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Sexuality,
Obscenity, Community
Women, Muslims, and the
Hindu Public in Colonial India
CHARU GUPTA
*
SEXUALITY, OBSCENITY, COMMUNITY
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List of Illustrations Vlll
Acknowledgements ix
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and Referencing Methods Xlll
Abbreviations xiv
1 Introduction 1
Women, Caste, Class and Hindu Communalism
in UP
'3 Tanika Sarkar, 'The Hindu Wife and the Hindu Nation: Domesticity and
Nationalism in Nineteenth Century Bengali, SH, 8, 2 (1992), pp. 213-35.
Sarkar highlights how AryanIHindu woman became a political resource for
Hindu chauvinism, defining her domestic roles in new precise and scientific ways
through new models of chastity and of the pativrata wife. Others too have signi-
fied the new lease of life to patriarchal practices under religious sanction in
colonial India. See Kumkum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid, 'Recasting Women: An
Introduction', in Kumkum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid (eds), Recasting Women:
Essays in Colonial History (New Delhi, 1989): pp. 1-26.
l 4 Anon., Chetauani-2: Desh Khatre Mein (VHP, Delhi, 1990). In fact, a large
part of the popular mass media in India today has a symbiotic relationship with
the Hindu Right, and has to an extent provided the base images of the grammar
Introduction 1 5
'We Five [i.e. the husband and his four wives] and O u r Twenty-five [i.e.
children]).
We shall see that similar stereotypes of Muslims as breeding in large
numbers, and constructed anxieties of their soon outnumbering
Hindus, were expressed much earlier.15
Extensive discussions have evolved around communalism in co-
lonial north India. Recent debates have ranged from assertions of
continuities between the pre-colonial and colonial periods'6 to sug-
gestions that communalism was largely a colonial construct." Some
have emphasised the primacy of high politics or native elites in deter-
mining its artic~lation,'~be it by Hindus" or Muslims.20Others have
of Hindu communalism. For a critique of the print media, see Charu and Mukul,
PrintMedia and Communalijm (Delhi, 1990); Charu Gupta and Mukul Sharma,
'Communal Constructions: Media Reality vs Real Reality', Race and Class, 38,
1 (1996), pp. 1-20.
l 5 These myths have persisted, though refuted by many studies which have
shown that Muslims are in fact less polygamous than Hindus and that Mus-
lims can never outnumber Hindus in India. For example, see Towards Equality:
Report of the Committee on the Status of Women in India (New Delhi, 1974); Sha.
Krishna-kumar, 'Canards on Muslims: Calling the Bluff on Communal Propa-
ganda', Frontline (12-25 October 1991), pp. 93-8; Abusaleh Shariff, 'Socio-
economic and Demographic Differentials between Hindus and Muslims in
India', E P K 30, 46 (18 November 1995), pp. 2947-53. For a broad critique
of the Hindu Right, seeTapan Basu, Pradip Datta, Sumit Sarkar, Tanika Sarkar
and Sambudha Sen, KhakiShorts andSafion Fkzgj: A Critique ofthe Hindu Right
(Delhi, 1993). Various democratic, left, dalit and women's movements in India
are also challenging the hierarchies and homogeneities favoured by the Hindu
Right.
l 6 C.A. Bayly, 'The Pre-History of "Communalism"? Religious Conflict in
India, 1700-186O1, MAS, 19, 2 (1985), pp. 177-203.
l 7 Gyanendra Pandey, The Construction of Communalism in Colonial North
India (Delhi, 1990).
l8 Paul R. Brass, Language, Religion and Politics in North India (Cambridge,
1974); idem, Ethnicity and Nationalism: Theory and Comparison (New Delhi,
199 1); Douglas E. Haynes, Rhetoric and Ritual in Colonial India: The Shaping
of a Public Culture in Surat City, 1852-1928 (Berkeley, 1991).
l 9 Ami ya P. Sen, Hindu Revivalism in Bengal, 1872-1905: Some Essay in Inter-
pretation (Delhi, 1993); Joya Chatterji, Bengal Divided: Hindu Communalism
and Partition, 1932-47 (Cambridge, 1994).
20 P. Hardy, TheMuslims ofBritish India(Cambridge, 1972); Francis Robinson,
6 l Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
focused on the public arenas of religious activities and ritual celebra-
tions, with collective involvement in riots and ~ i o l e n c e . ~Though
'
various critiques have emerged,22 most studies show insensitivity
towards gender,23thereby not only leaving considerable areas in dark-
ness but also offering only a partial and perhaps distorted under-
standing of communalism. The prominence given to public riots and
violence, where women may often not be vital players, can take one
away from the day-to-day world of home and family, and from every-
day interaction in social, public and ritual spheres. Thus, while ex-
ploring the intertwining of gender and communal politics, this book
concentrates not so much on high moments of collective violence and
riots; rather, it locates the growth of Hindu communalism in every-
day sites and relationships through the prism of gender. Much of the
discourse of Hindu publicists had moorings in everyday events which
were equally significant markers of assertion and contestation. By
concentrating on gender, my attempt is to try and assemble a history
of Hindu community identity-formation that mapped a somewhat
different terrain, or, more precisely, to map the familiar territory dif-
ferently. This may allow a more nuanced picture of the complexities
of both Hindu patriarchies and communal assertions.
The interrelationship between gender and communalism has,
however, drawn a lot of attention recently, mostly concerning
castes and jatis often led to the upholding of textual law, assisting in making so-
ciety more caste-bound and 'brahmanic' in character. See Bernard S. Cohn, An
Anthropologist among the Historians and Other Essays (Delhi, 1987), pp. 224-54;
Ronald Inden, Imagining India (Oxford, 1990), pp. 56-66; Nicholas B. Dirks,
The Hollow Crown: Ethnohistory of an Indian Kingdom (Cambridge, 1987);
idem, 'The Invention of Caste: Civil Society in Colonial India', in H.L. Sene-
viratne (ed.), IdPntity, Consciousnessand the Past: Forging of Caste and Community
in India andSri Lanka (Delhi, 1997), pp. 120-35; Rosalind 0' Hanlon, 'Cul-
tures of Rule, Communities of Resistance: Gender, Discourse and Tradition in
Recent South Asian Historiographies', in Seneviratne (ed.), Identity, pp. 147-
76. However, the British were not the paramount agents for perpetuating
caste, which had much deeper roots as a social structure in India. Moreover,
Indian polemicists too identified caste as a topic of vital concern for the modern
nation. See William R. Pinch, Peasants andMonks in British India (Delhi, 1996),
pp. 17-20; Sarkar, Writing, pp. 3 58-90; Susan Bayly, Caste, Socieg and Politics
in India fiom the Eighteentl~Century to the Modern Age (Cambridge, 1993),
pp. 25-96, 144-86.
48 C.A. Bayly, Rukrs, Townsmen and Bazaars: North Indian Society in the Age
ofBritish Expansion, 177U-1870(Cambridge, 1983), p. 427-30; idem, Empire
and Ir~firmation:Intelligence Gathering and Social Communication in India,
178U-1870 (Cambridge, 1996), p. 338.
49 Cohn, Anthropologist, p. 384.
Introduction 1 15
region rose from 255 to 354, an increase of 39%, and factory workers
rose from 72,545 to 88, 319, an increase of 22%.50 New jobs were
created in relatively respectable occupations, with lower castes being
appointed in railways, as manual servants of British families, as peons
in offices, as municipal sweepers and scavengers.There was increasing
migration, a weakening of hereditary employment, a loosening of
traditional caste ties, some extension of leisure time, and a simulta-
neous forging of new alliances which gave people a limited sense of
liberation and security.5' Sweepers, for example, felt more secure and
preferred municipal jobs to which no traditional stigma was attach-
ed.52There were examples of acquisition of wealth and status by
members of inferior castes like Chamars, Doms, Telis and Kalwars
on account of the development of leather, oil-seed and metal busi-
nesses. Chamars, significant in the economic hierarchy of UP,53
diversified into various jobs and some took to profitable trades-
becoming shoemakers or saddlers, and finding new avenues in large
tanneries, especially around Kanpur, with relatively higher wages.54
In Agra some families of the Chamar caste came to be accepted as
creditworthy merchants.55
Royal (Whitky) Commission of Labour in India, Evidence, Vol. III, Part I
[Includes UP] (London, 1931), p. 133. Capital was redirected largely from rural
areas to towns. Many industries processing agrarian products came now to be
concentrated in urban centres. Small scale industries saw remarkable expansion,
Report of the Department o f Industries in UP, 1935-36 (Allahabad, 1937).
5 1 Gooptu, 'Caste', pp. 278-9.
5 2 Ibid., pp. 2 9 5 4 .
53 O n the Charnars of UP, see G.W. Briggs, The Chamars (Calcutta, 1920);
Cohn, Anthropologist, pp. 255-319; Owen M . Lynch, The Politics of Untouch-
ability: Social Mobility and Social Change in a City of India (New York, 1969);
R.S. Khare, The Untouchableas HimseF Ideology, Identity and Pragmatism Among
the Lucknow Chamars (Cambridge, 1984).
54 H. G. Walton, A Monograph on Tanning and Working in Leather in UP
(Allahabad, 1903), pp. 25-8; E.A.H. Blunt, The Caste System ofNorthern India:
With Special Reference to UP (London, 1931), p. 237; E.A.H. Blunt (ed.), Social
Service in India: An Introduction to Some Social and Economic Problems of the
Indian People (London, 1938), p. 64; Briggs, Charnars, pp. 226-9; H.R. Nevill,
Catonpore: A Gazetteer, Vol. XIX of the District Gazetteers of UP (Allahabad,
1909), pp. 104, 117.
5 5 Bayly, Rulers, pp. 340, 445.
16 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Increasing opportunities and means, rising wealth, new ideas,
print media and the post, and a revival of old networks enabled the
forging of new internal alliances and ~ r ~ a n i s a t i o nMany
s . ~ ~caste asso-
ciations emerged from the 1880s, including those of the upper and
intermediate castes, with their own magazines and pamphlets dealing
with their aspirations and fears.57Even the relatively better-off castes
and jatis, such as Kayasthas, Khatris, Aganvals, Marwaris, Bais and
Orhs, started claiming higher (particularly Kshatriya) status, and
challenging or wanting a share in the power of upper castes in public
appointments and in political representatioa5*Some of the upwardly
mobile lower castes made the most forceful claims to higher status.
With the spread of education, the presence of lower caste groups in
political life grew and gave rise to caste spokespersons-part of a
vernacular reading public which could articulate caste demands.59
Through a proliferation ofcaste associations, journals and tracts, vari-
ous intermediate and Shudra castes made statements about their
56 Sarkar, Writing, pp. 358-90.
57 Kayasthas, Brahmins, Khatris, Jats, all had mouthpieces in UP. A list of
some journals with year of appearance, place, and founding editors, is: Kayastha
Samarhar, 1878, Allahabad, Dr Sachidanand Sinha; G n y a Kubj Prakarh, 1884,
Lucknow, Pt. Balbhadra Mishra; Khatri Hitkari, 1888, Mathura and Agra, Pt.
Ramnarayan; ]at Samachar, 1889, Agra, Kanhyalal Singh; Agarwal Upharak,
1887, Agra, Lala Kishanld; Kzyastha Punch, 1890, Allahabad; Brahman Samachar,
1890, Muzzaffarnagar, Pratap Narayan; Vaishya Hitkari, 1895, Meerut; Chatur-
uedi, 1895, Agra, Hiralal; Gaur Hithrak, 1876, Moradabad; Rajput, 1899,
Kashi.
Imtiaz Ahmad, 'Caste Mobility Movements in North India', IESHR, 8, 2
(1971), pp. 164-91; Lucy Carroll, 'Colonial Perceptions of Indian Society and
the Emergence of Caste(s) Associations', ]AS, 37, 2 (February 1978), pp. 233-
50; idem, 'Caste, Social Change, and the Social Scientist: A Note on the Ahistori-
cal Approach to Indian Social History', ]AS, 35, 1 (November 1975), pp. 63-
84. Also see Bharatendu Harishchandra, Agarwalon ki U ~ a t t(Banaras,
i 1918,
2nd edn); Thakur Deshraj, /at I d a s (Agra, 1934); Bhikari Das, Kayastha Varna
Nirnaya (Etawah, 1914); Bhagvan Vats Singh Rais, Bais Ktharriyatihas (Luck-
now, 1931); Lakshminarayan Singh and Bhagwati Prasad Singh (eds), OrhKrha-
tri' Chandrika (Hathras, 1936).
5 9 Censu~of In&, 1931, UP, Vol. XVIIZ, Part I, Report (Allahabad, 1933),
pp. 554-6.
'rights'.60 The population census was seen by many of these as a posit-
ive opportunity to assert caste aspirations and claim their rightful due
in a more forceful manner. Western claims and ethnographic studies
were constantly cited or refuted as part of their self-assertion. Statistics
and print were used to argue for new positions and preferential treat-
ment, alongside claims to a higher Kshatriya status, to posts in offices
and recognition in government ~ i r c l e s . ~ '
Meanwhile anxieties were btewing due to changes that signalled
decline or challenged orthodoxy, coupled with an economic situation
that became depressing. There were growing economic insecurities
for some: the colonial onslaught in UP posed a serious challenge to
many of the traditional occupations and dislocated existing social and
economic relations. Traditional sources of patronage were consider-
ably reduced, and adversity overtook a section of the population
formerly supported by a native court culture. With the introduction
of English and the proliferation of government schools62 there was
transformation in the social status ofsome Sanskrit pandits of Banaras
and their educational system. Many upper castes felt the need to
diversify and adapt to new opportunities. Kayasthas, traditionally in-
volved in clerical pursuits, faced competition and financial insecurity
with the growth of education and salaried jobs in government depart-
ments as this reduced the need for professional writers. Their con-
ferences often adopted resolutions about the need to break traditional
79 For example, fines were to be imposed on sweepers if it was felt that slhe
was not performing her duty in a proper way and at reasonable intervals. Bathing
and washing were restricted to certain times and places. Licences were necessary
for the mandacture and sale of articles of food or drink: NWP Municipalities
Act, 1900 (Allahabad, 1901), pp. 37-8, 42, 49-50, 62. Domestic servants had
to be licensed and registered: 23911906, Municipal Dept (UPSA). It has been
argued that the imposition of order by the appropriation and control of space
was central to colonial authority as it existed in UP: Veena Talwar Oldenburg,
The Making of ColonialLucknow, 1 8 5 6 7 7 (Princeton, 1984). Moreover, the ur-
ban poor and lower castes were often seen as 'dirty', leading to overcrowding,
insanitation and filth in the cities, spelling further insecurity for them: Nandini
Gooptu, 'The "Problem" of the Urban Poor Policy and Discourse of Local Ad-
ministration: A Study of UP in the Interwar Period', EPW 31, 50 (14 December
1996), pp. 3245-54.
80 Romila Thapar, 'Imagined Religious Communities? Ancient History and
the Modern Search for a' Hindu Identity', MAS, 23, 2 (1989), p. 218.
si Bayly, Rukrs, pp. 180-1, 386-93; Sandria B. Freitag, 'Religious Rites and
Riots: From Community Identity to Communalism in North India, 1870-
1940', PhD thesis (University of California, Berkeley, 1980), pp. 16-33.
Introduction / 2 1
mushroomed, novel processions appeared on the streets and the cow
attained a new prominence as the focus of Hindu c ~ m m u n i t y . ' ~
Vaishnava reforms took new contours and shapes in this period, stres-
sing higher caste status for many.lower castes, and evolving a more
aggressive H i n d ~ i s m . 'There
~ was a proliferation of religious rituals
and celebrations and the activities of the Arya Samaj, the Bharat
Dharma Mahamandal (the organised body of orthodox Hindus) and
the Hindu Sabha expanded considerably.84 Members of the ruling
Hindu aristocracy, landowners, priests and heads of Hindu societies
sustained the Bharat Dharma Mal~amandal.'~ Many Sanatan Dharma
Sabhas, gaushalas and schools were established. In Allahabad, for
example, the Prayag Hindu Samaj and the Madhya Hindu Samaj
were formed in the 1880s. These bodies helped upper-caste, middle-
class Hindus to organise and publish and use legal and other remedies
to defend a view of themselves and their religion which was both an-
cient and modern.
By the 1920s militant Hindu assertion reached new heights. There
were unprecedented communal clashes in UP. Christophe Jaffrelot
has stressed that Hindu nationalism was constructed as an ideology
between the 1870s and the 1920s, and that in the 1920s the doctrine
was crystalli~ed.~~ The growth of nationalism, both inside and outside
Congress, went hand in hand with the 'rediscovery' of Hindu (and
Muslim) cultural and religious values, acclaimed as at least equal to
those coming from the West. Religious reformism developed in tan-
dem with political nationalism and the strengthening of separate
identities. The membership of the Arya Samaj grew steadily in this
period. Whereas its members numbered only five per 10,000. of the
82 Katherine Prior, 'Making History: The State's Intervention in Urban, Reli-
gious Disputes in NWP in the Early Nineteenth Century', MAS, 27, 1 (1993),
p. 179.
83 Vasudha Dalmia, The Nationalisation of Hindu Traditions: Bharatendu
Harischandra and Nineteenth-century Banarar (Delhi, 1997); Pinch, Pearants.
Freitag, Collective.
8 5 Kenneth W. Jones, 'Two Sanatan Dhanna Leaders and Swami Vivekananda:
A Comparison', in Radice (ed.), Swami, pp. 224-43.
86 Christophe Jaffrelot, The Hindu Nationalist Movement and Indian Politics:
1925 to the 1990s (Delhi, 1996), pp. 11-79.
22 I Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
population in 1891, by 1921 they had increased to 45.87 Conflicts
between Sanatan Dharma and the Arya Samaj, so bitter at one time,
tended to subside and there was a broad reconciliation and common
ground between the two on certain issues, leading to a reduction in
the plurality of voices.88
Hindu assertions were aided by the growth of Muslim revivalism
in north India, especially from the nineteenth century. Accounts have
highlighted the fact that on account of various reasons, such as the
loss of state power by Muslim rulers and the divisive impact of colo-
nialism and Hindu revivalism, a substantial section of Muslim elites
made efforts to preserve Islam, to sustain and mobilise a Muslim
community, and that this led to separatist Muslim identity politics.89
Anxiety at the mass presence of Muslims in the Non-cooperation1
Khilafat movements increased the pressure on Hindus to organise on
a communal basis.
Among the middle classes there was an increasing scramble for
educational opportunities, government jobs and positions on muni-
cipal boards.90In some UP towns Muslims were relatively literate and
well e m p l ~ y e d , ~which
' led to a feeling among many upper-caste
Hindus that Muslims were usurping their jobs. The actual imple-
mentation of municipal acts was largely in Indian hands, increasing
the potential for tyrannies and rivalries between middle-class Hindus
and Muslims. Many Hindu lower castes also found it economically
advantageous to take to a rhetoric ofopposition against Muslims. The
percentage of Muslims in the population of urban UP was high in
relation to their total population, and they constituted a significant
98 Khatris for example had a separate All India Women's Khatri Conference
from 1936 onwards, Report ofthe Alllndia Khatri Confeence, 18th Sejjion (Luck-
now, 1937),pp. 33-5. Kurrnis too formed their Mahila Parishad, Shivrarn Singh,
Kurmi kihatriya ltihas (Banaras, 1936), pp. 191-2.
" Kapil Kumar, 'Rural Women in Oudh 1917-47: Baba Ramchandra and
the Women's Question', in Sangari and Vaid (eds), Recasting, pp. 337-40;
Deepti Priya Mehrotra, 'Women's Participation in Peasant Movements: UP
1917-47', unpublished MPhil thesis (University of Delhi, 1986).
loo Rosalind O'Hanlon (ed.), A Comparison Between Women andMen: Tarabai
Shinde and the Critique of Gender Relations in Colonial India (Madras, 1994),
p. 3.
l o ' Sheo Dayal Sah Gupta, Sri Vaijhya Vamsa Vibhuhan (Sitapur, 1907),
pp. 128-39. For example, Brahmins urged their women not to go 'begging' and
singing songs in front of Baniya households, Gajadhar Prasad, Brahmankul Pari-
uartan (Allahabad, 191 I), pp. 3,8; Lala Mangtoo Ram, Brahman Sudhar (Ram-
garh, 1922), pp. 5, 8, 10.
Io2 Kumar Cheda Singh Varma, Kthatrzjasand Would-bekihatnyas (Allahabad,
1904). It was originally printed at the Pioneer Press and translated in Hindi in
Introduction 1 25
'physical weakness' of Kayasthas who, he claimed, were good only for
inferior work as clerks. At another place he said: 'The use of the sur-
name Das is common with the Kayasthas and their feminine names,
without a single exception, terminate in Dasi.' The practice ofwidow
remarriage (dhrija or karao) and polyandry among the Jats were cited
as the main reasons for Jats not being Kshatriyas. Kurmis were attack-
ed for their lack of purdah.'03
Thus in UP, as elsewhere, women's roles affected the status of a
caste. Aganvals discriminated against the Agraharis because their
women served in shops. Khatiks were degraded as their women ped-
dled fruits on the street.lo4A certain section of Gujars was looked
down upon since their women sold butter and ghee. '05 Accordingly,
various intermediate and even lower castes started imposing restric-
tions on their women to improve their social status and strengthen
claims for upward mobility.106Some urban Chamars began putting
their wives under seclusion, proclaiming a new role for women in
The test was based on the famous English case of R.V. Hicklin, decided in
1868. The English authorities stated that the test of obscenity is 'whether the
tendency of the matter is to deprave and corrupt those whose minds are open
to such immoral influences and into whose hands a publication of this sort may
fall.' There was an intense debate among British officials from the 1870s on how
to interpret Section 292-what it covered and what was left out. For details see
229-32lJanuary 1890, Public, A, Home Deptt (NAI); 457-8310ctober 1890,
Public, A, Home Deptt (NAI).
