The God on top of a hill

Did you know that only a few years back, the mining engineering department at the prestigious Anna University got its first female student. A department was instituted more than 20-30 years before that. There was the question of how a woman could work in the hard conditions of a mine. I wondered too, if it was practically possible for that girl to get employed in a mine like her peers. Does she have to fight for everything from washrooms to maternity leaves? But when I interviewed her as a first year student, the excitement and josh she showed was heartening. The dream of an utopian society unfolded in my mind.

Even today, the Sabarimala verdict makes me want to dream. Hinduism is probably the most disorganised organised religion in the entire world. It is an large umbrella of cultures, it is much less rigid than most religions in the world. But this issue of restricting entry to temples on the basis of gender is an issue that is prevalent in Hinduism and Islam. Probably others too. Wasting government spending on security measures and personnel on a long term is probably the most useless of all expenditure. Because there is so much more to actually spend on in this country. Unless the Hindu population can come to terms with this judgement and peacefully walk together to Sabarimala without hundreds of armed personnel staring at them. I would say that this judgement does nothing for women or upholding equality. But this is an ideological win, that we can witness in action, in probably a decade or so.

But what this judgment has really thrown light on is, how regressive the minds of some of these so called progressive, residing abroad, decked up in modern attire Hindus are. Their reasons are outright ridiculous from questioning the moral compass of their very own deity to not having faith on their family men who take the vow of celibacy for 40 days. If children can walk through jungles, I think women can too. And that 40 day fasting period will be a piece of cake for women. These are the other reasons they come up with. All these reasons are made up to cover up one reason that they are all thinking but don’t have the conviction to say. Menstruating women are impure. I would be happy if these regressive morons said that instead of all their pretentious sympathy and concern.

The root is always menstruation and the stigma around it and without changing that, it is no use passing laws and picketing in front of temples. Untill then we keep dreaming…