anachronistic and chauvinistic tendencies which has savoured the idea of dominating and
alienating women in all the spheres possible by whichever means they deem fit,
in a way that they seem to replicate their particular demeanor at all such
social spaces ,which at present
struggles to host any woman ,then whether it be by resorting to any criminal
behaviour as via the acts of sexual assault or whether it be by casting such a
gaze and thereby committing symbolic violence against the women, who show up
the audacity to claim the impunity which has been constitutionally guaranteed
to them by the Indian Constitution and try becoming a part of such public
spaces just like women are able to ,at
other colleges and universities of any metropolitan in India.
Opinions brushing away such conduct
at the hands of the male population, as being a result of Aligarh being a
comparatively more conservative city than other places in India, the idea of it
being a place where 'one of the pioneering movements in the realm of women
education was steered upon by Wahid Jahaan, a Muslim woman coming
from an orthodoxical family and working towards revolutionizing the basic
narrative with the aid of his husband, that had existed around imposing
different restrictions concerning dress – code and morality of women following
the Law of Sharia cannot be forgotten, a movement which laid the foundational
scaffolding of women education in Aligarh in the form of Women’s College of the Aligarh Muslim University.' [1] The gift of education via the establishment of the
Women’s College is tantamount to the
grant of elixir to especially the Muslim
women coming from conservative families, who via this institution had the opportunity of
accessing education in their respective areas of interest, even if such an
opportunity was subject to certain disciplinary and surveillance rules at the
hands of the administration, like observance of purdah within the hostel
premises, or be it the stringent timings for outings , which were actually kept
in place so as to avoid any dissent from the orthodoxical sections of the
community ,it nevertheless offered a wonderful opportunity for the women
of the community to broaden their horizon and develop an understanding with
respect to their respective disciplines and life in general by looking at the
world through a setup which was shadowed not just by the narrow minded gender
conceptions but also showcased the ways to develop a profound modern understanding
of the society and develop within a capacity to bring in a revolution and to
raise their voices against any discrimination that tends to stifle their existence.
Thus the unwritten entente between the families, community and the
administration was and continues to be firmly in place which is exercised via ‘regulatory
dominant discourses on women as repositories of honour(enunciated through
official addresses or messages to students), the strict system of formal rules
guarding women, informal censuring by wardens and provosts who assume
‘responsibility’ for girls as fictive parents in boarding’[2], further
the permissibility of such paternalistic practices further facilitate the
denial of the legally guaranteed rights to women and the continuance of the
same in the contemporary scenario is just not in consonance with the world
we’re living in and with all the ambitions, women of today have in their mind of
asserting their individualism and putting to action their capacities ,walking
shoulder to shoulder with their male counterparts in every realm and shunning
away every idea which has the capacity to downplay their existence.