193-2041April 1913, Judl, A, Home Deptt (NAI).
57011323, Judl, Home Deptt (NAI); S.H.S. Gour, The PenalLaw ofIndia,
Vol. II (Delhi, 1980, 9th edn), p. 1996.
Susie Tharu and K. Lalita (eds), Women Writing in India: 600 BC to
the Present, Vol. I: 600 BC to the Early Twentieth Century (Delhi, 1391),
pp. 1-12, 1 1 6 2 0 .
32 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Kandukuri Veershalingam, who denounced the work for its crude
depictions o f s e ~Such
. ~ indigenous concern was not just a borrowing
of Victorian morality; indeed, British sensibilities were often shaped
by indigenous perceptions.' Second, Tharu and Lalita speculate that
'it is possible that the work became so controversial . . . principally
because it was written by a w ~ m a n ' However,
.~ charges of obscenity
cut across gender lines; many works which were to become equally
controversial were written by men, signifying that it was perhaps the
issue of obscenity that was central.
Any discussion on obscenity is closely linked with the debate on
elite and popular literature. Some scholars argue that in India new
elite literary sensibilities marginalised popular traditions, and that
print displaced performance. Standardised and sanitised literary norms
became a marker of modern national identity and culture for the edu-
cated middle clas~es.~ However, the strong continuity benveen the age
of the manuscript and that ofprint has been emphasised. Printed texts
could be transmitted in varied idioms--educational, oral and per-
formative; read and staged-ach offering different meanings.10 In
Ibid., pp. 2-3. Also see Manager Pandey, 'Ashlilta ke Bahane Nari ke Prashn
par Vichar', Hans (November-December 1994), p. 27.
' Eugene F. Irshick, Dialogue and History: Constructing South India, 1795-
1895 (Berkeley, 1994).
Tharu and Lalita, Women, p. 118.
Svati Joshi (ed.), Rethinking English: Essays in Literature, Language, Histoy
(New Delhi, 1992); Sumanta Banerjee, The Parlour and the Streets: Elite and
Popular Culture in Nineteenth Century Calrutta (Calcutta, 1989); idem, 'Margin-
alisation of Women's Popular Culture in Nineteenth Century Bengal', in
Kumkum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid (eds), Recasting Women: Essays in Colonial
History (New Delhi, 1989), pp. 127-79; idem, 'Bogey of the Bawdy: Changing
Concept of “Obscenity" in Nineteenth Century Bengali Culture', E P K 22, 29
(18 July 1987), pp. 1197-1206; Tapati Roy, 'Disciplining the Printed Text:
Colonial and Nationalist Surveillance of Bengali Literature', in Partha Chatterjee
(ed.), Texts of Power: Emerging Disciplines in Colonial Bengal (Minneapolis,
19951, pp. 30-62.
l o Roger Chartier (ed.), The Culture of Print: Power and the Uses of Print in
Early Modern Europe, trans. Lydia G. Cochrane (Cambridge, 1989), esp. pp. 1-
5; idem, Cultural History: Between Practices and Representations, trans. Lydia G.
Cochrane (Cambridge, 1988); idem, 'Publishing Drama in Early Modern
Europe', The Panizzi Lectures 1998, British Library (8-10 December 1998).
Redefining Obscenity and Aesthetics in Print / 33
pre-revolutionary France the canon of great Enlightenment philoso-
phers like Voltaire and Rousseau was read only by a limited public.
T h e bestsellers of the time were-the forbidden, salacious and porno-
graphic books, sold clandestinely. "
In UP, print stimulated new expressions of vernacular literature.
Not only did oral-performative traditions, scribal cultures and spok-
en languages continue to hold sway, but also genres like nautankis and
sangits, qissas and kahanis. Languages like Braj and Avadhi adapted
themselves to the new commercial forms. Print gave them a wider dif-
fusion. It was an arena where printed, oral and visual media crisscros-
sed, leaving their imprint on each other.
A complementary line of analysis has drawn sharp distinctions
between high and low literature, between small popular presses and
writers, and big elite ones.12 The Hindu literati attempted to disci-
pline writing, but reading practices and the market led them to
borrow some popular elements in their work. It has been argued that
in early modern Europe the upper classes did not wholly withdraw
from common culture.13 Similarly, popular literature selectively ap-
propriated certain values of elite literature. It has also been suggested
that popular sex literature could sometimes be a medium through
which the dominant culture, under the guise of breaking taboos, actu-
ally reinforced them.14
There is a tendency to view popular culture uncritically as heal-
thy, sensual and subversive.I5 O n the other hand, it has also been
seen as a 'pornographic continuum' and 'violent titillation', a 'bom-
bardment' and 'infiltration', aiding rightwing men to assert their
Fry, as we now know, was gay, and in any case colonial perceptions
were not homogeneous. Woodroffe for example drew favourable
It has been remarked that poetry was quite often singled out as a
source of the moral deficiency of Indians.*' Even writers like F.E.
Keay, who were otherwise full of praise for Hindi literature, could not
resist stating this about (especially) late medieval poetry: 'That litera-
ture of this kind has, however, a very dangerous tendency has too
often been shown. . . . Another thing to be noticed in Hindi poetry
is the limitation of the range of its subject matter. . . . There is indeed
a good deal of erotic poetry of a very unhealthy type.'30
The position of women was shown to have become degraded be-
cause of certain practices. In her monograph on the glorification of
Hindu women in ancient India, inspired by Max Miiller, Clarisse
Bader too associated the supposed decadence of Indian women with
the spread of eroticism, and with the growth of the sensuous Vaishnav
and Krishna cults. She argued that India was further corrupted by the
influence of Islam. Moral degradation was a direct result of the re-
placement of duty by passion.3'
Many Britons had clear notions of propriety and respectability.
Observations from different perspectives counterposed concepts of
'state' and 'civil society' to notions of vulgarity in aspects of Indian
religion, culture and literature, especially in medieval times. They re-
vealed an interest in demarcating what was obscene and what was
permissible in present-day civic order, showing not only their concern
with Victorian notions of sexual morality and chastity but also aes-
thetic tastes and anxieties over public health and decency.
28 Vincent A. Smith, 'Painting and Engraving in Agra and Delhi in 166G',
Indian Antiqualy, 43 (1914), p. 124. Smith refers to the same in his book, A
History ofFine Art in India and Ceylon: From the Earliest Times to the Present Day
(Oxford, 191 I), p. 336.
29 Gauri Viswanathan, Masks of Conqu~st:Literary Study and British Rub in
India (New York, 1989), pp. 82-3.
30 F.E. Keay, A Hiscory ofHindi Literature (London, 1920), pp. 79-80, 102.
3 1 Quoted in Chakravarti, 'Whatever', pp. 44-6.
Redejning Obscenity and Aesthetics in Print 1 39
36 This was visible in other regions as well. See Pragati Mohapatra, 'The Mak-
ing of a Cultural Identity: Language, Literature and Gender in Orissa in late
Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries', unpublished PhD thesis (SOAS,
University of London, 1997).
Redefining Obscenity and Aesthetics in Print 1 4 1
most of 'high' literature. The assertion of a moral code in a canon of
literature became a national virtue.
For more than 300 years, from the mid-sixteenth to the nineteenth
century, Braj was a dominant vehicle for vernacular Hindi poetry.37
Most of this period is commonly known as Riti Kal,38 when pious
devotional poetry gradually gave way to riti verses. The deliciousness
of good riti poetry rested largely on the ambiguity of reference in-
herent in traditional poetic situations and characters. There had been
long-established conventions of shringar as embracing devotional
contexts within the Sanskrit tradition. Jayadeva's Git ~ o v i n dcom-
,
posed in the twelfth century, is one example of open eroticism and
intense passion, celebrating thelove between t ad ha and Krishna, and
expressing the complexities of divine and human love.39During Riti
Kal, this tradition was enhanced and shringar ras and nayak-nayika
bhed became the hallmarks of poetry. Radha here stands as a potent
symbol of every woman in love and is neither mother nor wife. The
sexuality of Radha and the nayika generally cannot be contained
within any rigid bounds of conventional propriety. She is mostly
described as parakiya and her unconventional love is privileged over
that of svakiya. There is an accumulation of sensual and voluptuous
37 For a basic study of Braj Bhasha see Rupert Snell, The Hindi Classical
Tradition: A Braj Bhasa Reader (London, 1991), pp. 29-36.
38 Some outstanding riti poets are Biharilal, Kesavdas, Matiram and Devdatta.
Biharilal (161747) was born in Gwalior, married and settled in Mathura and
was later attached to Mirza Raja Jaisingh ofArner. His Satsai (collection of ver-
ses) is full of eroticism and wit. Kesavdas (1555-1617) was born in a literary
family of Sanadhya Brahmins of Tehri Garhwal. H e was later attached to the
court ofOrchha and his best work is Rasikpriya. Matiram Tripathi was born near
Kanpur in 1616. Devdatta was born in a village of UP in 1673. His Prem
Chandrika is regarded as the last word on the treatment of love and an in-depth
study of the psychology of women. See Jagadish Gupta, Ritikalyn Sangraha
(Allahabad, 1961); K.P. Bahadur (trans.), TheRasikapriyaofKejhavadasa (Delhi,
1972); K.P. Bahadur (trans.), The Satsai of Biharilal (Delhi, 1990); Lala Bhag-
wandin, Bihari Bodhini (Kashi, 1925); Madan Gopal, Origins and Development
of Hindi/Urdu Literature (New Delhi, 1996), pp. 79-84.
39 Barbara S. Miller (ed.), Lovesongofthe Dark Lord: Jayadeva> Gitagovinda
(New York, 1977).
42 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
detail in this poetry. Radha and Krishna are often engaged in a dar-
ingly adulterous and incestuous relationship. It is even argued that
the gopis of Krishna were largely low caste, rural ad~lteresses.~~Such
poetry was influenced by Vaishnavism, but also followed certain
rhetorical and stylistic models which allowed the liberal use of Perso-
Arabic words and even folk elements, signifying a somewhat syncretic
culture composed of residual Vaishnav mysticism and the Muslim
Sufi ethos which combine to form a medieval high art tradition. This
poetry is a vast collection, but here I give two examples:
Wearied after climbing her breast-mountains, my glance went on, desir-
ing her mouth;
but couldn't move again, just lay there fallen into the cleft of her chins4'
And:
T h e embodiment of beauty,
young, intelligent,
graceful, lovely, brilliant-
thus is the nayika described by all.42
The nayika emerged as an allegorical motif. Laden with poetic meta-
phors, she remained the central aesthetic category of this literature.
the taste of patron lungs, whose lives, according to him, were void of all heroism.
Shyamsundardas, Hindi Sahitya (Allahabad, 1944), p. 313. He also said that the
depiction of immoral love was done to satisQ the libidinous activities of lungs
in medieval times.
57 Sumitranandan Pant, Pallav(Allahabad, 1926),pp. 9-13. Translarion from
Schorner, 'Where', pp. 97-8.
58 Quoted in Shrikrshnalal, Adhunik Hindi Sahitya ka Vikac (Allahabad,
1942), p. 1 14.
RedefZning Obscenity and Aesthetics i n Print / 47
activities ultimately lead to the birth of a male child. As soon as sexual
descriptions celebrate desire and eroticism for their own sake, they
become unacceptable and obscene. There were attempts to construct
a body of 'classics' representing a glorious Hindu ancient past, in
which Kalidas and even Kamsutra could be embraced. But sexual
representations of the 'degenerate' late medieval period were unac-
ceptable for modern-day Hindi literary writings.
What happened to the imagery of Radha in this? She disappeared
almost completely from normative, standardised poetry.59This was
reflected especially in text-book literature. Thus for example Ganga
Prasad, Headmaster of the DAV School in Allahabad, and Dhirendra
Verma, Lecturer in Hindi at Allahabad University, compiled a Selec-
tion ofHindi Poems for the use of high school students in 1928. The
book was divided into typical groups, such as narrative, pathetic,
lyric, reflective, descriptive and patriotic. Its aim was stated as being
clearly to realise the pure spirit of poetry; there was not a single poem
on love or the sexuality of Radha, and none of the Riti Kal poets were
included.60
There was an interesting composition on Radha in this period
which reflects the shifting imagery. Ayodhya Singh Upadhyaya,
popularly known as Harioudh, composed his famous poem, Priya-
pravas, which recounts the familiar story of Krishna's departure to
Mathura. However, the differences within it from erotic traditions
are glaring. The love between Radha and Krishna is extremely res-
trained, bound by propriety. Radha is exhorted to overcome her
selfish desire for union with Krishna and, instead, morally and ethi-
In' his correspondence with George A. Grierson,
cally serve h ~ m a n i t y . ~
Harioudh wrote about Priyapravax 'Though it deals with the well-
known incidents in the life of Shri Krishna, and of Radha, which
have been . . . narrated by more than one author, this book presents
them in a quite different light. I read in them the lessons and examples
of a practical life; of high, pure and moral love; of a sense of duty
59Schomer, 'Where'.
60Ganga Prasad and Dhirendra Verma, Selecrioni ofHindi Poems (Allahabad,
1928).
Ayodhya Singh Upadyaya 'Harioudh', Priyapravas (Banaras, 1941).
48 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
unsurpassed; examples which we can put before us, nay before the
whole world, with advantage.'62
In such poetry Radha is transformed from being a figure of in-
comparable joy into an incomparable bore. From a predominantly
aesthetic category, the image of woman becomes a stiflingly moral
one. Sensuousness, passion and emotion give way to concerns with
social depravity, reform, chastity and morality. Prose and poetry ac-
quire a new purpose. The pathos of child marriage and widowhood,
a glorification of motherhood and service to the nation, become fre-
quent motifs under the considerable influence of the Arya Samaj.
Virtuous women, struggling to devote themselves to lord and hus-
band against all pressures, become the new carriers of the cultural
authenticity and integrity of the Hindu nation. Women become para-
digms of marital duty; marriage itself comes to be primarily a devo-
tional, hierarchical relationship.
Mahavir Prasad Dwivedi highlighted this respectable, ideal woman:
she wears a sari, puts on a bindi, and decorates herself with flowers.
She goes to the temple, prays for her husband, is educated, goes to
sabhya meetings and, upon coming back, wins the heart of her hus-
band.63 Gupt waxed lyrical:
A y kanya man k t i svapn mein bhi patijise,
bhinn usse phir jagat mein aur bhaj sakti kise?
(If an Aryan woman recognises someone as her husband even in her
dreams, she cannot ever think of worshipping anyone but him.)OL
The woman was invested with new values, at once nationalist and
Hindu. The dominant image ofwomen as sexual beings was reversed
and transformed into an ideology of female 'passionlessness', thereby
framing an oppositional womanhood against colonial designations of
derelict sexuality. The recast chaste wife was an emblem of feminin-
ity, purity and sublimated sexuality-which colonial discourse had
6Z Letter by Ayodhya Singh Upadhyaya to Grierson, 25 May 1915, Azamgarh,
Linguistic Survey of India Records c. 1900-c. 1930, S/1/5/7 (IOL).
63 Mahavir Prasad Dwivedi Rarhnavali, Vol. 13, pp. 248-9. Also see Sridhar
Pathak, Manovinod (Banaras, 1917), p p 25-9.
" Maithilisharan Gupt, Rang Mein Bhang (Jhansi, 1927, 9th edn), p. 22.
Redefining Obscenily and Aesthetics in Print / 49
denied Hindu society. The taboos on her behaviour were aimed to
enclose and discipline all female bodies, to ensure a new social and
moral hierarchy of power, to integrate chastity with middle-class
identity. Sexual thus came to be regarded with extreme sus-
picion and modern Hindu cultural discourse, even from its diverse
angles, converges on the gender question: there is now a clear demar-
cation between the aesthetic and the obscene, the ennobling and for-
bidden. However, this was not all. The feminine ideal did not merely
involve restraint and the suppression of pleasure. Rather, respectable
womanhood in the literary canon was actively defined around a no-
tion of pleasure that encompassed notions of self-sacrifice, 'positive'
missions, and the wider good. Aesthetics became an exercise in ethics.
Many of the Hindi writers ofcheap poems and romances cast their
'' Allahabad supplied 18 of the papers published in UP, Report on the Admi-
nistration o f UP, 1907-8 (Allahabad, 1908), p. 52.
70 'Reports', Sekctions, Part 44, Article 1, p. 5.
71 Ibid., p. 8.
72 Ibid., pp. 17-18.
52 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
style and language entirely in the Persian type,73because of their easy
appeal. Dilbahkzo, a Hindi book, was published by two different
presses in Agra in 1869. One edition printed 700 copies, priced at
1 anna each, and the other 1,500 copies at 9 pie. Kempson referred
to it as 'bazaar trash in the shape of ribald verses, some of them grossly
indecent. It is the stuff of this kind, which arms native opposition to
female education with its most powerful objection, and which poi-
sons the minds of the youths in large towns. For one who reads, there
are 100s [sic] who hear the libidinous suggestions and allusion^."^ In
the same year another book, Ras Prabodh, was a metrical Hindi
version of a well-known Sanskrit treatise on passions, which formed
a portion of the sahitya shastra. Nine passions, or moods, were des-
cribed in it, of which the first, love, occupied nearly the whole of the
book.75It was also feared that many press proprietors, pandering to
the 'licentious' tastes prevalent in society, would not reveal the names
of such publications in the list which they furnished to the govern-
ment. Many such books were surreptitiously printed and circulated.
In 1873 C.A. Elliot, Secretary to the Government of UP, remarked
that books of the 'very worst and most licentious class' could be ob-
tained in the region, though the number was limited at this time. It
was demanded that such books be marked objectionable and illegal,
and that the law for the registration of all presses, and of every printed
book and paper, be rigidly e n f ~ r c e d . ' ~
By 1868 publications in the Devanagri script began to grow, and
by 1925 Hindi newspapers, books, journals and periodicals far ex-
ceeded and surpassed those in By the early twentieth century
a wide-ranging variety of pulp and popular literature-semi-porno-
graphic sex manuals and romances in colloquial Hindi, thin tracts
73 'Books submitted to Government by Native Writers', Sekctions, V/23/129,
Vol. 3, Article 2, pp. 567.
74 'Report on Publications Registered at Curator's Office, Allahabad, during
1869', Sektions, V/23/129, Vol. 3, Article 15, p. 244.
75 'Report', Selections, Vol. 3, Article 15, p. 244.
76 'Reports1, Sekctions, Part 44, Article 1, pp. 17-18; 'Publications Registered
by the Curator of Government Books under Act XXV of 1867 during 1872',
Selections, V123/131, no. 6, Article 27, pp. 535-50.
77 Report on the Administration of UP, 1923-24 (Allahabad, 1724), p. 9 1.
Redefining Obscenity and Aesthetics in Print 1 53
and small formats of songs and poems in Braj-flooded the market
in UP. It was reported in 1905-6: 'the original works of fiction gen-
erally display extravagance and want of taste, and often moral deprav-
i ~ . ' Again
7 ~ in 1909-10 it was said that metrical works had grown
in quantity and the subjects were largely erotic and immoral, while
poetry on social subjects frequPntly degenerated into pedantry and
platitude.79
Printed sex manuals in Hindi made up a genre that saw substantial
growth in early-twentieth-century UP. Aligarh and Moradabad ap-
pear to have been thriving centres of p ~ b l i c a t i o n .Here
~ ~ the lines
between sexual science, erotic art and obscenity were often blurred.
Many of them used a highly Sanskritised language and ran into num-
erous pages, signifying that they catered to an elite Hindu audience,
though this may also have been a means for escaping censure. At the
same time there were popular, thin, cheap versions written in collo-
quial Hindi. However, all of them claimed to have been inspired by
classical works on kamshastra and almost all stressed in their intro-
duction that they were not ashlil. The fear of being banned on charges
of obscenity was constantly referred to, and thus most such books
camouflaged themselves with the language of sexual science, claiming
their authenticity by highlighting the scientific 'facts' of sexual life.
Many claimed to be prescriptive texts essential for sexual compatibil-
ity and fulfilment. At the same time, to make their books attractive
for their audience, they stressed the erotic element--especially the
presence of colour pictures-in advertisements carried by prominent
papers and magazines. One such book, in a full-page advertisement
in the leading Hindi daily Vartman,warned unmarried brahmachari
boys to keep away but recommended itself to married women and
" Report on the Administration of UP, 1905-6 (Allahabad, 1907), p. 41.
79 Report on the Administration of UP, 1703-10 (Allahabad, 191 I), p. 5 1.
Kanhaiya L d Sharma, KokShastra athva Yauvan B i h (Moradakad, 1900);
Jaidev Nirbhay Ganesh (trans.), Ratimanjari (Moradabad, 1906); Mohan La1
Gupta, Kok Sugar (Aligarh, 1908,2nd edn); Ganga Prasad Gupt, Gupr Prachin
Kok Shastra (Aligarh, 1916, 2nd edn); Kanhaiya La1 Agarwal, Kamrahaya
(Allahabad, 1932); Jagannath Sharma Agnihotri, Asli Kok Shastra arthat Kam-
shastra ka VrihadGranth (Banaras, 1935,2nd edn); Ramchandra Vaidya Shastri,
Kamya Yogavafi (Aligarh, 1939).
54 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
men. It went on to say that it had attractive pictures which thrilled
the heart, and that it was full ofkam and ~ h r i n g a r .An
~ ' advertisement
for another book, claiming to cure gupt rog, professed the use of
Vedic and Unani methods and went on to describe the colour pictures
that it contained of the sexual organs of women, the parts helpful in
the formation of semen, loose breasts, healthy nipples, e t ~ . Another
~'
first established its 'scientific credentials' and then said it had colourful
and spicy photographs of women not only from India but also from
Africa, Germany, France, Italy and A~stralia.'~ It was reported that
many of these books adopted a semi-pornographic format.84Several
went into multiple impressions. Pyarelal Zamindar's Kok Shastra,
initially published in 1900, saw seven impressions by 1905, with
2000 copies per i m p r e s s i ~ nWritten
.~~ in relatively simple Hindi, the
book had titles like 'Javani-Divani' (Crazy Youthfulness) and was re-
ported to have been particularly popular among young boys.
Other books offered pure erotic pleasure. Chumban Mimansa,
published by S.S. Mehta and Brothers of Kashi, was the translation
of a Gujarati book describing the history, development and methods
of kissing. O n its cover it said it was meant only for private circula-
t i ~ nBabu
. ~ ~Haridas Vaidya translated Shringar Shatak, categorically
stating in the preface:
I am proud to say that I write all my books for second and third grade
citizens, since I am also one among them. . . . Pandit Mohanlal Nehru
of Prayag sees a lot of faults in my book, like the degeneration of
York, 1997); Christopher Craft, Another Kind of Love: Mak Homosexual Desire
in English Discourse, 1850-1720 (Berkeley, 1934).
Ruth Vanita, 'The New Homophobia: Ugra's Chocolate', in Ruth Vanita
and Saleem Kidwai (eds), Same-Sex Love in India: Readingsfiom Literature and
History (New York, 2000), pp. 2 4 6 5 2 .
12' Giti Thadani, Sakhiyani: Lesbian Desire in Ancient and Modern India
(London, 1996); Vanita and Kidwai (eds), Same-Sex.
'27 Ugra, Chakkt, pp. 53-4, 87-95, 102, 125, 137.
64 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
reprehensible conduct was proved to have been committed inside a gene-
ral association barrack, one of the convicts, who admitted his complicity
in this conduct stated to the Committee: 'As to night rounds they give
no trouble. W e always know when they are coming and are back on our
berths before they arrive.'Iz8
Myth and R e a l i ~(Hyderabad, 1995), pp. 98-1 15. Sarkar shows how there was
a thorough pedagogisation of even the minute, mundane details ofdomestic life,
from diet, furniture or sanitation habits to the reorganisation ofleisure and fami-
lial relationships. Ordinary social commonsense was itselfelevated to a systematic
syllabus.
'39 See Chapter 4.
I 4 O For example, the Christian Vernacular Education Society, Allahabad,
regularly published Ratanmala, a reading book for women, advising them on the
domestic management and training of children. (1869, 1st edn). I saw continu-
ous reprints of it, with slight modifications.
I*' Sarkar, 'Hindu Conjugality'.
14* Ibid. Also see Tanika Sarkar, 'Scandal in High Places: Discourses on the
Chaste Hindu Woman in Late Nineteenth Century Bengal', in Meenak-
shi Thapan (ed.), Embodiment: Essays on Gender and Identity (Delhi, 1997),
pp. 35-73.
143 Ibid. Also see Partha Chatterjee, The Nation and its Fragments: Colonial
and Postcolonial Histories (Delhi, 1994).
Redefining Obscenity and Aesthetics in Print / 67
T o shift the focus somewhat: writers and critics have examined is-
sues of masculinity through an analysis of colonial discourse, by
looking at the dichotomies of manly British and effeminate colonial
subjects.'44 Beyond the rubric of colonial masculinity, it is necessary
to problematise notions of Hindu male sexuality by examining the
strain to which it was put. Though the fear of unregulated female
sexuality was great, male sexuality also had to be controlled; sexual
mores applied to men as well. The fact seems to be that the Hindu
male was not absolved of the burden of preserving virtue within the
Hindu family. This becomes apparent if we look at the shifting terms
of discourse on brahmacharya, and analyse advertisements for aph-
rodisiacs. Published in large numbers at this time, these provide an
interesting study of male anxieties and desires in colonial India.
Brahmacharya has long been one of the core doctrines of Hindu
dharma. Hindu tradition emphasised the preservation of semen as
essential for male empowerment and energy.'45 At the same time,
there is a history of sexual celebration within Hinduism; in brief,
sensuality and celibacy coexist in a religion which is well acknow-
ledged for its ability to accommodate such heterogeneity and contra-
diction. Within this, the image of the brahmachari remains the ideal
and a high cultural value is placed on sexual continence. In the colo-
nial period this ideal of brahmacharya was infused with new meanings
and transformed into a modern discourse.
It has been shown how brahmacharya operates among the wrestl-
ers of north India. The power of sex is supposedly turned away, in
the akharas, from the chaos of passion into disciplined masculine
strength.'46More recently, Alter has examined the medical mechanics
144 Ashis Nandy, The Intimate Enemy (Delhi, 1983); Mrinalini Sinha, Colo-
niaf Masculinity: The 'Manly Englishman 'and the Effeminate Bengali' in the Late
Nineteenth Centuly (Manchester, 1995).
145 Gananath Obeyesekere, Medusa; Hair: An Essay on Personal Symbols and
Religious Experience (Chicago, 198 1); Sudhir Kakar, Intimate Relations: Explor-
ing Indian Sexuality (New Delhi, 1989).
'46 Joseph S. Alter, The Wrestkri Body: Identity and Ideology in North India
(Delhi, 1993); idem, 'Celibacy, Sexuality and rheTransformation of Gender into
Nationalism in North India',jAS, 53, 1 (February 1994), pp. 45-66; idem, 'The
Celibate Wrestler: Sexual Chaos, Embodied Balance and Competitive Politics
68 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
of being and becoming a brahmachari through modern yoga and
naturopathy. He argues that the discourse of sex, semen and health
is conceived in terms of embodied truth. H e suggests a difference be-
tween a 'psychological' Western selfand a 'somatic' non-Western col-
lectivity.I4' Celibacy and self-control are viewed as most important
requirements for achieving body discipline, and female desire and
sexuality as the greatest e ~ i 1 .Vivekananda's
l~~ call to sexual abstinence
for building a nation of heroes gave brahmacharya renewed meaning
in the colonial period.I4' Gandhi applied a related though somewhat
different concept of brahmacharya. He believed that stored-up semen
was the source of splendid energy in the male body,I5O but he turned
brahmacharya into a discourse which went parallel to ideas on the
integrity of the nation. The nation required an end of wasteful ex-
penditure of time and energy, and this included the pleasures of sex.
Gandhi discussed sexuality almost entirely from the masculine point
of view, seeing women as passive victims of a male sexual urge.l5I
In the early twentieth century brahmacharya came to be linked to
sewa samitis and social service.152Many Hindu publicists, Sanatan
in North India', in Patricia Uberoi (ed.), Social Reform, Sexuality and the State
(New Delhi, 199G), pp. 109-31.
14' Joseph S. Alter, 'Seminal Truth: A Modern Science of Male Celibacy in
North India', Medical Anthropology Quarterly, 11, 3 (1997), pp. 275-98.
14' Alter, 'Seminal'.
149 Indira Chowdhury Sengupta, The FrailHero and Virile History: Gender and
the Politics of Culture in Colonial Bengal (Delhi, 1998), pp. 120-49.
'5O M.K.Gandhi, Brahmacharya aur Atm Sanyam (Banaras, 1934,2nd edn);
idem, Brahmacharya ke Anubhav (Prayag, 1932).
l5' Bhikhu Parekh, Colonialism, Tradition and Reform: An Analysis of Gandhi i
Political Discourse (New Delhi, 1989), pp. 172-206; Madhu Kishwar, 'Gandhi
on Women', EPK 20, 40 (5 October 1985), pp. 1691-1702 and 20, 41
(12 October 1985), pp. 1753-58; M.K. Gandhi, An Autobiography: The Story
of My Experiments with Truth (Boston, 1929); Kakar, Intimate, pp. 85-128;
Richard Fox, Gandhian Utopia: Experiments with Culture (Boston, 1989);
Pat Caplan, 'Celibacy as a Solution? Mahatma Gandhi and Brahmacharya',
in Pat Caplan (ed.), The Cultural Construction of Sexuality (London, 1987),
pp. 270-95.
l5* Carey A. Watt, 'Education for National Efficiency: Constructive Nation-
alism in North India, 1909-16', MAS, 31, 2 (1997), pp. 339-74.
Redefining Obscenity andAesthetics in Print / 69
Dharmists and Arya Samajists eulogised it. Through their educa-
tional bodies, such as the gurukuls, brahmacharya and semen-control
were linked closely to pedagogy.'53 In their arguments and publica-
tions this was no longer just a moral doctrine of self-discipline. Their
modern discourse intertwined eugenics, childbirth, and a scientific
'rationality'. Healthy bodies ensured strong Hindu men who, in turn,
were indispensable to a modern masculine nation. Brahmacharya
became closely tied to the fears and hopes of modern times. The
pervasive anxieties and tensions of the age of Kaliyug were perceived
as systematically undermining a healthy way oflife: Hindu males were
losing their physical and mental ~ i ~ 0 u rIn. the
l ~ prescriptive
~ litera-
ture of brahmacharya, too, it was believed that unbridled sexual desire
had become an obsession in contemporary times, and this was fatal
for the Hindu nation. Certain evils of modern society, e.g. cinemas,
theatres, novels, and an immoral and unhealthy lifestyle were seen as
making young men more susceptible to the new consuming passions
of entertainment and pleasure. Brahmacharya thus became a building
block for claims to social and political power, cultural identity, and
a 'scientific' way oflife. Other moral reformers and medical practition-
ers added to this discourse of celibacy.
Print brought a flood of cheap self-help guides on brahmacharya.
Age-old instructions were repeatedly stressed and infused with mod-
ern definitions. The Hindu male was inundated with treatises on
brahrna~harya,'~~ against masturbation and for the preservation of
R.L. Burman and Co. of Mathura, for example, was published in Saraswari
I'rakash, 17 October 1891, NNR 22 October 1891, p. 722.
IG4 Abhyudaya, 20 January 1923, pp. G and 10 respectively.
IG5 Vartman, 6 August 1938, p. 8.
Vartman, 24 January 1925, p. 4.
IG7 Anis-i-Hind 9 November 1898, NNR, 15 November 1898, p. 601.
IG8 Vartman, 22 January 1925, p. 4; Madhuri, 3, 2-6.
Redefining Obscenity and Aesthetics in Print / 75
v
r
B,-
r*
IW*
WFPi
W
'4F: m)
-, -,
~l-rgm*iMidpdmM
t l m 4 0 ~ a 1)m ~
4
gF(*~oTrn~rnmmm
4
3trpa*M*p*mrn
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76 / Sexuality,Obscenity, Community
Redefining Obscenity andAesthetirs in Print 1 77
78 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Redefining Obscenity and Aesthetics in Print / 79
homes and catching the attention of readers and consumers. The
advertisers had a ready mass market as they seem to have ~erceived
the real and imagined anxieties of the man on the street-such as loss
of vigour, impotence and premature ejaculation-in a more realistic
fashion than did brahmacharya manuals and professional doctors.
They knew what would sell, and to boost sales they preyed especially
on weak, nervous and debilitated men, promising them sexual heights
with a little ~racticalmagic, and a restoration of health and vigour
within weeks. Advertisements of 'Kamratan Goliyan' and 'Kamsundari
Vati' said feebleness had increased manifold and their pills would cure
impotence, and ensure a wonderful sex life. In the real world, the
Indian male had felt a real loss of material power: in such a situation
these advertisements offered a fantasy realm of compensation for their
supposed loss of masculinity. These advertisements did not just
celebrate male sexuality, they can also be viewed as desperate attempts
to allay fears of effeminacy and impotence. This partially explains
why the lion, widely recopised as a symbol of British masculinity,
was an icon frequently used in aphrodisiac advertisements at this
time, showing the animal's subjugation by the virile Indian male.lb9
At the same time, even as these advertisements implicitly chal-
lenged the moral rhetoric of sex, they also adopted it-to some extent.
While using male sexual fantasy to sell their products, they sometimes
moulded their language to moral perceptions. Occasionally they even
issued warnings against the perils of over-indulgence in physical plea-
sure. There was thus a convergence and divergence of beliefs in safe
and good sex.
The advertisements opened a new public space for sexual informa-
tion. They were seen as signifying a general breakdown of sexual
moralityand posing serious threats not only to notions ofbrahmacharya
but to civilisation itself. Their tremendous visibility and use of pic-
turesque language created a moral panic which made it hard for many
British and Hindus. The British government mounted a campaign
and expressed its desire 'to take action to purify the tone of adver-
tisements in the public press'.'70 The use of 'obscene' language, taken
lb9 Leader, 8 January 191 1, p. 5; Leader, 10 January 191 1, p. 10. See Illusrra-
rion 1.
1 7 4 4 l J u n e 191 1, B, Home Poll (NAI).
80 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
as a sign of moral corruption, illicit intercourse and unclean thought,
combined with fears of public health and eugenic.arguments, and
these were the usual reasons cited to justify their banning. The Cal-
cutta Missionary Conference submitted a memorial to the Viceroy
and Governor-General of India in 1890 which stated 'that your mem-
orialists, as persons deeply interested in the moral welfare of the peo-
ple of the country, have frequent cause to deplore the publication or
circulation of advertisements of a corrupt and degrading kind.'171
Many newspaper editors in UP were prosecuted and convicted for
publishing obscene advertisements for aphrodisiac^.'^^ In 1890, when
several editors of Moradabad were convicted and fined on the charge,
some of them resolved to submit a memorial to the local government
with a view to discover what comprised 'obscene'. They argued that
the advertisements were not published to encourage immorality or
outrage the public decency but were intended for the public good.
'Obscene' words, after all, were to be found even in legal and medical
works.173Again, after two years, certain editors in Agra protested
against government action on such advertisements printed in their
papers.174Some newspapers, on the other hand, supported action
against such advertisements. They agreed they were obscene and re-
duced the prestige of the press,175and urged the government to also
punish men who issued such n 0 t i ~ e s . Some
I ~ ~ were more timid and
warned 'sellers of medicines for diseases effecting the organs of gene-
ration of men and women' against sending advertisements to editors
for publication in, or circulation with, their papers. They asked their
staff to be on their guard before publishing such advertisement^."^
For many Hindu ~ubliciststhe advertisements reflected fears of
1892, all in NNR, 1 June 1892, p. 194; Riyaz-ul-Akhbar, 16 June 1892, NNR,
22 June 1892, p. 221; Prayag Samachar, 25 January 1894.
Anon., 'Vigyapan', Gurukul Samachar, 2, 9-1 0 (April-May 1910),
pp. 27-32.
'71 Ibid., pp. 28-31.
82 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
urging the government to censor all journals and newspapers that
published obscene and outrageous advertisements: these were intol-
erable to any civilised nation.'" Gandhi urged newspaper proprietors
to institute rigid censorship against such advertisements and to
'accept only healthy ones'. 'I
But the problem was that advertisements for aphrodisiacs were a
source of revenue for a press short of resources. Markets have their
own logic. Several newspaper editors who were otherwise staunch
supporters of the Hindu cause defended such advertisements. And so,
in spite of the concerted campaign against them, manufacturers of
aphrodisiacs continued to find ways to market their products.
Masculinity has multiple meanings: brahmacharya stressed one
kind while the advertisements stressed another. Both dealt with im-
potence and the crisis of Hindu male identity, yet they were pulling
in opposite directions. One argued containment, the other celebrated
sex. The brahmachari Hindu male preserved his power for the nation;
the one in the advertisements used it for 'selfish' sexual fulfilment.
Masculinity was asserted in one by the containment of semen, in the
other by its release. Both upheld patriarchal notions--one by mar-
ginalising women, the other by overpowering them.
A documentary film, Father, Son and Holy War, made by Anand
Patwardhan in the 1990s, and one of its persuasive analyses, both
describe a volatile intersection between male sexuality, patriarchy,
and the militant politics of Hindutva.ls2 At one point in the film, an
aphrodisiac selier's sales pitch rhapsodising semen 'shooting like an
arrow from a bow' is juxtaposed with an iconic arrow glistening in
the night sky of a Shiv Sena rally. Conversely, puritanical images
which repress male sexuality and celebrate brahmacharya equal-
ly form part of the discourse of such Hindu publicists. Male sexual
' Nita Kumar, The Artisans of Banarm: Popular Culture and Identity, 1880-
1986 (Princeton, 1988), pp. 9, 62.
Thus for example, Holi saw the participation of women along with men.
O n other occasions, like fairs and women could be seen participating
alongside men.
In this chapter the focus is only on some cultural spheres. Women visiting
pirs, pilgrimages and bathing ghats, travelling by trains, their sexual and other
relationships, and their reading of novels have been dealt with in later chapters.
S.W. Fallon, New Hindustani-English Dictionary (Banaras, 1879), p. iii.
Sisir Kumar Das, A History of Indian Literature, Vol. I??, 1800-1910:
Western Impact, Indian Response (Delhi, 1991), p. 110. Das points out how a
great corpus of all kinds of songs was created partly, if not entirely, by women,
and it was they who mainly preserved and transmitted this corpus.
Sanicising Women i Social Spaces / 87
These songs often articulated their desires and sorrow^.^ They were
not only a form of ~ r i v a t eleisure but were a public extension of wo-
men's culture. Women sang kajalis, raginis and lavni. Kajalis were a
favourite among UP'S women, many of them composed and sung by
the women themselves. They were chanted duringvarious melas, such
as 'Kajarihya ka Mela', 'Thunmunia ka Mela' and 'Raat ka Mela'.'
Women learnt these songs from their mothers, their sisters, their
friends, while cooking, washing and stitching, maintaining and trans-
mitting them over generations.8
Particularly popular was the singing of jocular wedding songs,
known as garis or galis. They were sung mainly by the bride's side,
chiefly addressing the groom and his family. Some of these garis ridi-
culed the husband, the mother-in-law, and the existing hierarchy of
familial relationships, and they were provocative and illicit. The devar
was enticed by the bhabhi to come and sleep on her bed.9 Newly-wed
girls were advised to dictate terms in the sasural so that the sas and
the nanad remained at their command, and so that the jeth fetched
the water. The groom's family was abused and the sexual proclivities
of the groom's mother were joked about.1°
Just as women's language and songs spilled out into a mixed and
public arena, so too did upper-caste women themselves occasionally
escape seclusion. Most notably, they participated in popular melas.
For example, within the district of Bulandshahar, fairs were held at
many places: at Pacheta a fair was held in honour of an Ahir saint.
It lasted two days, during which about 15,000 Chamars and Lod-
has assembled to fulfil their vows at the tomb of the saint. Sterile
women propitiated the saint. At Muhana in Sikandrabad, on the
seventeenth day of the months of Baisakh, Bhadon and Magh, about
1920, 2nd edn), pp. 83-97; Baijnathprasad Yadav, Ahir jati ki Niyamavali
(Banaras, 1927), pp. G, 10-13; Anon., 'Stri Dharm', KalwarXthatriyaMitra, 18,
9 (September, 1922), p. 193.
33 Bhagwan Singh, Mahila Git (Prayag, 1933), p. 3.
j4 Kavivar 'Chanchrik', Gram Gitnnjali (Gorakhpur, 1938,3rd edn), pp. 'k'-
'gh'.
35 Ramnaresh Tripathi, 'Introduction', in Chanchrik, Gram Gitanjali, p. 4.
Tripathi made an effort, through the famous magazine Chan& to get women to
send ancient songs sung by them on various occasions. Many women, in
response, sent dadras, thumris and ghazals. Tripathi felt sad to note that such
Sanitising Women > Social Spaces / 9 5
means to reform rites of passage and improve syllabi. The author him-
self appealed to district and municipal boards to make the book a part
of the curriculum in girls' schools. He also felt it should be gifted to
all Hindu women at the time of marriage.36 The book contained
'Vivah ke Git' (Marriage Songs), 'Adarsh Gari' (Ideal Gari), with
titles like 'Adarsh Grihani Kartavya' (Duties of an Ideal Housewife),
and 'Muhjor Striyon ka Roznamacha' (Daily Noise of Brash Wo-
men).37In the process, women's songs were converted into an advice
manual for national uplift. T o claim serious intent and the authority
of the national movement, it was necessary that trivial songs be re-
placed by adarsh git,38 sung by women in service to the nation.39
Other prescriptive songs for women appeared. The new emphasis
was on accomplishments, which had to be encouraged but not exhi-
bited. One song went:
Dekho Lqja ke & v a n mein tum mukhra . . .
pativrata ki orho chunariya, sheel ka nainon mein ho kajra.
(See your face in the mirror of modesty. Wear the veil of chastity and mark
your eyes with the kohl of decency.*')
And:
Behanon, buri kitab kabhi na parha karo,
kisson se sadu door hi pyari raha karo,
bharat ki deviyon ki kahani kaha karo.
(Sisters, never read a bad book. Stay away from popular texts my dears.
Narrate the stories of India's great women.*')
lowly songs had been sent: Ramnaresh Tripathi, 'Mangal Git', letter in Chand
(January 1928), pp. 4 1 4 1 6 .
36Chanchrik, Gram, p. 12.
37 Chanchrik, Gram, pp. 99-1 10, 191-212.
38 Chanchrik, Gram, pp. 1 5 4 7 3 .
3' Most song-books for women were filled, with songs that had a strong
nationalist fervour, especially from the 1920s. Many promoted charkha and
khadi: Chanchrik, Gram; Singh, Mahik Brahmashankar Mathur 'Anand', Stri
Git Prakash (Kanpur, 1927); Baburam Bajpei, Stri Gayan Prakash (Lucknow,
1933).
40Anand, Stri, p. 5.
*' Ibid., p. 11.
96 I Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Yet another song, written like a sermon, said:
Nachna uchit nu nachuana, nu byahon mein gali gana . . .
kabhi mat dekho sajni ras, krishna sakhiyon ka vividh vilas.
(It is not right to dance or set others dancing, or to sing galis in marriages.