Ecclesiastical discourse on the
status of women and its effect on the contemporary perception of women
The factum of women posing a threat
to the male community, in general, has been delineated by the reference to the
charged word ‘fitna’, in Sharia,
which means – social chaos or disruption,
because of the attraction they supposedly exerted which tended to corrupt
the male patriarch was seen as the basis of why there was the need for them to
observe purdah while they passed through the areas. ‘Legal culture, therefore,
paganized the zaif (which comprised of
the women and slaves in particular )privatizing, sensualizing, and feminizing
them. All of which explains the law’s
almost obsessive concern with maintaining not only a physical but also a
sartorial and behavioural separation between male and female’[3] and in
consonance with the same, ‘baseless restrictions on the mobility of women have
been imposed at the hands of orthodoxical authorities of the University in
Aligarh in the past, as happened in the case of female students getting denied
the entry in the Maulana Azad Library over the ground that their presence could
distract the male students at the place!’[4] Furthermore
significant impunity has also been provided to the Islamist groups and organizations
which seek to train Muslim students in Muslim values like the Jamaat-e-Islami-Hind which was
established in 1941, and one of its student wing with the name SIMI( Students' Islamic
Movement of India) had been banned and was declared an unlawful group under the
Unlawful Activities Prevention Act,1963 as it had taken to extremist activities
and the ban on the organisation was extended again in the year 2019, wherein
the Home Ministry via its notification had listed that there were as many as 58
cases in which members belonging to the SIMI were involved, then another
student wing with the name Students' Islamic Organisation was formed in 1982 ,whose
one of the purposes is to make students aware of their purpose in life through
Islamic perspective ,and so via these organisations novel ways of
interpretation of religious sanctions are put to use so as to give legitimacy to
the inequities existing in the educational as well as social setup within and
around the University campus, turning a deaf ear to women students' demands for their rights and access to social
spaces in and around the University campus. There have been instances at the
hands of these outfits wherein they had objected to the screening of feature
films in the University auditorium, asserting that it featured obscene scenes and there also has been an
instance from the mid 1980s when an Inter- University Youth Festival was
organised ,since many girls from various colleges were also a part of the dance
and drama shows, a group of slogan shouting individuals had gatecrashed
into the auditorium demanding a stop to the vulgar show, forgetting ‘that
decades ago the University founder had worn anklets on his old feet to dance at
the annual Aligarh exhibition , seeking
funds for the college that turned into AMU in 1920’[5] , further
similar instances continue till date ,like fresher’s and farewell events
happening in various departments of the University disallow dance performances and
allied fun activities like ramp walks and so, as it again according to the
conservatives is not in compliance with the upright conduct a true Muslim is
supposed to abide by and consider the above-mentioned as vulgar activities! But in consonance of the above-mentioned, I am
reminded of a very beautiful saying from Quran (Surah Noor) which says - ‘tell
the believing men to lower their gaze and to be mindful of their chastity…. God
is aware of what you do’,
And this saying
assumes significance in respect of the above-mentioned activities as well as
other unwritten codes in terms of dress-codes and conduct which are imposed on
women students in the University.
But through all that I have learnt in my student life, I have been able to
comprehend the fact that different concepts, ideas and words tend to have
specific meanings in different time frames and the idea of trying to apply a
concept in existence at a particular period in history in the contemporary
scenario with an expectation of it being able to sustain the social order
peacefully as it did back then , in that scenario it would be an injustice to
the 3.8 billion years of evolutionary success, humans have been undertaking,
only to constantly reform for better, and bring about changes in such a fashion
which would align with the social, ideological, political and cultural
refinement and development we as human beings have been seeking to achieve. The
initiative to undo the existing predominance of men at the social spaces in the
city to make them accessible to everyone irrespective of gender has been taken
up by campaigns like ‘Why Loiter?[6]’ and
by female students becoming part of
events like‘ One Billion Rising ' but at a very microscopic level without
any great formal organisation of the movement, but the need is there, for women
to realise the issue which can give way to greater chasm getting created in the
realm of accessing opportunities by the women in the different areas.
The idea of flexing a particular mannerism
or the discourse of traditions and cultural values of the University in the name of its ' Tehzeeb’, sounds fascinating only
until it actually tends to preserve practices prudent to be preserved, like the
harmonious relationship between the seniors and juniors which the varsity has a
rich legacy of , or the obeisant conduct towards the teachers at the University
and alike, but the moment it tries to go to the extent to incorporate the idea
of housing ' well – behaved and disciplined female students ' for an e.g
and tends to give a very narrow definition of the above-mentioned phrase by
considering only those women to fall
into this category, if they tend to surrender, to the hands of the restrictive rules
set out by the varsity administration for the women students of the university
campus or if they submit their compliance to those males who relish the idea of
subjugating women under them, then whether it be by expressly or indirectly
denying them the access to public spaces or be it by policing their mobility ,or
showing their indirect disparagement of their interactions with the opposite
gender or alike ,therein itself the
objectivity which some people believe lies in the word ' tehzeeb’ , would tend to
dissipate into the highly subjective interpretations of the term which go well
with the liberalised, progressive and egalitarian standards of the modern day
society we live into. Hence it's high time that
conditions which 'ld be conducive for women to exercise their liberty at
the same time ensuring their security are fostered which 'ld allow them to
safely take to such social spaces and not the vice versa which continues to
happen at present !