Dear women-friends, never watch the dance-drama or the playful frolics
of Krishna and gopis.42)
The Burhwa Mangal fair disappeared almost completely by the
1920s.~ While
~ the decline of Hindu princely culture, the withdrawal
of royal patronage and economic hardship were significant reasons
for its disappearance, the fair had been under growing attack since
the late nineteenth century, from organisations like the Banaras
Temperance Association, for its carnivalesque style and revelry.44The
withdrawal of patronage by rais was a significant factor in its decline
but the role of redefined gender codes and moralities needs stressing.4s
A tract published at this time, in the form of a court case, urged Hin-
dus not to participate in the fair and specifically to stop their women
doing so. The judge argued that Banaras was the biggest pilgrimage
centre of Hindus and it was shameful for such a dirty fair to be held
at such a place.46
O n e particular tract, titled Mekz Ghumni, went into many impres-
sions. It was printed by various publishers and accredited to different
or anonymous authors. However, it was the same collection of poems
with slight modifications in titles and words. All versions vociferously
dissuaded women from visiting fairs and claimed that those who did
were prostitutes and sensuous creatures with no qualms or morals.47
42 Bajpei, Stri, p. 5.
43 Eck, Banarm, p. 278; Kumar, Artijans, p. 127.
44 Bharat Jiwan, 28 March 1892.
45 Kumar, Articani, p. 130.
46 Durga Prasad Gupt, Ek Raat ki Vardat (Banaras, 1929, 2nd edn).
47 1 came across four different copies of this tract: Bhagawat Prasad, Mela
Ghumni (Muzzaffarpur, 1925);Anon., Mela Ghumni Bhanvarva (Bharti Book-
depot, Banaras, 1923);Gopaldas Tandon, Mekz Ghumni (Babu Baijnath Prasad
Bookseller, Banaras, 1931); Anon., Navin Mela Ghumni (Bhargav Pustakalay,
Banaras, 1931).
Sanitising Women 2 Social Spaces / 97
Fairs were identified as laces where Hindu women were molested
and abducted.48
Not all fairs were targeted in the same way. Some were subject to
efforts at regulation and cleansing. Lala Baijnath of Agra, one of the
secretaries of the All India Hindu Sabha, wrote at length to define
what he considered to be the scope and organisation of the Hindu
Sabha. H e declared that the proper regulation of Hindu fairs and
festivals, so as to make them a source of religious instruction to the
masses, was to be one of the main ends of the Hindu Sabha.49The
Gurukul Mela, held in 1910, was greatly praised as a place of meeting
for 'bal brahmacharis' (young brahmacharis) and 'Arya griha devis'
(Aryan household goddesses). The word 'mela' wzs acclaimed for
connoting sweetness and power, a capacity for rejuvenating people,
but in a very specific context and only in a special way.50
Holi was the festival that especially attracted the attention of
Hindu reformers, who expressed their contempt for the form it had
taken in recent times. The views of missionaries and the colonial state,
- with those of reformer^.^' John Mur-
in this matter, often converged
doch, the evangelical missionary, was disgusted with the obscenity in
the festival and blamed men for targeting people of respectability, and
females with gross expressions and rough usage.52Amidst such views,
the authorities tried to accommodate the continuous demands-
made by Hindu publicists to the local administration and the mu-
nicipal corporation-to intervene in perceived obscenities during the
festival. In this endeavour what became more significant was 'how
Holi should be' rather than 'how Holi is'. And it was to be of the kind
based on the model of Hindu publicists.
In a treatise on Hindu festivals, published by the famous Chand
Press of Allahabad, the writer determined the criterion of civilisation
in festivities through the mirror of other countries. Holi sent the
48Ediror, 'Prayag ka Magh Mela', Kurmi Kthatrija Diwakar, 2, 2 (April
19261, p. 3.
49 Leader, 16 July 191 1.
50 Anon., 'Gurukul Mela', Gurukul Samachar, 2, 5 (1910), p. 11.
5' Growse, Mathura, pp. 72, 74, 98.
5 2 Murdoch, Hindu, pp. 35-6.
98 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
worst possible message to outsiders on the state of the country. More-
over, images of uncivilised modernity and civilised tradition seem to
have combined only within India's culture:
Today, too communities that are uncivilised, celebrate such festivals.
Nations that are civilised today, celebrated similar festivals when they
were uncivilised. In England, France, Germany and Belgium, 6 January
was celebrated as the Festival of Fools. . . . In England and Scotland, in
December end, King- of Misrule was elected, who was also called Abbot
of Unreason. . . . Women dressed as men and men as women and they
both clung to each other while singing and dancing. . . . The most dirty
songs were sung on such occasions and obscene scenes enacted. . . . But
this was the situation of these countries before the eighteenth century. . . .
In all uncivilised and uncultured societies of the world, such vulgar and
disdainful practices were to be found. . . . Many festivals of the West were
as indecent as Holi. . . . The difference between them and us is that obs-
cenity prevailed in other countries when they were uncivilised, but it is
veryshameful that we practice this obscene festival when weclaim not only
to be civifised but also the children ofsaints. . . . However loudly we claim
to be civilised, in the eyes of the world and indeed in reality we will remain
uncivilised and degraded till we continue with this.53 (emphasis mine)
Another tract on festivals expressed this sadness: 'On that [Holi] day
when people shelve their modesty, and passionately shower a torrent
of abuse and obscene songs on each other, the pure and clean hearts
of our future generation are stained with contaminated feelings.'54
Various Hindi newspapers were disgusted with the festival, and
every year, at Holi, published articles, editorials and reports attacking
its alleged obscenities, public displays of unseemly behaviour, and the
participation in these of women and lower castes.55An editorial in
53 Shitlasahai, Hindu, pp. 101-5.
5* Singh and Singh, Hindu, p. 95.
5 5 Kaui Vachan Sudha, 22March 1871, NNR, 25 March 1871, p. 129;Afmora
Akhbar, 14 March 1887, NNR, 22 March 1887, p. 191; Bharat jiwan, 3 March
1890; Bharat Jiwan, 7 March 1892; Abhyudaya, 12 February 1907; Aduocate,
17 February 1907, NNR, 23 February 1907, p. 225; Indian Daily Tebgraph,
3 March 1908, NNR, 7 March 1908, p. 241; Central Hindu Colkgc Magazine,
April 1901 ; Central Hindu Colkgc Magazine, April 1909; Indian Peopk, 11
March 1909, NNR, 13 March 1909, p. 209.
Sanitising Women j Social Spaces / 99
one newspaper noted regretfully that obscene songs, disgraceful ac-
tions and foul language continued unabated in connection with the
celebration of Holi. It pointed out that the licence allowed while the
ceremony lasted aroused the worst passions of the human heart and
altogether banished the spiritual aspect of the festival.56Holi debased
Hinduism and was a disgrace to religion.57
T o redeem Hindu religion and the civilised nation the festival was
vilified, largely by identifying it with lower castes and women. This
proved an effective weapon in showing the contempt of upper-caste
educated Hindus towards the lowly, the uneducated and the ill-bred.
The point was repeatedly driven home: it was the lower castes who
were squarely responsible for the sexual irregularities, lewd revelry and
excesses of H ~ l iUnder
. ~ ~ the influence of the Arya Samaj and Chris-
tianity, Chamars were made to feel ashamed of 'grosser' elements in
their customs.59 Manvaris were also partially blamed.60
All respectable women were asked to keep away from the festival,
those who did not were severely condemned for uttering obscenities
and taking part in loathsornes~an~s.~' Since the reformers were trying
to establish that the festival was limited to the uncivilised and lower
castes, some of the lower castes also started condemning the festival
in their quest for upward mobility, as proof that they were no less
civilised than the educated upper castes. They too blamed their wo-
men. A tract of the Ahirs said one of the most improper customs
among them was the indecent festival of Holi. The women were con-
demned for forgetting their modesty and singing cheap songs, the
impact of which was felt in the remaining eleven months.62
could safely prevent the singing of obscene songs on all public streets, and that
public opinion would support the action of the government. The same news-
paper (28 February 1909, NNR, 6 March 1909, p. 195) carried a long letter
signed by one 'BNG', urging the government to come to the assistance of respect-
able society by enforcing provisions of the law against revellers at Holi, and stres-
sed the necessity for social reform. Prayag Samachar (20 March 1910) asked the
District Magistrate of Allahabad to proclaim by beat of drum that any person
found singing obscene songs on public roads on Holi would be punished.
" Sass, Domestic, p. 107.
" Bbarat Jiwan, 7 March 1892.
70 For example, Leader, 10 March 191 1, published the full text ofthe petition,
and largely supported it.
'' Abhyudqa, 12 March 191 1, NNR, 18 March 191 1, p. 227.
7 2 Leader, 15 March 191 1, NNR, 18 March 191 1, p. 227.
73 Leader, 10 March 19 1 1.
74 Abhyudaya, 12 March 191 1 and Independent, 13 March 191 1, both in
NNR, 18 March 191 1, p. 227.
102 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
to state intervention indicate attempts on the one hand to gain res-
pectability in relation to the English ruling classes, and on the other
to stress an indigenous reformist impulse. While the two groups pro-
pounded different methods, what united them was their condemna-
tion of 'obscene' and 'immoral' songs in public places.
While there were a few voices which went so far as to urge a ban
on the festi~al,'~ most stressed reforms and fundamental change. An
alternative Holi was proposed, and to a limited extent this was suc-
cessful. The recitation of kathzs, contemporary educational bhajans
and prabhati kirtans were urged instead of obscene songs and absurd
kabirs. Instead of mimicry, parody, jokes and fun, the performance
of good and clean historical plays was advocated to bring the lower
castes and women upon the righteous path and improve their char-
a ~ t e r . 'It~was acause related to social ~ u r i t ~ . ~ ~ T hSamaj
eAr~ started
a
the practice of a havan, giving speeches, and singing bhajans on the
occasion in U P . 7 8 T h ipurified
~ Holi ensured that Hindu religion was
not polluted. Women, particularly, were told to celebrate this 'Pavitra
Holi', obey their husbands in celebrating the festival, and sing no ob-
scene songs. The very composition of Holi songs was to be drastically
altered,79 affirming refined manners and high culture.80 Appeals to
reason and logic combined with a reconstituted tradition, legitimising
a new model of Holi.
Reformist polemic of the late nineteenth century condemned
other cultural forms as well. It pushed the theatre to the margins of
Ved Prakash Vatuk and Sylvia Vatuk, 'The Ethnography of Sang, A North
Indian Folk Opera', in Vatuk (ed.), Studies, p. 30.
82 Hansen, 'Birth', pp. 77, 86.
83 Balkrishna Bhatt, Hindi Pradip (September-December 1903).
Robilkhand Punch, 9 February 1890, NNR, 24 February 1890, p. 116.
8 5 Azad 25 March 1892, NNR, 31 March 1892, p. 1 10; Nizam-ul-Mulk,
31 December 1891, NNR, 7 January 1892, p. 6.
863~811925,Box 149, GAD (UPSA); 6411932-3, Box 125 (Varanasi Re-
gional Archives).
" Indian Cinematograph (Rangacbariar) Committee, 1927-28, Evidence,
Vol. I I (Calcutta, 1928), pp. 362-5, 497-505.
9011935, Home Poll (NAI).
89 C-311934-6, Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha Papers (NMML).
104 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
These trends were not limited to UP. B. M . Malabari, the great
reformer from Bombay, called the festival of Holi the 'unholy Holi'.
H e was disturbed not only by the way that the Manvaris of Bombay
used filthy epithets, cast wanton glances, and made obscene gestures
towards their women, but also by the way the equally shameless
women rewarded men in the same coin, and enjoyed it Digambar
Jain Mitra Mandal of Kota called Holi the most shameful custom as
it destroyed pure thoughts and vitiated brahmacharya. Women were
prone to revealing their whole body in the festival, leading to trans-
gressions and adultery." In Bombay a Holika Sammelan Sabha was
established which attempted to purify HoIi.'* In Punjab an attempt
was made to substitute Holi with 'Pavitra H ~ l i ' . ~ ~
An interesting tract published from Bhiwani, Haryana, addressed
mainly to Manvaris, came out forcefully against women's songs:
Make Saraswati reside in your house and not a bhand or a prostitute . . . If
you do not sing dirty songs in your homes and girls do not listen to such
songs, their character can never be dirty. . . . If you claim to be of high
status and family, rhen do not allow your women to sing dirty
songs . . . These songs are a path to hell . . . Children are stopping their
mothers from singing such songs . . . Aganval Mahasabha everywhere
should definitely note the following: (1) O u r devis should not sing dirty
songs at any moment. (2) Teach new bhajans in your households aimed
at the progress of country, family and community. (3) If Brahminis sing
dirty songs, do not let them do so in your homes. (4) At all times clean
songs should be sung. (5) If a woman sings such dirty songs, she should
immediately stop on the command of a swayamsevak. (6) It is primarily
the duty of men to ensure that dirty songs are not sung as many women
are not aware that such songs have been banned.'*
These were attempts to reorder the daily life and recreation of
women, largely by male Hindu publicists, in view of their concerns
"B.M. Malabari, Gzrjarat and Gujaratis: Pictures ofMen and Manners takerr
from Life (London, 1882), pp. 350-1.
" Anon., Holi ya, pp. 1-6.
92 Garg, Kalavati, p. 97.
93 Murdoch, Hindu, p. 43.
"Melaram Vaisya, Gande Gir Bahishkar (Bhiwani, 1932, 2nd edn),
pp. 1-9.
Sanitising Women 2 Social Spaces / 105
for upward mobility and family, caste and community honour. The
challenge to a Hindu civilising mission and nationalist agenda, posed
via such assertions by deviant women, had to be met. Since women
were seen as aligning themselves against good taste, proper behaviour
and sexual morality, there was a devaluation of women's entertain-
ment. Women were perceived not as preservers of the cultural and
spiritual sphere but rather as the main threat on account of their lack
of loyalty to definitions of civilisation. Respectability could only be
achieved by discipliningand cleansing this cultural world o f ~ o m e n . ~ ~
Hindu reformers had to draw away not only from the obscene and
the sexual but also from the popular and the frivolous as a part of the
serious business of nationalist struggle and civilised norms. They
sought to modify the leisure activities and social behaviour ofwomen
as well as the institutions that gave expression to such behaviour.
Endeavours such as these reflected anxieties within the Hindu re-
formist agenda: they were now attempting to extend their jurisdiction
by entering arenas of social life that were seen as beyond their pale.
Such cultural proselytisingserved as a new measure of the changing
social boundaries ofthe time, stratifying leisure activities into physical
spaces, types, and images. In their public utterances, many commu-
nity and caste reformers adopted a holy rhetoric. However, reform
movements often fail and are not identical with dorninan~e.~' Popu-
lar booklets of Holi songs in Braj continued to hold sway well into
the 1940s. They were thin tracts, cheaply priced, which did not go
into the debates surrounding the festival. Their continuous demand
(New Haven, 1985) and idem, Domination and t t ~ eArts of Resistance: Hidden
Transcripts (New Haven, 1990).
lo* Susan Gal, 'Between Speech and Silence: The Problematics of Research
on Language and Gender', in Micaela di Leonardo (ed.), Gender at the Crossrod
of Knowledge: Feminist Anthropology in the Postmodern Era (Berkeley, 1991),
pp. 175-203, argues that resistance found in women's linguistic genres is often
contradictory and ambiguous; but this heterogeneity within women's speech
practices does not prevent them from becoming sites of struggles about kinship,
gender definitions and power.
' 0 5 Steven L. Kaplan (ed.), Understanding Popular Culture: Europefiom the
Middle Ages to the Nineteenth Century (New York, 1984); John Storey, Cultural
Studies and the Study of Popular Culture (Edinburgh, 1996).
Sanitising Womeni Social Spaces 1 109
its centre. Though many build a romanticised, nostalgic picture of
courtesan culture in Nawabi Lucknow and the Awadh of Wajid Ali
Shah, or alternatively dismiss it as the zenith of a decadent culture,
we do have significant insights into the lives of prostitutes.106Some
were a part of the high court culture and closely allied to regimes of
pleasure and power. They were among the chief entertainers and
cultural status symbols for the elite. Working mainly under the public
male gaze, they commanded respect in the court and in society.'07
Common prostitutes were also viewed as a means of puribing towns,
maintaining the moral order, and as outlets for men's sexual drive.
There were hierarchies within prostitutes, dividing them into tawaif,
thakahi, randi and khangi.lo8 However, they were a part of society,
of life, and were largely accepted and tolerated by people. They parti-
cipated in cultural, religious and social functions. This acceptance of
them, within a space inhabited by many others, underwent crucial
changes at this time.
The position of the prostitute became increasingly precarious after
1857. Recent studies have explored this by examining the relationship
between soldiers, venereal disease, brothels, prostitutes and the em-
pire.''? They have highlighted the increasing concern of British
' O G Especially useful are Mirza Muhammad Hadi Ruswa, IJmrao ]an Xda:
trans. Khushwant Singh and M.A. Husaini (Hyderabad, 1987); Hasan Shah,
Nashtar or The Nautch Girl, trans. Qurratulain Hyder (Delhi, 1992); Abdul
Halim Sharar, Lucknow: The LastPhaseofan Oriental Culture, trans. and ed. H.S.
Harcourt and Fakhir Hussain (London, 1975); Amir Hasan, Palace Culture of
Luckmow (Delhi, 1983), esp. pp. 107-25; idem, Vanishing Culture of Lucknow
(Delhi, 1990).
Mildred Archer, 'The Social History of the Nautch Girl', The Saturday
Book (1962), pp. 243-53.
lo' Tawaifs were usually high-class singer-entertainers, catering to the highest
elite of the land. The others mainly provided sexual services: Veena Talwar
Oldenburg, The Making of Colonial Lucknow 185677 (Princeton, 1984),
pp. 132-6.
lo' Pioneering has been the work of Kenneth Ballhatchet, Race, Sexand Class
under the Raj: Imperial Attitudes and Policies and their Critics, 173.7-1905 (Lon-
don, 1980), esp. pp. 20-1, 41-3. Also see Philippa Levine, 'Venereal Disease,
Prostitution and the Politics of Empire: The Case of British India', journal of
the Hisrovy ofSexuality, 4, 4 (1994), pp. 579-602; idem, 'Re-reading the 1890s:
1 10 I Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
officials to ensure 'healthy' sex for its soldiers, especially after the sup-
pression of the revolt. A large number of prostitutes operated outside
the cantonment areas, were largely unregistered, and posed a threat
to British order. A detailed system was therefore worked out for regis-
tering prostitutes, inspecting them, and detaining them in hospitals
if they contracted venereal disease. For this purpose La1 Bazaars (Red
Light Streets) were established as brothel areas in regimented canton-
ments, Contagious Diseases Acts passed, and lock hospitals set up."'
The shifting terrain ofold courtesans in post-Mutiny Nawabi Lucknow
has been linked to British policies and legislation concerned with
regulating, sanitising and cleaning the city.''' Simultaneously, there
Venereal Disease as "Constitutional Crisis" in Britain and British India', JAS, 55,
3 (1996), pp. 585-612; Antoinette Burton, Burden of History:British Feminists,
Indian Women and Imperial Culture, 1865-1915 (Chapel Hill, 1994); Judy
Whitehead, 'Bodies Clean and Unclean: Prostitution, Sanitary Legislation and
Respectable Femininity in Colonial North India', Gender History, 7 (1995),
pp. 41-63; Douglas M. Peers, 'Soldiers, Surgeons and the Campaigns to Combat
Sexually Transmitted Diseases in Colonial India, 1805-60', MedicalHistory, 42,
2 (1998), pp. 137-60.
"O Ibid.
"I Oldenburg, Colonial, pp. 132-42. She complements her work with a
study which views Lucknow's courtesans as subversive agents with decision-mak-
ing abilities; in the process she challenges studies which see prostitutes as mere
'victims': Veena Talwar Oldenburg, 'Lifestyle as Resistance: The Case of the
Courtesans of Lucknow', in Douglas E. Haynes and Gyan Prakash (eds), Con-
testing Power: Resistance and Everyday Social Relations in South Asia (Delhi,
1391), pp. 23-61. At a general level, some feminists have been arguing this posi-
tion persuasively: see Ellen Carol Dubois and Linda Gordon, 'Seeking Ecstasy
on the Battlefield: Danger and Pleasure in Nineteenth Century Feminist Sexual
Thought', in Carole S. Vance (ed.), Pkarure and Danger: Exploring Femak Srm-
ality (London, 1984), pp. 33-5. However, it has been recently argued that
though Oldenburg dislocates the consistently exaggerated notion of the prosti-
tute as always a victim who is forced into the trade out of financial needs, and
hence requiring protection, she also goes off to another extreme, of seeing the
prostitute as an agent in total command of her position. Such views fail to see
that prostitutes are necessarily and complexly related both to patriarchy and to
women as a class: Rajeswari Sunder Rajan, 'The Prostitution Question(s):
(Female) Agency, Sexuality and Work', in Ratna Kapur (ed.), Feminist Terrains
Sanitising Women i Social Spaces / 1 1 1
was a decline in court patronage as the old urban aristocracy slowly
lost its power and wealth. Courtesans now found themselves mostly
inhabiting the same public space and bazaar as regular prostitutes.
New clients had to be found, and the new urban elite and British
soldiers became their chief sources of income.'12 Prostitutes were in
these ways being increasingly pushed into a strictly defined and nar-
row space. Stripped of all emotional and intellectual functions, they
now had the exclusive role of specialists in sexual entertainment.l13
Increasing economic insecurity, the scarcity ofjobs and the sidelining
ofwomen's labour in many areas swelled the number of prostitutes,''*
at the same time making the profession competitive. Many lower
caste/class women, such as milk-sellers, coolie women and vegetable
sellers, took to the profession either part-time or full-time. The in-
crease in urban space, and the shifting of areas of operation for some
prostitutes from court to city, made them more conspicuous in the
bazaars.
However, the studies mentioned above implicitly associate the
changing problem of prostitution solely with British power and
colonial structure.'15 In the process they fail to acknowledge, much
less analyse, the conservative sexual politics and the new moral code
of indigenous patriarchal nationalism and revivalist/reformist move-
ments of the period-which had an equally profound impact on at-
titudes towards prostitutes. The fact is that the upper castes and
the middle classes, and sometimes others, adopted an ambiguous
position, often complicit with British attitudes, even when they
7 May 1892, NNR, 12 May 1892, p. 169; PrayagSamachar, 19 May 1892, NNR,
25 May 1892, p. 185; Cawnpore Gazette, 23 September 1892, NNR, 28 Sep-
tember 1892, p. 359.
'21 Prayag Samachar, 31 December 1891.
Iz8 Agra Akhbar, 14 May 1900, NNR, 22 May 1900, p. 259. Vanijya Sukh-
dayak, November 1907, NNR, 7 December 1907, p. 1366, held prostitution to
be responsible for a number of murders in the locality.
I z 9 Nuru-i-Anwnr, 1 November 1890, NNR, 4 November 1890, p. 710; Pra-
yagSamachar, 31 December 1891; Mohini, 3 February 1904, NNR, 13 February
1904, p. 56.
I3O Nmim-i-Agra, 30 June 1900, NNR, 3 July 1900, p. 338; Nasim-i-Agra,
30 July 1892, NNR, 3 August 1892, p. 284. Also see, Nuru-i-Anwar, 1 Novem-
ber 1890, NNR, 4 November 1890, p. 710; I'ocket Akhbar, November 1905,
NNR, 16 December 1905, p. 426.
13' Naiyar-i-Azam, 12 June 1907, NNR, 15 June 1907, p. 719.
Sanitising Women i Social Spaces 1 1 17
maintaining public order in the city.132Extensive bylaws were drafted
to regulate laces of ~ u b l i centertainment, including the time at
which such entertainment had to end, how many people could
attend, and how much noise they could make.133Municipal rules
often upheld the shifting of prostitutes to remote areas and ~rohibited
the establishment of brothels in any place not set apart for such
purposes.134The middle classes of UP, too, continually appealed for
special laws to expel prostitutes from thoroughfares and compel them
to live in settlements set apart, away from municipal centres.135It was
pointed out that in civilised towns like Bombay and Lahore prosti-
tutes lived in specified areas outside the towns, where they could be
under constant police vigilance, and UP'S towns must follow their
e ~ a m - p l e . 'Municipal
~~ boards were often lauded if they drafted
specific rules for this purpose;'37 alternatively they were rebuked
when they showed leniency towards prostitutes by allowing them to
13' Oldenburg, Colonial, pp. 75-95.
133 498, Box 90 (Varanasi Regional Archives); 101, Box 78 (Varanasi Regio-
nal Archives).
13* For example, rules framed by the local government ofAgra forbade prosti-
tutes and eunuchs to frequent public streets as this might prove unpleasant to
respectable persons: Praja Hitkarak, 23 March 1890, NNR, 3 1 March 1890,
p. 197. The Municipal Board, Banaras, ruled in 1898 that a professional prosti-
tute, or any other woman of loose character, living within the municipal limits,
at whose house bad characters assembled to the annoyance of her respectable
neighbours, would be called upon to vacate her house: Raf;-ul-Akhbar, 18 April
1898, NNR, 27 April 1898, p. 226. Similar provisions were introduced in the
new Municipal Bill at Lucknow in the same year. The Bill was warmly supported:
Hindustani, 3 August 1898, NNR, 10 August 1898, p. 423.
' 3 5 Mutkz-i-Nur, 25 July 1876, NNR, 29 July 1876, p. 382; Oudh Akhbar,
6 August 1876; Nasim-i-Agra, 7 May 1892, NNf?, 12 May 1892, p. 169.
13' Prayag Samachar, 19 May 1892, NNR, 25 May 1892, p. 185; Agra Akh-
bar, 14 May 1900, NNR, 22 May 1900, p. 259.
13' Bharat]iwan, 27 June 1892, p. 6 lauded the order passed by the Aligarh
Municipality forbidding prostitutes to sit on their balconies. Hamid-ul-Akhbar,
31 August 1892, NNR, 7 September 1892, p. 329 did the same and urged the
Moradabad Municipal Board to immediately follow suit. Nasim-i-Ap, 30 Sep-
tember 1900, NNR, 9 October 1900, p. 509, lauded the powers conferred on
the Agra Municipality to remove prostitutes, living in the bazaars amidst respect-
able persons, to some other locality, where they may not so easily demoralise the
youth of the towns. It hoped the government would implement the laws strictly.
1 18 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
live in town centres and respectable neighbourh~ods.'~~ The editor
of Independent took strong exception when certain prostitutes of
Allahabad were allowed to vote in the election for municipal com-
missioners. 13'
Strikingly, almost the same language of morality, purity, sanita-
tion, civilisation and religion was deployed against meat-shops and
Muslim butchers. Many Hindus objected to the sale of meat and fish
at a central market in Jhansi in 189 1 and submitted a petition to the
municipal board, asking for the removal of such ~ t a l 1 s . lIn~ ~1892
Hindus objected to the presence of butchers in the principal streets
of Moradabad on sanitary grounds.141The town witnessed bitter
conflict on this question, with the sanitary commissioners and mu-
nicipal corporations constantly changing their stances according to
the pressure of Hindus or Muslims.142In 1913, when the municipal
board of Allahabad sanctioned a plot of intra-municipal nazul land
as a meat market at Katra, the Hindu residents were up in arms.143
A protest memorial was submitted to the Lieutenant Governor, ar-
guing that government buildings and the houses of respectable Hin-,
dus would surround the market and that the squabbles of lowly
people haggling for bargains would disturb the quiet of the neigh-
bourhood. It was also said that the locality contained several temples
and was inhabited by many vegetarians, and the removal of butchers
was imperative to prevent their houses and temples from being
Sinha, ColonialMasculiniry, pp. 138-72; Janaki Nair, Women and Law in Colo-
nial India: A Social History (New Delhi, 1996), pp. 71-84; Judy Whitehead,
'Modernising the Motherhood Archerype: Public Health Models and the Child
Marriage Restraint Act of 1929', in Uberoi (ed.), Social pp. 187-200; Geraldine
Forbes, Women in Modern India (New Delhi, 1998), pp. 83-90.
20 See Sudhir Chandra, 'Rukhmabai: Debate over Woman's Right to Her Per-
son', EPW (2 November 1996), pp. 2937-47; idem, Enslaved Daughters: Colo-
nialism, Law and Women i Rights (Delhi, 1998); Uma Chakravarti, Rewriting
Histoly: The Life and Times of Pandita Ramabai (New Delhi, 1998); 189-921
June 1887, Judl, A, Home Deptt (NAI).
130 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
of love between husbands and wives. They clung to the idea of
imprisonment as a deterrent to prevent Hindu women from deserting
their husbands.21Pandit Jagan Nath, a vakil from Agra, said: 'I have
never known a chaste Indian wife refusing of her own free will to go
and live with her husband. . . .The fear of imprisonment makes many
young wives return to their allegiance and duty, and ultimately live
a happy life, instead of a corrupt one, which they are very likely to
follow if allowed to remain separate.'22
Coercion and control over women by seduction or fear was an
important aspect in the arguments of conservative Hindus. The Bha-
rat Varshya National Association of Aligarh appointed a select com-
mittee to go into the various terms of reference of the 1882 Code.
Vehemently opposing any change in the law, it argued that it would
introduce divorce amongst Hindus; it would lead to further legisla-
tion on the subject of early marriage; it would attack Hindu manners,
customs and religious right; it would make marriage purely a civil
contract; and it would be undesirable for the good of women them-
selves.23
Orthodox Hindus had constantly opposed British interference in
the personal laws of Hindus. However, at this moment they upheld
the colonial law, signifying that they were not averse to invoking such
law when it was seen as strengthening patriarchy. Lakshmi Narayana
Vyasa, President, Hindu Samaj, Allahabad, expressed the opinion of
the Samaj:
Under Hindu kings enough power was exercised by individuals for the
coercion of disobedient and wayward wives. . . . [But] the power of curb-
ing the spirit of a recalcitrant wife is now entirely in the hands of the law
64 Ibid.
65296/1930, Box 213, Judl (Civil) Deptt (UPSA).
66Charles H. Heimsath, Indian Nationalism and Hindu Social Reform
(Princeton, 1964), pp. 91-4; Nair, Women, pp. 184-5.
67 IlFebruary 1911, Judl, Deposit, Home Deptt (NAI).
68 Padam Kun~arivs. Suraj Kumari, Indian Law Reports, Allahaba4 Vol. 28
(Allahabad, 1906), p. 458.
69 1241191 1, Box 45, Judl (Civil) Deptt (UPSA).
Mapping the Domestic Domain I 139
Bill-that it was detrimental to the sacramental character of the
Hindu religion and marriage ceremony; that it would create problems
for inheritance and s u c c e ~ s i o nMeetings
.~~ were held and resolutions
passed to endorse such views.71
However, at the core of the. opposition were fears of inter-caste
marriages polluting the 'pure blood' of upper-caste Hindus,72and of
inter-religious marriages challenging the cohesiveness of Hindu com-
m ~ n i t y Kirti
. ~ ~ Sah Bahadur, Raja of Garhwal state, put it bluntly:
'The second objection appears far more formidable to me. If the bill,
as it stands, is passed into law there will be nothing to prevent a Hindu
marrying a Muhammadan wife or a high class Brahman from mar-
rying a low caste Shudra woman; but such marriages cannot possibly
be regarded as valid under Hindu law.'74
Some reformers, like C.Y. Chintamani, president of the Fifth UP
Social Conference, pointed out that such a bill was necessary for the
removal of caste barriers.75These voices were hopelessly outnumber-
ed, revealing the unrepresentative character of the liberal reformers,
and the bill could not be passed. The opposition revealed an incon-
sistency, as it applied miscegenation arguments to liaisons between
castes, while at the same time professing one 'Hindu' identity. Even
branches of the Arya Samaj took public positions against the bill.'"
It was maintained that there was no need of exogamy as each Hindu
caste and the community as a whole contained a sufficient number
of males and female^.'^ It was contended that the Hindu race could
70Abhyudaya, 30 July 1911, NNR, 4 August 1911, p. 709; Abhyudaya, 6
August 1911, NNR, 11 August 1911, p. 733; Abhyudaya, 10August 191 1, NNR,
18 August 191 1, p. 756.
7 1 Ameeting was held at Banaras on 5 July 191 1, protesting against the bill:
Trishul 5 July 191 1, NNR, 14 July 191 1, p. 627. A drafi memorial in opposition
co che bill was published: Abhyudaya, 30 July 191 1, NNR, 4 August 191 1,
p. 709.
72 Abhyudaya, 10 August 191 1, NNR, 18 August 191 1, p. 756.
73 17lNovember 1911, Judl, B, Home Deptt (NAI).
74 1241191 1, Box 45, Judl (Civil) Deptt (UPSA).
75 85IJuly 1911, Judl, B, Home Deptt (NAI).
'' 1241191 1, Box 45, Judl (Civil) Deptt (UPSA); 132lNovember 191 1, Judl,
B, Home Deptt (NAI).
77 Mashriq, 22 August 191 1, NNR, 1 September 191 1, p. 799.
140 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
not be improved or the Hindu nation made strong and muscular by
such promiscuous inter-caste marriages. They would result in the
birth of inferior children,78and were seen as fatal to Hinduism itself.
L. Stuart, Secretary to the Government in UP, also supported claims
against reform.79
Some scholars claim that legal interference by colonial authorities
was an important cause of nationalist dissent. This is not entirelycon-
vincing. The rejection ofcolonial interference in personal matters was
selective, and there were interesting ambivalences towards the colo-
nial law which resulted in different, even conflicting, statements by
similar people and organisations.
The debates around marriage and conjugal law were one manifes-
tation of concerns with women's sexuality. The sartorial styles of
Hindu women, their love of jewellery, their bathing semi-nude in
public ghats, and their veil were other markers of desire and its con-
trol. Considerations of nationalism and modernism gave new twists
to these emblems of identity.
dress reform, for different reasons. See Elizabeth Wilson, 'All the Rage', and Sera-
fina K. Bathrick, 'The Female Colossus: The Body as Fagade and Threshold',
both in Gaines and Herzog (eds), Fabrications, pp. 28-38 and 79-133 respect-
ively.
93 Lord Meston, Nationhoodfor India (London, 1931), pp. 52-3; Percival C.
Scott O'Connor, The Indian Countryside: A Cakndar and Diary--Description
and Travel, UP (London, 1908).
94 Cawnpore Gazette, 1January 1908, NNR, 11 January 1908, p. 51; Kannomal,
Mahila, p. 22.
" Rukmani Devi, Mem aur Saheb (Banaras, 1919), pp. 1-32.
144 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Mapping the Domestic Domain / 145
146 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
unveiling for whom, where and how. Many women writers and jour-
nals were faced with this incongruity. The discourse on purdah
amongst Hindu reformers highlighted it as a problem that resulted
from Muslim rule and became widespread for two reasons, namely
the unhealthy impact of Muslim customs, and as a weapon to shield
Hindu women from being attacked by bestial Muslim males.96More
important was how to negotiate this in the present context, when one
had to appear reformist, progressive and an upholder of household
values and culture all at the same time. There were many who high-
lighted the evils of purdah in a perplexing manner. An article stated
that lajja was the most important jewellery for women, and it had two
younger sisters-sushilta and sehanshilta. But actual purdah could
lead to problems. The article cited a 'true' story in which two brides,
one a Kshatriya and the other a Brahmin, were inter-changed un-
knowingly due to purdah!" Another suggested that the veil should
not to be a foot long but just two inches, whereby it would increase
the beauty of the woman tenfold.98
purdah was not opposed universally. With the greater access of
women to public places, a selective appearance of purdah was thought
necessary-at railway stations, public ghats and roads, and in inter-
actions with shopkeepers and other such men." The arguments hint-
ed at worries about women's behaviour, movement and relationships
outside the household. With the development of railways and im-
proved communications, the number of pilgrims increased dramati-
all^.'^^ However, the Arya Samaj and certain reformers declared pil-
grimage centres as dens of evil, where women, particularly widows,
were constantly violated. Pandas and mahants were seen as symbols
of the degradation of Hinduism.'O1 This was combined with patri-
"For details see Chapter G.
97Anon., 'Lajja', KanyaManoranjan, 2 , 8 (May 1915), pp. 212-13. Also see,
Iridiarr People, 25 April, 1909, NNR, 7 May 1909, p. 351.
98 Pandey, Nari, pp. 122-3.
99Anon., 'Grhasthcharya', p. 20; Lakshmi Narayan 'Saroj', Nari Shiksha
Darpan (Banaras, 1929), p. 21.
l o o L.S.S. O'Malley, Popular Hinduism: The Religion of the Mmser (Cam-
bridge, 1935), pp. 238-42.
l o ' Anon, 'Mahanton ke Vyabhichar', Chand, 2 , 2 , 4 (August 1924), pp. 302-
4.
Mapping the Domestic Domain 1 147
archal worries about women going on pilgrimages. lo2 One writer said:
'It is my experience that, in households where women maintain pur-
dah from members within the house, when they go to ghats and
pilgrimages they open their big mouths and talk for hours with pan-
das and mahants."03
Women bathing semi-nude in public ghats were signs of shame,
of being uncivilised, of licensed misdoings in an open space.lo4This
was the antithesis of purdah. An article in Stri Darpan, a women's
magazine from Kanpur, said:
These days women have constructed completely opposite meanings of
purdah. As soon as they enter their homes, they pull a yard-long veil, and
when they go out to fairs, they leave their face,totally uncovered. Singing
obscene songs, they walk on the streets at the time of marriages. In such
situations can they be thought ofas purdah-bearers just because their faces
are covered? . . . Then again in the month of Kartik, they take baths in
rivers, where thousands of people see them. Then they do not feel at all
ashamed. . . True purdah is that which existed between Sita and
Lakshman.lo5
lo2 Tanika Sarkar, 'Scandal in High Places: Discourses on the Chaste Hindu
Woman in Late Nineteenth Century Bengal', in Meenakshi Thapan (ed.), Em-
bodiment: Essays on Gender and Identity (Delhi, 1997), pp. 35-73.
lo' Pagal, Grhini, pp. 15-16.
Io4Anon., 'Striyon ka Nagn Snan', Madhuri, 1, 2, 1 (January 1923), pp. 53-
4; Kanauj Punch, 1 August 1892, NNR, 3 August 1892, p. 284.
Io5 Shakunrala Devi Gupta, 'Purdah', Stri Darpan, 29, 1 (July 1923), pp. 346-
7.
Io6 Rup Narayan Tiwari (Arya Pratinidhi Sabha, UP), Ganga Snan (Kanpur,
1923), pp. 8-9,31-2; KhichriSamnchar, 6 September 1890, NNR, 8 September
1890, p. 584; Ram Pataka, 1 December 1893, NNR, p. 548; Prayag Samachar,
23 January 1902, NNR, 1 February 1902, p. 77; Rohifkhand Gazette, 16 Sep-
tember 1902, NNR, 27 September, 1902, p. 595; Swarajya, 4April 1908, NNR,
18 April 1908, p. 354.
148 / Sexuality, Obsceniry, Community
lo' The issue of constructing separate bathing ghats for women had come up
in Banaras many times but was rejected mostly on grounds of expenditure.
Zenana ghats constructed at Mirzapur and Mathura were also not very successful:
3111 1211869, Bundle 6, Judl Deptt (Allahabad Regional Archives).
'08There were no railways in India in 1850. But within the next fifty years,
an extensive network developed: Ian J. Kerr, Building the Railways of the hj,
185&1900 (Delhi, 1995), p. 1.
lo' J.N. Westwood, Railways of India (London, 1974), pp. 3 6 4 0 .
'I0 Bharatjiwan, 5 December 1898, NNR, 13 December 1898, p. 653; Agra
Akhhar, 20 December 1876, NNR, 23 December 1876, p. 747; Hindustan,
9 May 1889, NNR, 15 May 1889, pp. 300-1; Anis-i-Hind, 9 December 1893,
NNR, 1893, p. 551; Rohilkhatid Gazette, 1 February 1902, NNR, 8 February
1902, p. 96; Mohini, 2 November 1902, NNR, 15 November 1902, p. 693;
Rohilkhand Gazette, 8 September 1905, NNR, 16 September 1905, p. 308;
Hindustani, 20 September 1905, NNR, 23 September 1905, p. 314; Sar Punch,
1 August 1910, NNR, 1910.
Mapping the Domestic Domain 1 1 5 1
reforms in order to appear civilised. Thus, selective purdah was shown
as being good for women. Worries about modern developments, i.e.
markets, railways, pilgrimages, etc. becoming sites for the 'exposure'
of respectable women, indicated the problems of completely doing
away with purdah. This led to discerning condemnation as well as
endorsement of purdah. Selective purdah in public places was seen
as necessary, even within the home, and where this was impossible,
certain relationships between women and men had to be monitored.
One such relationship, a cause of some concern for Hindu moralists,
was that between devar and bhabhi.
' ' I The ideal in most of north India has been the relationship benveen Sita
and Lakshman, where Lakshman, when asked to recognise Sita's ring when she
is abducted, is unable to do so, as he had only looked at his bhabhi's feet. How-
ever, there are strong undercurrents in this relationship which have also been
much highlighted. Tagore wrote on this theme, suggesting the eroticism inher-
ent in the forbidden crossing of boundaries, where the woman often becomes too
close to her brother-in-law. In Haryana, a widow was often made to marry her
younger brother-in-law: Prem Chowdhry, The Veikd Women: Sh~ftingGender
Equations in Rural Havana, 1880-1990 (Delhi, 1994).
S.W. Fallon, A Dictionaty of Hindustani Proverbs (Banaras, 1886), p. 1.
' I 3 Ibid., p. 48.
1 52 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Mapping the Domestic Domain / 153
>
2 ci
.G
Pa'
05
C 1=
11
Kt
154 I Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
in them are the pleasures of illicit liaisons between a devar and bhabhi.
Undercurrents of such relationships led to exaggerated fears and the
condemnation of any hint of extramarital inclinations.
T h e Hindu joint family considerably restricted the social interac-
tion between husband and wife. It has been argued that this was func-
tionally a traditional operating principle to preserve the extended
Hindu family.'14 Increasing male migration at this time, especially in
eastern UP, widened the spatial gaps in local families and households,
leading to new kinds of crises. The resulting separations caused emo-
tional stress and hardship for women. The joint family was ruptured
and women were frequently forced to live in oppressive households,
without their husbands. Male migration increased the responsibilities
ofwomen. Many folk songs of UP in this period talk of the migration
of males and women's loneliness. The poet Bihari Thakur's Bidesiya,
a lament for the loved one who has gone 'abroad', became very popu-
lar throughout the region.'15 Thus a folk-song in eastern UP ran:
Ser gohunua baras din khaibain, bar& din khaibain,
piya ke jaye na debayin ho.
Rakhaiben ankhiyan ke hajuravan,
piya ke jaye na debayin ho.
(One seer of wheat I will eat for a year, but I will not allow my husband
to go. I will keep him before my eyes and will not let him
Loneliness probably led many women to seek solace in other
relationships, and the chances of getting close to their younger
brother-in-law were high. In urban areas, education and reformist
rhetoric increased the opportunities for women to move around in
the household. They may have found in such extramarital relation-
ships a degree of solace and escape from everyday drudgery. The
devar-bhabhi attraction seems to have been fairly common and it was
m-'rm;r-m
* m 2
120Vishwa Prakash, Striyon ke Rishte (Prayag, 1935), pp. 73-4, pp. 112-13.