Relinquishing the past and moving
forward
Right from the era of
British rule itself, leaders have been emphasising creating a society based on
an equal opportunity, a society which'ld not discrimination on the basis of religion,
race, caste, sex or place of birth but the truth is that even after 75 years of
Independence, egalitarianism based on the above-mentioned grounds exist only on
paper, making its presence felt only via the Article 14 and Article 15 of the
Indian Constitution, where contrastingly the ground reality remains far from
the utopian image of a society based on equality which the Indian Constitution
has wanted to create.
There are a significant number of movements which have
been initiated, and a sizeable number of research papers have got published on
the subjects of women’s education, rights, equality, child marriage,
patriarchy, equal opportunities in jobs, accessibility to professional
opportunities for women in different sectors and a lot more but lamentably the
same has not been able to break the lens of machismo and toxic masculinity
which the sizeable male population seem to see the world with, and so
discrimination and alienation based on gender is born every day for the women
of the society to rise to revolt to. Every era needs a revolution at the hands
of the subjugated to reclaim the rights which are denied to them, and here in
the city of Aligarh, the time has come that woman instead of getting accustomed
to this state of schism which has been existing for quite a period now, claim
what is truly theirs i.e the liberty and the idea of safely and securely being
able to enjoy the same.
The foundation of Aligarh Muslim University lies in Aligarh,
which is popularly referred to as “Pdhai
likhai ka gadh”. And so when I came to the city ,my idea of the place
was dominated by it being a place brewing with hopes in the minds of people to
make a name for themselves ,which is recognised across the country and world
over, a place where its mockingly asserted
that : this city does not have blood running in its veins, it has chai...
'and a place where people share their sorrows, their opinions, and their
camaraderie over some cups of tea (they can’t stop at just one cup)' [7],but
never ever I could have imagined that students enrolled in this wonderful
institution could be so constrained in their approach towards women that at times via their illiberal opinions
they would bypass the chasm that exists between literate and an illiterate
individual and hence the condescending approach they tend to exhibit towards
women , has made even the attempt at the hands of certain sections
of women to revolutionalize the way the traditional
tea stalls , dhaba places are hosted, a really valorous and venturesome thing
to do, which not every female can afford to!
If one’s to trace the history of the establishment of this
phenomenal institute, then the first proposal after the establishment of
Mohammedan Anglo Oriental College in 1986 was regarding concerns about the need
for women’s education by Sir Syed Ahmad Khan and his associates, but things
changed for good only when
Sheikh Abdullah was appointed as secretary to look into women’s education
project and played a pivotal role with his wife Wahid Jahaan Begum in shaping
the movement for the promotion of women education and started writing articles
in favour of women’s education in different journals. One of the most popular
ones was “Hum Aur Hamari khawateen”[8],
though even today Aligarh’s monthly magazine gets published, unfortunately, it
is not talking about the university’s khawateens anymore. The plight of the
women ,so far as their isolation from the social places in the city is
concerned is not just a product of the male supremacist and orthodoxical
conceptions of how women are supposed to conduct themselves at any place but is
also a result of women not taking appropriate measures to bring a change in the
status quo! I wonder why can’t there be
organisations in the University standing up for fostering of modernism and feminism,
which can have both the male and female students alike who believe in the
promotion of the progressive and liberalistic ideals in the University milieu, if
the conservative organisations via their super- anachronistic conceptions have
the capacity to develop a stronghold within the University, why can’t all the students and faculty members of the
University who advocate liberalism and ‘changes in consonance with time’ come
together to form a stronger structure which can effectively counter the absurd
assertions and demands of the orthodoxical groups, though it clearly would be a
herculean task ,but unitedly it is not undoable for sure.