Also see Thakur, Viva/), p. 112, who argues that it is necessary to give women
some space to meet and laugh with other men, for it functions as a safety valve
in the preservation of the family structure.
12' Nita Kumar, 'Orange for the Girls, or, the Half-Known Story of the
Education ofGirls in Twentieth Century Banaras', in Nita Kumar (ed.), Women
us Subjects: South Asian Histories (New Delhi, 1974), p. 212.
W. Hooper, Christian Doctrine in Contrast with Hinduism and Islam: Zn-
tendedfot Young Missior~ariesin North India (London, 1887); A.M. Robinson
(cornp.), Weaving Patternsfor Eterniry: The Wonderfitl Story of C.E. Z.M.S Indus-
trial Missions (London, n.d.); Agnes Johnson (cornp.), About Signs Following:
The Work of C.E.Z. H.S(London, n.d.); North Indian Christian Tract and Book
162 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
stated: 'In the dreary, monotonous life of the zenana, one sees no
books, writing materials, fancy work-nothing in fact of the innu-
merable traces of civilisation which are scattered around the boudoirs
of English ladies."23 These women had to be reached by any means:
If secluded from men they must be reached by women; and if the ordained
missionary is prevented proclaiming in their ears the glad tidings of
salvation, then sister missionaries must be sent, with the Word in their
hands and on their lips, to tell it out to these sorrowful ones that there
is no real hindrance, but life and salvation is free, absolutely free, to them
also.124
Society, Hindu Dharma ke Phal (Allahabad, 1905, 2nd edn), p. 15; H. Lloyd,
Hindu Women: with Glimpses into their Life and Zenanas (London, 1882),
pp. 1-47; Raj Bahadur Sharma, Christian Missions in North India 1813-1913:
A Case S t d y ofMeerut Division and Dehradun District (Delhi, 1988), pp. 95-
6, 124-5; Priscilla Chapman, Hindoo Femak Education (London, 1839), pp. 28-
30; Iswar Saran, 'The Education of our Women-A Great Social Problem',
Kayastha Samachar, 4, 6 (December 1901), p. 490.
'23 Emma Raymond Pitman, Indian Zenana Missions: Their Need, Origin,
Objects, Agents, Modes of Working and Results (London, n.d.), p. 27.
12* Lloyd, Hindu, p. 47.
1 2 5 Bharat Jiwan, 1 l April, 1892, p. 4.
I z 6 Aligarh Institute Gazette, 8 July 1870, NNR, 1870, p. 270; PrayagSamachar,
14 April 1898, NNR, 27 April 1898, p. 228; Hindi Pradip, January-April 1909,
NNR, 9 July 1909, p. 230.
I2'.~nnie Besant, The Education of Indian Girls (Banaras, 1904), p. 1; Saran,
'Education', p. 490; Pratap, 26 September 1914, NNR, 31 October 1914,
p. 1168.
Mapping the Domestic Domain / 163
consented. Family interference, in the nick of time, prevented this.lZ8
The mission, in some senses, challenged Indian religions and social
institutions more than the empire.12?
N o education could be useful at the cost of family values and the
disruption of gender hierarchies at home. O n behalf of Hindu men,
a paper said:
Prayag Samachar, 28 April 1898 and 5 May 1898, NNR, I1 May 1898,
p. 254. In 1902, ladies of the American Zenana Mission at Allahabad 'enticed'
a woman whom they were teaching, who was the sister of one Babu Chandra
Kant Bose, an orthodox Bengali: Oudh Samachar, 14 November 1902, NNR,
22 November 1902, p. 707. Enraged by their efforts, he started a girl's school
'to prevent simple, unwary Hindu girls from coming under the baneful influence
of missionary ladies': Prayag Samachar, 3 July 1904, NNR, 9 July 1904, p. 230.
In 1907, a Hindu girl was 'abducted' in Allahabad by a lady of the London
Mission Bible Women's Training Institution, leading to agitation in many verna-
cular newspapers: Ablyudaya, 30 July 1907 and Atya Mina, 1 August 1907, both
in NNR, 3 August 1907, p. 926.
12' Antony Copley, Religions in Conflict: ia'eology, Cultural Contact and Con-
version in Late-Colonial India (Delhi, 1997), p. 6.
I3O Aligarh Institute Gazette, 8 July 1870, NNR, 1870, p. 271.
13' Ikbal Kishen Shargha, The Moral Education of Indians (Bareilly, 1908?),
p. 13. Also see Purshottam, Stri, pp. 2 1 6 1 8 ; Hari Rarnchandra Diwakar, 'Bhar-
tiya Striyon ka Vishwavidyalaya', Saraswati, 17, 2, 4 (October 1916), p. 220;
Samrat, 2 September 1909, NNR, I0 September 1909.
164 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
The God-like husband has himself made tea for his wife.
She has to give an important lecture on 'family happiness'
at Minto Park. The tea has been delayed by five minutes,
because of which she is scolding her husband.
Illustration 6. Education and Women
Mapping the Domestic Domain / 165
14* Statistics of British Indiafor 1907-8 and Preceding Years, Part VII, Educa-
tion (Calcutta, 1909), pp. 16-17; Statistics of British India, Vol. I/: Education,
1919-20 (Calcutta, 1921), p. 238.
143 General Report on Public Instruction in UP, year ending 31 March 1938
(Allahabad, 1939), pp. 34, 36.
'44 General Report on Public Instruction in UP, year ending 31 March 1910
(Allahabad, 191 1); Minna. G. Cowan, The Education of the Women of India
(Edinburgh, 1912), pp. 129-45.
145 Arya Samajists made special efforts to impart women a specific kind ofedu-
cation. T h e Kanya Mahavidyalaya at Jalandhar was one of their most successful
attempts: Madhu Kishwar, 'Arya Samaj and Women's Education: Kanya Maha-
vidyalaya, Jalandhar', E P Y 21, 17 (26 April 1986), pp. WS-9-24.
'46Cowan, Education, p. 134. Besides these, the most important was the
Crosthwaite High School for university and intermediate girls' education at
Mapping the Domestic Domain / 169
T h e national movement for girls'
- education must be on national lines:
it must accept the general Hindu conceptions of women's place in the
national life, not the dwarfed modern view but the ancient ideal . . . It
cannot see in her the rival and competitor of man in all forms of outside
and public employment, as woman, under different economic conditions,
is toming to be, more and more, in the W e s t . . . India needs nobly
trained wives and mothers, wise and tender rulers of the household, edu-
cated teachers of the young, helpful counsellors of their husbands, skilled
nurses of the sick, rather than girl graduates, educated for the learned
professions.14'
Many British officials, quite wary of the women's movement in
their own country, looked at this ideal with warm appreciation, and
there was a ~rofessedconservatism in their views. H.B. Butler, who
was then the Director of Education, stressed that the education of
girls should not seek to imitate that which is suitable for boys, nor
should it be dominated by examination^.'^^ Mackenzie, Director of
Public Instruction in UP, emphasised that they did not want Indian
girls to be more or less copies of Indian boys, nor did they want them
to be copies of Western girls. H e highlighted the need to develop a
curriculum for girls which would bring out the best traits of Indian
womanhood.149I t was perceived that the Hindu world would lose
much of its fascination and charm if, instead of a rehabilitation of the
ancient ideals ofwomanhood, the modern type were to develop mere-
ly as a denationalised caricature.150The ideals of women's education
upheld by Christian missionaries in UP were not too dissimilar from
the ones propagated by Hindus themselves, except for their religious
teaching. It was remarked:
A girls' school is not worth its existence that does not profess ro teach the
Accomplishments! . . . T h e durzi at the door is a reproach to the home,
One reason given for the failure of female education in UP was the
unsuitability of the curriculum. The public instruction department
generally held that in the case of female education too much arith-
metic was taught, and that some instruction of domestic science was
necessary. In 1915, therefore, a committee was formed to revise the
vernacular curriculum for girls. Its recommendations consisted chiefly
in a simplification of the arithmetic course and the introduction of
domestic science as a compulsory subject in the lower middle classes. 152
Further, though great concern was shown for women's education, the
government was actually unwilling to spend any substantial sum
upon it, and there was a serious lack of resources and trained female
teachers. In comparison, boys' schools were better equipped and
better staffed.153
The insidious impact of educated women taking to Western ways
was feared by Hindus:
In those schools where English education is given, girls get used to
fashionable ways of living. . . . T o promote simplicity among Hindu girls
and to avoid the impact of English education, religious education should
be specially given to them. . . . Today in most ofthe English girls' schools,
girls of all religions and caste study together. Christian, Muslim and
15' Joseph Carroll, Our Missionary Life in India (Allahabad, 191 7 ) ,pp. 335-
40.
15' General Report on Public Instruction in UP, year ending 3 1 March 1720
(Allahabad, 1920), p. 82.
'53 Prirna,y Educationfor Every Boy and Girlin UP(Allahabad, 1928),pp. 25-
6; Report on the Working of the Local and District Board in UP, 1901-2 (Allaha-
bad, 1303),p. 3; General Report on Public Instruction in UP,year ending31 March
1938 (Allahabad, 1939), pp. 34, 41'.
Mapping the Domestic Domain / 171
Hindu girls intermingle, and this has a very negative impact on Hindu
women. Christian girls say 'good-morning', wear jumpers and frocks
instead of saris, and wear hats on heads, and high sandals. . . . Hindu
families send their girls for education and not to become mems. . . . I am
saying all this to stress that Hindu, Christian and Muslim girls should
study separately. This should especially be enforced in boarding houses.'54
25 January 1902, p. 55. Hindusran Review, June 191 1, NNR, 14 July 1911,
pp. 620-1.
I 5 V 0 r language debates, see chapter 5.
I6O Besant, Education, p. 5.
16' Rarnkrishna, Stri Shiksha (Allahabad, 1874), p. 32; Devi, Pativrata, p. 3;
Hansdas Shastri, 'Stri Shiksha', Kurmi Kthatriya Diwakar, 4, 7 (September
1928), pp. 15-17; Primary Education, pp. 23-4.
I G 2 Bishambhar Prakash, Nari Updesh (Meerut, 1912), pp. 1 6 1 7 .
IG3 Thakur, Adarsh, pp. 1-4.
'64 Kanhaiya Lal, Rashtriya Shiksha ka Itihasaur Uski VartmanAvastha (Kashi,
1929), pp. 90-1, 133-42.
Mapping the Domestic Domain / 173
of separate schools and a different education for women and men.165
Segregations were created: woman represented the heart and emo-
tions while man was the brain and intellect. Masculine spaces
contained socially valued knowledge on theology, law and medi-
cine, feminine spaces contained devalued knowledge on child-care,
cooking and cleaning. The literature for women was consciously
didactic.
T o stop here would be to emphasise only the limits to the edu-
cational avenues of women and the function of education in the
subordination of women.166A study of women's education would be
incomplete if it drew no attention to levels other than the formal
script. Certain upper-caste widows of Banaras, it has been shown,
used education to reject stereotypes of widowhood and managed to
manipulate models of asceticism to carve out a space for them-
selves.16' Scholars have also shown how Hindu middle-class women
increasingly began to participate and become visible in the public
realm of print culture from the early twentieth century in UP. Wo-
men's magazines, the periodical press and women writers were mov-
ing and negotiating in a public sphere and had to be constrained in
their use of language and the values they propounded. Thus, the
representational practices of that culture were cast in a reformist
mould. Women's journals became agents of transmission ofa middle-
class code of conduct, though under the mantle of a progressive ori-
entation in relation to women. However, though they accepted some
of the structuring principles to be found among male reformers, they
also translated and negotiated others in order to argue for a voice of
their own in family and educational life, thereby posing some sort of
challenge to patriarchy.'68 It has been argued that letters written in
165 Purshottan~,Stri, pp. 350-1; Sharma, Sukhi, pp. 7-9; Pagal, Grhini,
pp. 4-6.
IGG Most works tend to highlight this aspect, see Chanana (ed.), Socialisation.
lG7 Nita Kumar, 'Widows, Education and Social Change in Twentieth Cen-
tury Banaras', E P R 26, 17 (27 April, 199 l), pp. WS-19-25; Kumar, 'Orange',
pp. 21 1-32.
IG8Vir Bharar Talwar, 'Feminist Consciousness in Women's Journals in
Hindi: 19 10-20', in Kunlkum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid (eds), Recasting Women:
Essays in Color~ialHistoy (New Delhi, 1989), pp. 204-32; Francesca Orsini,
174 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
various women's magazines, especially Chand, allowed space for soli-
darity in a covert and tentative way.'69 This issue can be elaborated.
People could limit and frame syllabi, they could order prescriptive
texts, but once women were educated it was difficult to control what
they read and the uses to which they put their knowledge. Education
was conducted in relatively public spaces, but reading was largely a
private act, offering greater scope for negotiation.'70 Women were
also 'reading against the grain' and even gaining access to 'trash'
material. They were quite possibly reading and enjoying erotic novels,
detective fiction, love stories, plays, svangs, nautankis and books of
songs. Unmarried educated girls were even reading birth manuals.
Such books were rather popular among educated women and had a
definite market.'" Though educated women were less likely to buy
such books in bazaars, which were mainly frequented by men, there
is no doubt these books were accessible to them. Yashoda Devi, a
leading ayurvedic doctor ofAllahabad, and writer of more than forty
prescriptive books, lamented:
I am fully aware that in the trunks of all educated women are kept at least
one or two such novels. . . If I had written such novels, I would have
gathered a lot of money . . . People say it was these novels that encouraged
Hindi reading, especially among women. . . . Every day women write
letters to me, demanding spicy novels . . . They returned my books on
nitishastra and dharmashastra. . . N o one asked for books on religious
'The Hindi Public Sphere: 1920-401, unpublished PhD thesis (SOAS, Univer-
sity of London, 1996), pp. 158-210. For Muslim women, see Minault, Secluded.
IG9 Orsini, 'Hindi', passim.
Roger Chartier, 'General Introduction', in R. Chartier (ed.), The Culture
of Print: Power and the Uses of Print in Early Modern Europe, trans. Lydia G.
Cochrane (Cambridge, 1989), pp. 1-5, 156. Chartier shows how festive, ritual,
cultic and pedagogic uses of print literature were by definition collective. At the
same time, he argues that books were often read in private within the home, and
could portray erotic scenes unimaginable in public art or publicly displayed
liturgical texts.
"I For the reading habits of women, see Thakur, Adarsh, p. 9; Upadhyaya,
Mabikz, p. 27; Shyamkumar, Smiyon, pp. 98-9; Purshottam, Stri, pp. 218-19;
G. P. Khanna, 'Stri Shiksha', Stri Darpan, 33, 4 (April 1925), p. 84. For names
of such books and their description, see Chapter 2.
Mapping the Domestic D o m a i n 1 175
education or household management . . . For two-three years I sent my
books on women's education to the Magh Mela on the banks of the
Triveni. T h e women who came to purchase books went away after seeing
my stall. They named juicy novels and used to demand them specifically,
as well as the likes ofAlbela Gauiyaand GhazaiSangraha. Shops that sold
such useless novels reported brisk sales."*
i93 Wendy Perkins, Midwifery and Medicine in Early Modern France, Louise
Bourgeois (Exeter, 1996); D. Armstrong, Political Anatomy of the Body: Medical
Knowledge in Britain in the Twentieth Century (Cambridge, 1983); L. Doyal, S.
Rowbotham and A. Scott (eds), Witches, Midwives and Nurses: A History of
Women Healers (London, 1976); Ludmilla Jardanova, Sexual Ksions: Images of
Gender in Science and Medicine Between the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries
(New York, 1989); Charlotte G. Borst, Catching Babies: The Professionalization
of Childbirth, 1870-1720 (Cambridge, 1995).
19* Dagrnar Engels, Btyond Purdah? Women in Bengal 1890-1737 (Delhi,
1996), p. 129; Arnold, Colonizing, pp. 257-9.
I" Forbes, 'Managing', pp. 163-8; Roger Jeffery, The Politics of Health in
India (Berkeley, 1988), p. 49; even a somewhat sympathetic account in Balfour
and Young could not help but say, 'The problem was (and still to a large extent
is!) the indigenous midwife': Balfour and Young, Medical p. 126.
l Y 6 Census of India, 171 1, UP, Vol. W , Part I (Allahabad, 1912), p. 193.
"' Census of India, 1721, UP, Vol. WI, Part I (Allahabad, 1923), p. 87.
I" For example see Sixty-ThirdAnnual Report of the Director of Public Health
of UP (Allahabad, 1931), p. 48.
180 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
At the same time, colonial policy fluctuated between trying to dis-
card dais entirely in favour of modern midwives, as well as retain an
indigenous agency. Along with condemnation of the traditional dais,
great effort was made to train them, to give them a standardised for-
mat, to develop them as 'professionalised' practitioners, and to instil
in them a distinct and exclusive body of Western kn0w1edge.l~~ The
civil surgeon at Bareilly, where one of the first official trainings of
midwives took place, favoured it because it might help reduce infan-
t i ~ i d e . ~This
" was because dais were often seen as having a hand in
female infanti~ide.~" It has been noticed that midwives were part of
a range of informal agents used by the British in early-nineteenth-
century north India.202With the entry ofvoluntary organisations, the
training of midwives received a further boost, especially in the major
urban centres of UP. In 1924,42 dais received lectures in Allahabad,
and in the same year it was reported that the 'scheme for training of
a superior class of midwives', introduced at Gorakhpur, Fyzabad,
Meerut, Aligarh, Allahabad, Banaras, Kanpur and Agra, was making
steady progress.203
Before 19 14, Western notions ofmedicine and hygiene made little
impact on the vast majority of UP. Going to the hospital was consi-
dered degrading by many of the middle classes.204Trained midwives
' I 5 Sixty- ThirdAnnual Report of the Director f l u b lic Health ofUP (Allahabad,
1931), pp. 46-7.
' I 6 Balfour and Young, Medical, p. 168; Jeffery, Politics, p. 91.
'" Sixty-Sixth Annual Report of the Director ofPublic Health of UP (Allahabad,
1934), Appendix C, pp. 46A-47A.
* I 8 E.H. Wyatt, Materniry: A Simple Book for Mothers and Materniry Nurses
in India (Allahabad, 1918), pp. 5-10.
'I9 Wyatt, Maternity, pp. 11-28.
'lo Forbes, 'Managing', pp. 167, 171.
'" Vaughan, 'Should', p. 18.
184 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
services, thus asserting their superiority. The colonial and nationalist
elites were engaged in a cultural dialogue, exchanging privileged
constructions of knowledge to devalue or discipline the traditional
dai, taking greater recourse to trained midwives and hospitals.
At the same time the disciplining was not smooth and was fractur-
ed to some extent by women themselves as well as by the dais, who
resisted Western medicine to a considerable degree-though there
were slight changes in the later phase. In 1869 the superintendent of
dispensaries at Bareilly spoke of the 'great difficulty' he and his staff
had in persuading women to attend dispensaries.222As late as 191 1
Major H. Austen Smith, civil surgeon ofAgra, said that the warning
against the dai had been of no avail and had failed to have much im-
pact on the population.223Most traditional dais were openly hostile
to training and licensing, and resisted efforts to render them 'harm-
less'.224Britishers lamented that the situation was much worse in the
north;225very few dais here completed their training.226An exasper-
ated Margaret Balfour said:
N o one knows better than myself the difficulties of training indigenous
dais. First, their ignorance, which makes them believe they have nothing
to learn. Then their prejudice against European methods; the apathy of
their patients, who desire nothing better than they are getting; the fact
that most dais are old and cannot take in new ideas even if they could.
They are independent women . . . There is no doubt that other women,
not of the dai caste, can be more satisfactorily trained . . . They have less
prejudice, can be secured younger, and not being independent of their
teachers are obedient and anxious to please.227
In 1923 the failure of being able to train the indigenous dai was
recognised in UP.228In 1934 it was again reported: 'The indigenous
23s Margaret Jolly, 'Introduction', in Kalpana Ram and Margaret Jolly (eds),
Maternities and Modernities: Colonial and Postcolonial experiences in Asia and the
Pacific (Cambridge, 1998), pp. 1-2.
*"Vasudha Dalmia, The Nationalization of Hindu Traditions: Bharatendu
Harischandra and Nineteenth-century Banaras (Delhi, 1997), p. 245.
240 'Shishupalan', Bahbodhini, 1,2-3 (March 1874), pp. 14,32; (June 1874),
pp. 61-5.
24' Ganeshdutt Sharma Gaur 'Indra', Santan Shastra (Allahabad, 1928, 2nd
edn), pp. 489-91.
242 Indra, Santan, p. 491.
243 K.N. Panikkar, 'Indigenous Medicine and Cultural Hegemony: A Study
of the Revitalisation Movement in Keralam', SH, 8, 2 (1992), pp. 288-95;
Brahmananda Gupta, 'Indigenous Medicine in Nineteenth and Twentieth
188 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Devi of Allahabad was a famous ayurvedic practitioner at the begin-
ning of the twentieth century.244Though ayurvedic training was tech-
nically closed to women practitioners as it was largely in Sanskrit,245
Yashoda Devi had received an education and training in ayurveda
from her father and, at the young age ofsixteen, began active practice:
she established her Stri Aushadhalaya at Allahabad around 1908; she
was a prolific writer who wrote more than forty books, not only on
health and sex but also on the different aspects ~ f w o m e nShe
. ~ had
~~
her own printing and publishing house, known as Devi Pustakalaya,
and advertised her various books extensively in her own publications,
as well as in leading journals and newspapers.247She started occa-
sional magazines like G n y a Sawasva and Stridhama Shikshak.
Yashoda Devi moved in a relatively new territory. There was at this
time hardly a dispensary based on indigenous belief systems which
catered exclusively to women in India.248It was difficult for pur-
dahnashin women to go to male practitioners,249there were limits to
their access to cash and legitimate reasons for leaving home,250and
there was still much bias against Western medical systems. Thus
Yashoda Devi fulfilled two much-felt needs-being a woman and the
256Atvarious places, I have cited her works. For example, see the sections on
conjugality and education in this chapter. Here I have focussed upon her medical
works.
'j7 Devi, Dampati, pp. 16-25.
NNR, 24 April 1900, p. 187; Anjuman-i Hind 14 April 1900, NNR, 24 April
1900, p. 187; Prayag Samachar, 26 April 1900, NNR, I May 1900, p. 198; Hin-
dustani, 25 April 1900, NNR, 1 May 1900, p. 201.
263 320-621January 1898, Sanitary (Plague), Home Deptt (NAI); 67-9/June
1900, Sanitary (Plague), A, Home Deptt (NAI); 153lJune 1900, Sanitary
(Plague), A, Home Deptt (NAI); 486Cl1900, Box 105, GAD (UPSA). How-
ever, it appears that these regulations were often not implemented in practice.
264 244-52IJuly 1900, Sanitary (Plague), A, Home Deptt (NAI); Arnold,
Colonizing, pp. 2 11-39.
265 Rol~iikhandPunch, 30 January 1898, NNR, 2 February 1898, p. 61;
Nizam-ul-Mulk, 16 April 1900, NNR, 24 April 1900, p. 189; Shahna-i-Hind,
16 April 1900, NNR, 24 April 1900, p. 189; Cawvrpore Gazette, 1 May 1900,
NNR, 8 May 1900, p. 2 17; Bharat jiwan, 20 June 1898, NNR, 29 June 1898,
p. 347.
266 5211May 1898, Sanitary, Home Deprt (NAI); Sitara-i-Hind 12 April
1898, NNR, 20 April 1898, p. 210; Almora Akhbar, 23 April 1898, NNR, 27
April 1898, p. 225.
192 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
honour, purdah, domestic privacy, public examination, and forcible
removal to segregation camps and hospitals.267Within the toll of
death by plague in UP, women often outnumbered men, and this may
also have been due to resistance to being examined.268Excitement was
evoked not by the spread of plague but by the possibility of purdah
being violated. Fears were engendered by tales of abuse and rumours
about the unknown. There was a rumour repeated by thousands in
Lucknow in 1898 that a native police officer, travelling with his wife
by rail, freely offered himself to the doctor for medical examination
but refused it for his wife. Words were exchanged and the policeman
first shot the doctor and then himself.269A newspaper represented a
young girl bitterly complaining of plague rules to her mother and
sister. She did not know how to go to her husband's house in Patna,
as she was fearful of the examination on the way, and of being sent
to the plague hospital.270At a zenana fair at Fyzabad, rumour spread
that a lady doctor would be coming to perform plague inoculations
on purdahnashin women, causing panic and consternation among
women concerning their honour and safety.'"
In April 1900 a serious plague riot occurred at Kanpur lasting more
than fivedays. Crowds of people went to the plague camp, set it afire,
killed a police constable and severely wounded another. The army had
to be called. Ten people were killed. Shops were closed. It was re-
ported that Manvari merchants instigated the tumult and boycotting,
and that it all began with attempts to isolate a Hindu woman sus-
pected of being ill with plague.272Until 29 March of that year no case
of plague had been reported in Kanpur. O n that day a Mam-ari wo-
The notion ofa pativrata wife and an ideal woman functioned as ideo-
logical constructs in the period. Conjugal relations, concerns about
education and health, were imbued with new meanings t ~ ~ q f r o d u c e
and introduce gender hierarchies and patriarchal norms, ahd establish
Hindu identity. The modernisation of technologyand economy, new
laws, print, biomedicine and so on aided this fopmation. In the
process, it was largely a middle-class and upper-caste Hindu domestic
model that was constructed, thus attempting to 'colonise' the bodies
of Hindu women, both of their own class and of the lower classes and
castes. There were obvious tensions here with the lower castes, as was
revealed in debates around inter-caste marriagesand dais. However,
middle-class agendas were also sometimes able to provide linkages
across castes: intermediary and lower castes were being tied into high-
caste norms of the household as part of the construction of a Hindu
identity, as was evident in the case of plague.
However, the pativrata was not a self-contained category. While
there was some support from the women themselves for such an ideal,
it was less convincing as an explanation of their actual experiences.
Though there were constant attempts to sketch the middle-class
This symbolism was evoked largely to aid men in the service of the
nation. The emotional appeal of the symbol of the mother was com-
bined with modern scientific arguments and economic 'facts' about
the earth and the cow.
worked at the temple since 1968, and before him, his father and grandfather
looked after the temple. Today the temple is not really a place of worship and
has more of a historic value. Puja is held in the temple on 26 January and
15 August.
l 8 The poem is placed just inside the temple.
l 9 Aaj, 25 October 1936.
20 Kavivar 'Chanchrik', Gram Geetanjali (Gorakhpur, 1938,3rd edn), p. 26.
*' Gupt, 'Shri', p. 11 1; Gopal Shastri 'Darshan Keshari', 'Shri Shivprasad
Guptasy Krityani', in Tiwari and Krishnanath (eds), &hi, p. 101.
202 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
in medieval India.22Unlike Bengal, in the Bharat Mata Temple the
female figure representing Mother India was absent; instead she was
concretised as a political and geographical body. The map identified
Hindu nationalism with the land of India, imagined as a sacred
'mother'. A tradition of nationalism linked to a poetics of love and
longing was constructed.
This new Hindu-nationalist map drew from the technologies of
mathematical cartography. Its significance was not questioned by
Gupt or the chiefsculptors; they took it for granted and used it extens-
ively to show Bharat Mata as the geographical territory of India.23
This allegorical figuration of nation as mother portrayed cities, dis-
tricts, rivers and mountains, a sovereign territory with set boundaries.
Thus in his description of the temple Gupt's fundamental preoccu-
pation was the height and length of the map, the number of marble
pieces that went into its making, the markings of various countries
surrounding India, the measurements of places. The map was to aid
the study of the womb of the earth, India's geography and geology,
help in understanding the mystery of Indian culture, its development
and its special essence.24
Mother as map of the nation also served to suggest a loyal political
citizenry devoted in the service of the nation. The children of the
nation attained greater existence, personhood and identity via their
location within sacred boundaries. These dutiful children were male
Hindu sons ofthe nation, shown as constituting ideal Indians. In fact,
the conceptualisation of 'Indian' was one of the major currents in
Indian nationalist thought by the turn of the twentieth century, and
the ideological preoccupations of the Bharat Mata Temple gave him
a concrete presence. Shivprasad Gupt called his temple 'Shri Bharat-
mata Mandir'. Literally translated this is 'Mr Mother India Temple'.
The irony of the Mother as a body of male Hindus is unlikely to have
struck Shivprasad Gupt.25
22 Daud Ali, 'From Bhudevi to Bharatmata: Fragments in the History ofplace
and Patriarchy', unpublished paper.
23 Ali, 'Bhudevi'. Ali tries to problematise mathematical cartography, as other
scholars have done.
24 Gupt, 'Shri', pp. 109-1 1.
* 5 Gupt, 'Shri', p. 109.
The Icon of the Mother 1 203
Mother as map was so all-encompassing and huge that all had to
submerge their separate identities in her presence. The political impli-
cations of worshipping India as a Hindu map were clear: sacredness
and political rhetoric were being fused towards a valorisation of patri-
archal Hinduism. While described as a place where all could come,
the hymn 'Vande Mataram' inscribed at its very gates defined national
and religious identity in terms of Hindu piety and activism.
This image of Mother India and the attendant discourse of spiri-
tuality grew so pervasive at this time in UP that even those political
leaders who opposed Hindu sectarianism resorted to using it. Such
uses may suggest that these were merely innocuous cultural and poli-
tical pieties. Yet the fact is that each such use had the potential to pro-
mote a singular Mother India and pride in India's 'superior' Hindu
cultural heritage.26 The Bharat Mata Temple can thus be seen as a
symbol of the deliberate confusion and conflation between Hindu/
IndianINation. Such an idea, it has been suggested, is anathema to
Muslims. It was certainly a way of alienating them by disregarding
Islam's anti-anthrop~morphism.~'
The Bharat Mata Temple of Banaras was conceived with 'noble'
sentiments and a spirit of nationalism, and claimed to be precise and
scientific. But the structure and the idea marked the inherent limit-
ations, ambiguities and contradictions of such imagery. Today, al-
most all schools run by the RSS have a map/figure/temple of Bharat
Mata within their complex.2s
11. Language Debates
Scholars have shown how, from the late nineteenth century especially,
language became, both among the Muslim gentry and the Hindu
26 Lise McKean, Divine Enterprise: Gurus andthe Hindu NationalistMovernent
(Chicago, 1996), pp. 1 4 6 5 7 , 2 8 6 9 ; idem, 'Bharat Mata: Mother India and
her Militant Matriots', in John. S. Hawley and Donna M. Wuff (eds), Devi:
Goddesses ofIndia (Berkeley, 1996), pp. 250-80.
*' Surjit Hans, 'The Metaphysics of Militant Nationalism', in Alok Bhalla and
Sudhir Chandra (eds), Indian Responses to Colonialism in the Nineteenth Century
(New Delhi, 1993), p. 193.
2S Tanika Sarkar, 'Educating the Children of the Hindu Rashtra: Notes on
RSS Schools', in Praful Bidwai, Harbans Mukhia and Achin Vanaik (eds),
Religion, Religiosity and Communalism (New Delhi, 1996), pp. 237-48.
204 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
upper castes, a means and symbol of community-creation.29 The
Hindi movement is shown to have animated a Hindu communal
consciousness in pre-independence India.30 The assertion of Hindi
by the upper-caste Hindu literati was an attempt to assert a distinct
community identity and prepare themselves for a culturally hegemonic
role in the new nation.31The Nagari Pracharini Sabha of Banaras and
the Hindi Sahitya Sammelan of Allahabad sought to Sanskritise
Hindi, removing Persio-Arabic words and marginalising spoken
forms of Hindi such as Avadhi and Braj.32
Hindi propagandists deployed potent gender symbols at this time.
Language was personified. It was not just Hindi as rnatri bhasha or
mother tongue that was important, gender icons were used to mark
out boundaries between Hindi'and Urdu and benveen Braj Bhasha
and Khari Boli, leading to an assertion of the Nagari script. Imagery
around the mother tongue was endowed with overt political mean-
ings, but it also revealed a tension. While Hindi was upheld as a res-
pectful female in opposition to Urdu, the 'femininity' of the language
roved a hindrance in debates between Braj and Khari: here feminin-
ity came to be equated with degeneration.
29 Suniti Kumar Chatterji, LanguagesandLiteraturesofModern India (Calcutta,
1963); Amrit Rai, A House Divided: The Origin and Development ofHindi-Urdu
(Delhi, 1984); Krishna Kumar, PoliticalAgenda ofEducation:AStudy ofcolonialist
and Nationalist Ideas (New Delhi, 1991); Christopher R. King, One Language,
Two Scripts: The Hindi Movement in Nineteenth-Century North India (Bombay,
1994).
30 In the process King challenges the position ofArnrit Rai and the earlier one
of Suniti Kumar Chatterji, who consider Urdu a significant deviation in the
Indian language tradition, and regard it as divisive and parochial.
3' Kumar, Political pp. 125-7; idem, 'Hindu Revivalism and Education in
North-Central India', in Martin E. Marty and R. Scott Appleby (eds), Funda-
mentalisms and Society: Reclaiming the Sciences, the Family, and Education (Chi-
cago, 1993), pp. 5 3 6 5 7 .
32 King, One Language, pp. 33-41; Shitikanth Mishra, Khariboli ka Andolan
(Kashi, 1956); Naresh Prasad Bhokta, 'Marginalization of Popular Langua-
ges and Growth ofsectarian Education in Colonial India', in Sabyasachi Bhatta-
charya (ed.), The Contested Terrain: Perspectives on Education in India (New
Delhi, 1998), pp. 201-17; Mohammad Hasan, Thought Patterns ofNinrteenth-
Century Literature of North India (Pakistan, 1990).
The Icon of the Mother / 205
II. I . Hindi as Mother
The Hindi language was personified as Mother Hindi. Poems were
written extolling her good qualities, depicting her as a mother, as a
powerful mother goddess, and as the hope and soul of India:
Hum hind tanya hain-hindi matu humari.
Bhasha hum jab ki ek maha hindi hai,
asha hum sab ki ek maha hindi hai. . . .
Bharat ki to bm pran yahi hindi hai.
(We are the sons of Hind-Hindi is our mother. O u r only language is
Hindi. O u r only hope is Hindi. This Hindi is the life of India.33)
(Albany, 1992), pp. 124-47. The two plays analysed here are Pandit Gauri Datta,
Nagari aur Urdu ka Swang (Meerut?, 1883-1900?) and Munshi Sohan Prasad,
Hindi aur Urdu Ki Larai (Gorakhpur, 1884). O f the latter, I saw a 2nd edn of
1929.
43 Vasudha Dalrnia, The Nationalization of Hindu Traditions.
44 Kumar, PoliticaL! p. 129; Krishna Kurnar, 'Quest for Self-identity: Cultural
Consciousness and Education in Hindi Region, 1880-1950', E P q 25, 23 (9
June 1990), p. 1248; Madhu Kishwar, 'Arya Sarnaj and Women's Education:
Kanya Mahavidyalaya, Jalandhar', EPW 21, 17 (26 April 1986), WS-9-24.
4 5 Karine Schorner, Mahfidevi Varma andthe ChhayavadAge ofModern Hindi
Poetry (Berkeley, 1983), pp. 152-3.
4"atyavati Devi, 'Striyon ko Kaisi Shiksha aur Sahitya ki Avashyakta Hai',
Madk~uri,10, 1, 6 (January 1932), p. 788; Ved Prakash, April 1907, N N R 1 1
May 1907, p. 564.
208 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
the effeminacy of Urdu poetry and songs has been in keeping with the
growing effeminacy of the people who had the keeping of Urdu literature.
T h e high-sounding and elaborate forms of expression in Urdu have be-
come almost a by-word and are a standing subject of amu~ernent.~'
While disagreeing with some of the arguments raised in this article,
a rejoinder agreed on the effeminate nature of Urdu, declaring it an
ungrateful daughter of Braj B h a ~ h a . * ~
T h e masters of Urdu were the descendants of those people whose langu-
age was Persian, and therefore they introduced in Urdu all the metres,
all the interesting and gaudy images, and the different kinds of styles
peculiar to Persian. And the wonder is that by their sweetness and beauty
they succeeded in ousting those ideas of Bhasha which were so indigenous
to the country; so much so indeed that the literary class, as well as the
common people, quite forgot the songs of the Koel (the Indian Cuckoo)
and the Papiha (the Sparrow-Hawk) and the scent of the Champa and
the Chameli (Jasmine) and began to sing the praises of Hazar and Bulbul
(Nightingale), Nasrin (Eglantine) and Sambul (Spikenard) which they
had never seen.*'
'' Anand A. Yang, 'Sacred Symbol and Sacred Space in Rural India: Commun-
ity Mobilisation in the "Anti-Cow Killingn Riot of 1893', Comparative Studies
in Society and History, 2 2 , 4 (October 1980), pp. 576-96; Peter G. Robb, 'Offi-
cials and Non-officials as Leaders in Political Agitations: Shahabad 1917 and
Other Conspiracies', in B.N. Pandey (ed.), Leadership in South Asia (New Delhi,
1977), pp. 179-210; Peter Robb, 'The Challenge of Gau Mata: British Policy
and Religious Change in India, 1880-1916', MAS, 20, 2 (1986); G. Pandey,
'Rallying Round the Cow: Sectarian Strife in the Bhojpuri Region, c. 1888-
1917', in Ranajit Guha (ed.), Subaltern StudiesII: Writingson SouthAsian History
and Society (Delhi, 1983), pp. 60-129; Gyanendra Pandey, The Construction of
Communalism in Colonial North India (Delhi, 1990), pp. 162-200; Sandria B.
Freitag, Colkctive Action and Community: Public Arenas and the Emergence of
Communalism in North India (Berkeley, 1989), pp. 148-74.
77 Sandria B. Freitag, 'Religious Rites and Riots: From Community Identity
to Communalism in North India, 1870-19401, PhD thesis (University of Cali-
fornia, Berkeley, 1980), pp. 126, 139.
78 Yang, 'Sacred', pp. 582-7.
79 Peter van der Veer, Religious Nationalism: Hindus and Muslims in India
(Berkeley, 1994), pp. 86-99. His treatment is effective in highlighting the gend-
ered imagery of the cow in general terms. Nevertheless, in the specific context
of the cow-protection movpments ofthis period, previous associations of the cow
with mother were continuously shifted or elaborated on.
The Icon of the Mother / 2 15
organisation as well as the ideology of the cow-protection agitatiom80
In these the body of the cow was invested with the divine and she
herself became a proto-nation. This new space of the cow-nation em-
bodied a Hindu cosmology, with the sacred inscribed on her body.8'
In UP, as elsewhere, new sabhas and gaushalas sprang up in the
late nineteenth century, giving the movement a much more system-
atic form. Preachers and emissaries came to have a much wider influ-
ence. Improved communication and increases in the dissemination
of news gave a boost to the m ~ v e m e n t . ~The
' availability of print
made it easier to publish posters, distribute handbills, print poems,
sing bhajans and perform plays in praise of mother A news-
paper entitled Gausewak was regularly published at Banaras from the
1890s; another called Gaudhama Prakash was issued monthly at
Farrukhabad. A play in Hindi called Bharat-dimdima Natak, pub-
lished at Lucknow with copies sold at railway book-stalls, highlighted
the grievous condition of India owing to c ~ w - s l a u ~ h t ePictures
r . ~ ~ of
the cow were circulated and exhibited at meetings. One depicted a
cow in the act of being slaughtered by three Muslim butchers and was
titled 'The Present State'. Another exhibited a cow with every part
of her body made up of groups of Hindu deities and holy personages.
A calfwas at her udder and a woman sat before the calfholding a bowl,
At che same time, the appeals for the protection of the cow were
addressed by and to Hindu men, largely of the upper castes, and later
extended to intermediate castes, especially the Yadavs. The interme-
diate castes manoeuvred the movement to fulfil their own caste
dynamics and needs. A significant feature of the movement was that
it led to an entente benveen publicists of the Arya Samaj, Sanatan
Dharma sabhas, and other Hindu bodies. Its leaders were mostly
Brahmin officials, schoolmasters or pleaders, and its main adherents
in 1893-4 were the Hindu trading and banking classes, with several
prominent rajas giving support.98Over 19 10-1 3 the leading enthu-
siasts of the movement in U P were Suraj Parshad, a Brahmin of
Kanpur; Awadh Behari Lal, a Bania of Mainpuri; Gauri Shankar of
Allahabad; Maheshanand of Moradabad; Swami Atmanand of Jalaun;
and Bhagwan Das of Haridwar. All of them gave extensive lectures
and distributed pamphlets and booklet^.'^ 'Snowball letters', using
gendered imagery, became a significant feature of the propaganda.
The sin of incest was constantly evoked in many of the patias addres-
sed to men.'OOThecow as mother was not so useful in her own right
but her utility rested precisely in producing a body of brave and strong
men who could build and defend the nation."' Thus the responsi-
bility for her protection also rested on them:
Prati varsh ghat rahi hain, kuch hain bachi bachai.
Kyon dhyan ho na dete? hokar kathor bhaiya.
(Every year they decrease and only a few are left. Brothers why don't you
pay attention to them and become strict?'02)
" Pushkar, Hindu, p. 17. Also see Narayan, Bhajan, pp. 7, 9, 28.
98 309-414/January 1894, Public, 3,Home Deptt (NAI).
" IlllDecember 1913, A, Home Poll (NAI).
loo Pandey, Communalism, p. 185.
lo' Achalram Maharaj, Hindu DharmaRahasya(Agra, 1939,2ndedn),p. 255.
'02 Pushkar, Hindu, p. 17.
220 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Another said:
Mard unhi ko janen hum jo rakshak hain gau mata ke.
(We consider as men only those who are protectors of mother cow.Io3)
pp. 37-88; Papiya Ghosh, 'The Virile and the Chaste in Community and Nation
Making: Bihar 1920s to 1940s', Social Scientist, 22, 1-2 (January-February
1994), pp. 80-94; Charu Gupta, 'Articulating Hindu Masculinity and Feminin-
ity: Shuddhi and Sangathan Movements in UP in the 1920s1,EPK 33, 13 (28
March 1998), pp. 727-35.
'There had been attempts at unifying the Hindu community in the late
nineteenth century by the Arya Samaj, the Hindu Sarnaj of Allahabad, the
Sanatana Dharma Mahamandal and the Sanatan Dharma Sabha. People like
Bharatendu Harishchandra and Madan Mohan Malaviya had declared the need
to rejuvenate Hinduism. See C.A. Bayly, LocalRoots oflndian Politics: Allahabad
224 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
and nation-making rhetoric, theArya Samaj and the Hindu Mahasabha
launched a programme of shuddhi and sangathan on a large scale in
1923. The communal character of these movements has been dis-
c ~ s s e dbut
, ~ little note has been taken of their gendered messages. The
campaign against Muslims left bitter legacies: sections of Muslims
grew more aggressive and launched tanzim and tabligh, which aggra-
vated the s i t ~ a t i o n . ~
The reasons for the growing movement of Hindu reformist, reli-
gious and communal organisations in this period are ~ a r i e d The .~
wider context was constituted in part by the recognition of commu-
nal representation in the political and constitutional reforms intro-
duced by the British government after World War I. More important,
Hindu publicists saw in the Khilafat Movement and Moplah revolts
the threat of a thoroughly united, well organised and militant Muslim
population poised to wipe out Hindus and their ~ u l t u r eT. ~o add to
this, asection ofthe Congress leadership in UP, led by Madan Mohan
Malaviya and actively supported by Swami Shraddhanand, adopted
" Masculinity has received increasing academic attention in recent years. For
example, see Clara A. Lees, Thelma S. Fenster and Jo Ann McNamara, Medieval
Masculinities: Regarding Men in the Miah% Ages (London, 1994); Harry Brod,
Theorising Masculinities (London, 1994); Peter Middleton, The Inward Gaze:
Masculinity and Subjectivity in Modern Culture (London, 1992); J.A. Mangan
and J. Walvin (eds), Manliness andMorafity:Mid& C h s Masculinity in Britain
and America, 1800-1740 (Manchester, 1987); R.W. Connell, Masculinities
(Cambridge, 1995); David Jackson, Unmmking Masculinity (London, 1990).