It is high time that
people get okay with the idea of women’s presence in every space possible,
because, in the contemporary era, women are reigning supremely as the heads of
several MNCs across the world, as able administrators in the bureaucracy,
and showcasing their might in almost every realm and field today. Holding onto the ancient dehumanising
conceptions of women as in Manusmriti, where women were considered to be the
seducers, were required to fit in the standards of beauty before they get accepted
at the hands of the men as their wives and were objectified to showcase the
requirements of controlling and guarding them and hence ostracization of theirs
took place in the particular age or the retrograde perceptions concerning the
women in the medieval times should not become the basis for deciding the
liberties, rights and liabilities of the female population in today’s world, as
one can observe by taking the opinions of plebeians who make a point to sit at
these places as well as University students, some of whom abide by the above
notions, while some openly admit of how
their colleagues take to passing comments as they see any female take to such
tapris or dhabas ,while there even exist
people who seem to be perfectly fine with the idea, but majority exists of the
former category who believe that decent
women should not take to the places as a ‘chai
ki tapri’ or should abide by the ladylike and docile qualities with which
an ideal woman is recognised by, or that women should not be loud with her
voice or should not indulge into arguments is something that will take the
entire existence of ours rearwards into the age of barbarism and chaos. Time demands change as change is the only
permanent thing in life, had not it been for the same, the offence of adultery
would not have got decriminalised, triple talaq would still have been
considered legitimate and in the tantamount fashion the evil of Sati pratha
would still have been in existence! The time has come to acknowledge the wrong
and make way for the needful change.
The idea is to
introspect if our existence is truly going hand in hand with the changing times
and if not where are we lagging, as we embark on this mission of ours, we are
reminded of a beautiful couplet of
Allama Iqbal which says-
masjid
to ban? d? shab bhar meñ ?m?ñ k? har?rat v?loñ ne
man apn?
pur?n? paap? hai barsoñ meñ nam?z? ban na sak?[9]
Translation-Though the mosque was built
overnight by the believers,
Our heart is an old
sinner, for years a devout it could not become
Survival is a battle
for every woman and it has always been in every age and timeframe, so even if
it calls for a revolt to survive, women should not step back!
[1] Shadab Bano, (2018) Wahid Jahan, A
Reformer’s Wife And Partner In Muslim Women’s Reform at Aligarh, Pakistan
Journal of
Women’s
Studies: Alam-e-Niswan Vol.25.
[2] Zeba Imam, Shadab Bano, (2015),
Patriarchy, Community Rights and Institutions for Education: Counter discourse
and Negotiation for Rights, Indian
Journal for General Studies
[3] Faisal Fatehali Devji, (1991) Gender And The Politics Of Space: The
Movement For Women's Reform in Muslim India, 1857–1900, South Asia:Journal of South Asian Studies
[4] https://www.dawn.com/news/1143785
[5] Mohammad Wajihuddin, The Making of Modern Indian
Muslim; Aligarh Muslim University, Harper Collins,
2021
[6] https://www.reuters.com/article/aligarh-muslim-university-women-idUKKCN0YT0OJ
[7]
https://www.thecitizen.in/index.php/en/NewsDetail/index/9/18884/Aligarhs-Brewing-Love-Story-with-Chai-Dhabas-and-Cafs-
[9] Allama Iqbal, (1924) Bang-e-Dara The Call
Of Marching Bell,
Article Information
CHUNGI, CHAI AND CHAUVINISM-THE ALIGARH QUINTESSENTIALS
Authors: TANYA PANDEY, ZOHRA HAQUE
- Journal IJLRA
- ISSN 2582-6433
- Published 2024/01/18
- Issue 7
About Journal
International Journal for Legal Research and Analysis
- Abbreviation IJLRA
- ISSN 2582-6433
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- License CC 4.0
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