39 See Chapter 2.
Varrman, NNR, 15 September 1923; Chandkaran Sharda, 'Hindu Jati ki
Durdasha ke Karan aur Uske Nivaran ke Upaye', Madhuri, 3, 1, 2 (September
1924), pp. 290-5; Editorial, 'Hindu Manovriti ka Vyapak Svarup', Chmd 6,
1, 5 (March 1928), pp. 546-54; Krishnand, Hinduon Cheto (Agra, 1929),
pp. 11-13.
4 ' Indira Chowdhury Sengupta, The Frail Hero and Virik History. In UP,
'Us'and 'Them' 1 23 1
received wisdom. A large number of tracts of the early twentieth cen-
tury elaborated Rajput and Maratha tales of re~istance.~'Maharana
Pratap and Shivaji became the leading models of the time.
Shuddhi and sangathan claimed a restoration of that masculinity.
The emphasis on Malkanas was linked to a need felt to draw in Raj-
puts, associated with the culture of physical prowess.43Conversion
from Hinduism represented loss of power, weakness and misery.
Shuddhi represented a reversal of this loss and a restoration of mas-
culine power to the Hindu male.44 Poems highlighted this.
however, the preoccupation with masculinity and Kshatriya status can be noticed
significantly among peasants from the nineteenth century and is not as linked
to the image of effeminate man, as in the case of the Bengali babu.
42 Haridas Manik edited many so-called history books, famous as Manik
Granthmala Series. For example, Chauhani Talwar (Benaras, 1918), which
depicted the early struggles of King Prithviraj of Delhi with the Muslim invaders
of India, or Rajputon ki Bahaduri, Part I and II (Banaras, 1918), which had
chapters like Hardaul Bundela, Rana Sangram Singh, Shivaji ki Durg Vijay and
Haldighati ki Larai. Also see Chunnilal Gaur, Shivaji ki Bavani (Kanpur, 1921).
Tod's Rajasthan became so popular that many Hindi works were inspired by it,
like Maithlisaran Gupt, RangMein Bhanguhansi, 1927,9th edn) and Chaturvedi
Dwarkaprasad Sharrna, Prachin Arya Virtu Arthat Rajputane ke Viron kc Charin
(Banaras, 1927). Alhakhand the great ballad of Rajput chivalry, with its heroes
Alha and Udal, was the property of illiterate minstrels in north India, handed
down from generation to generation. Wandering bards sang it. The tale attracted
attention in this period and many Oriental scholars studied it. At least twenty
versions of it were published. See William Westerfield (partly trans.), The Lay
ofAlha, with an introduction and abstracts of untranslated portions by Sir George
Grierson (London, 1923). The book received great reviews: Indian Antiquary,
53 (1924), pp. 65, 208. Many Hindi versions, in different forms, also appeared:
Banke Lal,]amuna Haran (Etawah, 1927); Rama Naresh Tripathi, A h a (Allaha-
bad, 1933).
43A large number of peasants and caste associations and the urban poor also
invoked kshatriyahood to argue for a higher social status, and to assert their
martial valour. See William R. Pinch, PeasantsandMonks in British India(Delhi,
199G), pp. 81-114; Gooptu, 'Political', pp. 130-74.
44 Seunarine, Reconversion, pp. 85-6. Singh (comp.), Kthatriya, for example,
juxtaposed the ancient glory of Aryas and the medieval praise of Rajputs with
the power of shuddhi.
232 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Ai hinduon utho ab kyon dukh utha rahe ho,
kis shoch mein pa& ho, jo muh ki kha rahe ho.
Sahas vihin hoke bekar ji rahe ho,
shuddhi mein derpyare, nahak lagd rahe ho.
Mardangi tumhari thi kal jahan mein roshan,
aphsos humko api, kayar bana rahe ho.
(Hindus rise, why are you bearing pain. What worries load you down and
defeat you? You live without courage in vain. You are unnecessarily de-
laying shuddhi. Your masculiniry was once praised the world over, but
alas you are making yourself weak today.45)
The Scmgathan,
Illustration 7. Sangathan
Source : Vyanga Chitravali (Kanpur, 1925). p. 2. It was a collection
of political and social caricatures and was published by Prakash
Pustakalaya.
'Us'and 'Them' 1 237
Legends and myths of brave Rajput and Aryan women of the past
were invoked here, these being seen as at once pativrata and heroic.
It was emphasised that, in order to defend their honour and chastity,
they had taken to arms, especially against Muslims. Tracts eulogising
courageous Kshatriya women were written at this time.64The legend
of Padmini and Alauddin was frequently narrated.65
The Hindu woman was now told that in order to preserve her
chastityand honour she too had to be apart ofsangathan. Stitvaraksha
led to the articulation of atmaraksha, and the woman here emerged
as the virangana. She was not just weak and suffering but a sister-in-
arms. It has been argued that the figure of the 'sister' de-sexed the
woman and helped the idea of an activist masculinity.66 Sangathan
ka Bigul especially addressed itself to 'sisters':
Every sister who joins the army ofthis revolution called sangathan should
definitely have a sharp knife with her which she can use whenever she
needs. T h e knife should be made like household knives, which can be used
immediately. Every sister should practise for 10-15 minutes with this
knife.-And this can easily be done by cutting various fruits, such as the
custard apple and the water melon. It is a prime religious duty of all wo-
men who enter the army of sangathan to be able to defend their chastity
and honour.67
At the annual anniversary meetings of the Arya Samaj at Moradabad
in 1923, Murali La1 of Bulandshahr suggested that every Hindu girl
2nd edn mentioned in SPBP, September 1917, 4th edn mentioned in SPBP,
Decem ber 1928.
77 Ibid., pp. 9-18.
78 Ibid., p. 21.
'"other incident reflecting the attitude of Shivaji towards Muslim women,
however, was severely condemned by no less than Savarkar-when Shivaji and
Chinaji Appa honourably sent back the daughter-in-law of the Muslim governor
of Kalyan. Savarkar stated that the plaintive screams of millions of molested
Hindu women did not seem to have reached the ears of Shivaji. For details, see
Aganval, 'Savarkar', pp. 48-52.
Riynz-ul-Akhbar, 4 November 1904, NNR, 12 November 1904, p. 386.
Pandey Bechan Sharma 'Ugra', Chand Hasinon ki Khutut(Calcutta, 1927).
8 2 Francesca Orsini, 'Reading a Social Romance: Chand Hasinom ke Khutut',
in V. Dalmia and T. Damsteegt (eds), Narrative Strategies: Essays on South Asian
Literature and Film (Leiden, 1998).
'Us'and 'Them' / 24 1
woman provided titillation and a general sense of elation. For the
Hindu male there was a thrill in seeing the Muslim heroine fall at the
feet of the Hindu hero. It endorsed images of heroism without vil-
lainy, bravery without cowardice, and romance without abduction.
It signified control, subjugation and victory over Muslim women-
made all the more potent because it did not involve force, coercion
and suppression. An article published in 1931 stated that Akbar was
prepared to give girls of his clan to Rajputs in marriage, but Hindus,
with their limited vision at that time, would not accept them. This
was a matter of deep regret because, had this happened, India would
have been a huge nation of Hindu religion, feelings and culture, a true
Hindustan indeed.83
The conversion of Muslim women to Hinduism was encouraged.
Shiam La1 of Mathura remarked during his visit to Allahabad that
there were instances on record of the conversion ofwives of m a u l v i ~ . ~ ~
At the anniversary meeting of the local Arya Samaj at Rai Bareilly,
Pandit Dharam Bhikshit of Lucknow said that Hindus should abduct
Muslim women not for adultery but for s h ~ d d h iO. ~n ~16 April, at
one of the annual meetings of the UP Hindu Sabha held at Lucknow,
Kedar Nath said that Muslim women should be kept in Hindu houses
in order to attract other Muslim women.86 However, though there
seem to have been very few cases of Muslim women actually convert-
i r ~ g , ~the
' point made was that whereas Hindu males were 'recovering'
'06 Dularelal Bhargav (ed.), Sahitya Sumen [Collection of essays by the late
Balkrishna Bhatt] (Lucknow, 1937, 5th edn). Also see Vishambharnath Jijja,
'Parde ki Pratha', Stri Darpan, 3 4 , 2 (August 1925), pp. 345-6; Shraddhanand,
Hindu, p. 95.
lo' Ambikacharan Sharma, Bhartiya Sabhyata euam Sanskriti ka Kkas (Agra,
1940), p. 21.
log Sudhir Kakar, The Colors of Vioknce: Culturallakntities, Religion and Con-
flirt (Chicago, 1996), pp. 17-18.
lo' Jagdishprasad Tiwari, Aurangzeb ki Khuni Talwar (Kanpur, 1933, lGth
edn, 54,000 copies till date).
"O Joshi and Josh, Srruggk, 111, pp. 206-14.
Shiv Sharma Updeshak (Arya Prarinidhi Sabha, UP), Musalmani ki
Zindagani (Moradabad, 1924); Lekhram, Jihad, Quran ua lslami Khunkhari,
trans. Raghunath Prasad Mishra (Erawah, 1924);Anon., Quran ki KhuniAyaten
(Banaras, 1927).
' I 2 Some of these were Yavnon ka Ghor Atyachar, Munh Tor, jarput, Lal
'Us'and 'Them' / 247
TdliJhar was available in most of the big towns of The Pro-
phet Muhammad was specifically maligned in several; many of these
were written in the form of 'gupps', parodies and satires. The scan-
dalous publications of Rang& Rasul and VichitraJivan in the 1920s,
which were Arya caricatures of the Prophet, and the celebrated cases
that surrounded them, have been discussed elsewhere.l14 Various
other pamphlets were written on similar lines.'15 In all of them the
Prophet was accused of gross sensuality and low sexual morals. For
example, said one: can he be paigamber who has committed incest
with his own daughters? Can he be paigamber who has indulged in
sex with a large number of ~ o m e n ? " ~
These stereotypes of licentious Muslim rulers and the debauchery
of the Prophet were extended to the Muslim male. In the 1920s, espe-
cially, there was a proliferation of popular inflammatory and de-
magogic appeals as never before, based on stories of atrocities against
Hindu women, ranging from allegations of rape, aggression and ab-
duction to luring, conversion and forced marriage by Muslim males."'
Jhandi, Taranai Shuddbi, Makzksh Tor and Islam ka Bhanda Phut Gaya, 1401
1925, Home Poll (NAI).
Il33G3/1924, Box 52, Police Deptt (UPSA).
' I 4 G.R. Thursby, Hindu-Muslim Relations in British India: A Scudy of Con-
troversy, Conjlictand CommunalMovements in Northern India, 1923-28 (Leiden,
1975), pp. 40-62. Rangila Rasuf (Merry Prophet) was first published in Urdu
at Lahore, in May 1924. It aroused immediate interest, and reported brisk sales.
Muslims soon protested against it, and a case followed. For further details, see
10/50/1927, Home Poll (NAI); 13211/1927, Home Poll (NAI); 103/1928,
Home Poll (NAI). The book was translated into Hindi, and published and cir-
culated clandestinely in UP as well, in spite of being proscribed. I saw a Hindi
copy in 132/11/1927, Home Poll (NAI). VichitraJivan (Strange Life) was written
in Hindi by Kalicharan Sharma, an Arya Samaj preacher, and first published by
the author in Agra in November 1923. I saw a 2nd edn of it, published from
Moradabad in 1925.
' I 5 Kanhaiya Lal, Muhammadjivan Charitr (Banaras, 191 1,3rd edn); Prem-
saran (Arya Pracharak), Devadut Darpan (Agra, 1926).
' I 6 Premsaran, Devadut, pp. 24-5.
' I 7 Kalpanan Kannabiran, 'Rape and Construction of Communal Identity',
in Kumari Jayawardena and Malathi de Alwis (eds), Embodied Violence:
Co~nmurralisingWomen i Sexuaiiry in South Asia (Delhi, 1996), pp. 32-41.
248 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Here were crucial continuities but also significant differences and ad-
ditions. Firstly, lechery, abduction and conversion were no longer
limited to rulers, the Prophet and villains. They were not just extra-
ordinary events or a thing of the 'bad' medieval past. Now, average
Muslims were depicted as being involved. 'I8 The image of the violent
and virile Muslim thus gained current significance, strengthening
shared prejudices and further justifying shuddhi and sangathan.l19
In 1923 Madan Mohan Malaviya, in a speech delivered when he
was President of the Hindu Mahasabha at Banaras, made one of the
first attempts to create a history of present-day abduction^.'^^ Simi-
larly, an article headed 'Kidnapping' said:
In 1924 there was a case in which Raza Ali, the Deputy Collector
of Kanpur, was accused of abducting and then seducing a Hindu girl.
H e was blamed for having converted her forcibly. The vernacular
Hindi press launched a virulent campaign against him, arguing that
Iz2 The Hindi newspapers of the time were full of it. Pratap referred in con-
demnatory terms to the action of Raza Ali, and remarked that this incident
strengthened the belief among Hindus that Muslims could not be trusted, espe-
cially regarding women. Rzad also deplored the incident. Abhudaya remarked
that Raza Ali's actions were a clear example that such activities extended to all
Muslims. Arya Patra warned Hindus to learn a lesson from this incident. All in
NNR, I 2 July 1924.
123 PAL 12 July 1924, no. 27, p. 220.
12* File C-611934-35, Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha Papers (NMML).
'25 Bharat Dharrna, a Hindi weekly published from Kashi, and a supporter of
Sanatan Dharma, constantly accused Muslin1 males of seducing women: See for
example, 29 July 1924, p. 1; 5 August 1924, p. 12.
126PAI, 30 August 1924, no. 34, p. 276.
'21 Varfrnan, NNR., 23 May 1925.
2 50 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
Ai aryon kyon so rahe ho paipasare,
Muslim yeh nahin hoyege humrah tumhare. . . .
Shuddhi va sangathan kiya tabhi se difjab. . . .
Taahd badhane ke liye chaf chahi
Muslim banane ke fiya scheme banayi. . . .
Ekkon ko gali gaon mein fekar ghumate hain,
parde ko ah1 mwfim aurat bethate hain.
(Dear Aryans, why are you calmly sleeping? Muslims will never be your
companions. Since we launched shuddhi and sangathan, they have been
jealous of us. They are making new schemes to increase their population
and make people Muslims. They roam with carts in cities and villages and
take away women, who are put under the veil and made
The Vultures.
(And so Hinduism remains untarnished
and the vultures chuckle)
-
'Us'and 'Them' 1 255
136 Ganga Prasad Upadhyaya (ed.), Hindu Striyon ki Loot ke Karan (Allahabad,
1927). Also mentioned in SPBR,June 1927.Also see Suraj Prasad Mihsra, Musal-
man Gundon ke Hinduonpar GhorAyachar, Part I (Kanpur, 1924), which was
a collection of excerpts from the public press. Also mentioned in SPBR, March,
1924.
I3'It has been argued that when confronted with the phenomenon of conver-
sion from Hinduism, whether in eighteenth-century Kerala or in contemporary
India, a certain kind of Hindu loses herlhis logical faculties. The politics of
cultural virginity is inevitably shadowed by a myth of innocence, combined wlth
rantings against violation, invasion, seduction and rape. See Alok Rai, 'Religious
Conversions and the Crisis of Brahminical Hinduism', in Gyanendra Pandey
(ed.), Hindus and Others: The Questzon of Identity in India Today (New Delhi,
1993), pp. 225-37.
13* PAI, 4 July 1925, no. 25, para 207, p. 271.
'39 PAI, 4 July 1925, no. 25, para 208, p. 273.
140 PAI, 15 August 1925, no. 31, para 250, p. 329.
1 4 ' PAI, 27 March 1926, no. 12, para 31 1, p. 177.
'Us'and 'Them' / 257
release who was abducted by Ravan. In the same way we have to aid
the release of our women from present-day abductor^."^^ There were
repeated calls for Hindus to come forward to protect their women.
Awhole series of meetings was addressed to Hindu males. During the
ninth anniversary celebrations of the Arya Kumar Sabha at Moradabad,
Sher Singh of Muzaffarnagar referrecl to the apathy of Hindu failure
to protect the honour of their women.'43Tribhowan Dutt of the Arya
Samaj addressed a meeting atAyodhya and implored Hindus to guard
their womenfolk against Muhammadan goondas.'44 The Meerut
Hindu Sabha held a large meeting in June 1924 to disciiss means of
counteracting what was asserted to be an organised campaign by Mus-
lims to kidnap and forcibly convert Hindu women.'45At Rai Bareiilly,
during the anniversary meetings of the local Arya Samaj, held from
9 to 12 April 1926, Pandit Debi Charan, vaid of Lucknow, asserted
that Hindu women were daily being used by Muslim goondas but
Hindus were doing nothing. They should kill those responsible for
such a b d ~ c t i 0 n s .The
l ~ ~ central argument being used by Hindu com-
munal organisations was that to protect 'our' women, all steps were
justified. This was the self-image of a community at war.
The attack on Muslims was linked to the phenomenon of the
enemy as neighbour; earlier attacks on Christian missionaries on simi-
lar gounds now shifted to Muslim abductors. A tract, published in
question and answer form, squarely asks who is a bigger threat to
Hindus-Christians or Muslims, especially with regard to conver-
sions? Bhai Parmanand smoothly replies:
Though both are trying it, we are more scared of the Muslims, because
Muslims are our neighbours in every village, every city and every nook
and corner. They are aware of our weaknesses and thus can harm us much
more . . . Intolerance is the basic nature of Muslims and thus both
Hindus and Muslims have to change. their basic nature. Either Mus-
lims quit religious intolerance, or Hindus also become totally and equally
15' Interview with Kshem Chandra Sumen by Hari Dev Sharma on 17 Sep-
tember 1971, Oral History Transcript, no. 210, pp. 12 to 15 (NMML). Born
in Meerut, Kshem Chandra Sumen was an Arya Samajist and a writer and journ-
alist. His interview gives many names ofwriters and journalists of this period who
were also members of the Arya Samaj.
' 5 9 Gordon, 'Hindu', p. 152.
I6O 25lJune 1923, Home Poll (NAI).
16' Report on the Administration of UP, 1323-24 (Allahabad, 1925), p. 91.
' 6 2 I noticed this while looking at the NNRand some local newspapers within
the period of my study.
Leader, 17 November, 1938, p. 14.
16* Leader, 27 November, 1938, p. 6.
165Leader, 30 September 1938, p. 12.
'" Leader, 17 November 1938, p. 14.
'Us'and 'Them' 1 26 1
'Unprecedented Communal ~nterest';'~''Miyanji lu Kartut' (Sinful
Act of a Muslim);168'Musalman Utha le Gaya Hindu Yuvati KO'
(Muslim Abducted a Hindu Woman).'" It was not just a question
of particular cases: these moved readily from the particular to the
general and abstract. Reckless and venomous generalisations were
made, and almost every day the Hindi vernacular press published
statements, without concrete proof, of abductions. Statements were
freely issued portraying the Muslim as one who abducts Hindu
women, with no ~ubstantiation.'~~ Pratap of 28 May 1923 called the
attention of the Hindus of Fyzabad to the seduction ofHindu women
generally by Muhammadans of the district.I7'
Hindu-owned newspapers not only started giving more space to
abduction stories but built up a range of communal stereotypes
which, to some extent, provided the basic grammar of the abduction
of Hindu women. In complex and subtle ways the newspapers de-
fined,.constructed and sustained these stories. They were not only a
powerful source of ideas of abductions but also a place where these
ideas were articulated, worked on, transformed, elaborated and popu-
larised in a vivid vernacular. The fact that generalisations about ab-
ductions and kidnapping of Hindu women and children could now
be made openly, legitimised their public expression and increased the
threshold of public acceptance for them; this also made them 'true'.
Propagating stories of abductions, both in newspapers and in every-
day conversation fed by them, sustained abductions as an active
cultural, and therefore political, issue.
Lawyers and courts provided additional public space in which
abduction spectacles could be produced. Newspapers also showed a
lively interest in court proceedings. Leader carried two pages every
fortnight devoted exclusively to court proceedings. Thus newspapers
and legal institutions operated in tandem. The newspapers translated
Another matter affecting a High Court has come up recently. There was
a sensational incident in Cawnpore. T h e daughter of a well-known
Hindu vakil eloped with the son of a prominent Muslim merchant, and
apparently the girl embraced Islam and was duly married to the boy. A
charge of abduction was brought against the boy. After some weeks the
girl was discovered and pending the trial of the criminal case, her father
made a claim to custody of the girl under the civil law. T h e High Court
were moved to intervene and transferred the civil proceedings to them-
selves. Meanwhile the girl and her father disappeared and have not yet
been found. T h e whole matter has given rise to acute communal feeling
both in Cawnpore and Allahabad, and allegations were made against the
imparrialiry of one of the Muslim judges of the High Court. An appli-
cation was made to the Provincial Government to transfer the case to an-
other High Court under the amended form ofsection 327 of the Criminal
Procedure Code. T h e g o u n d s advanced were that there was danger of
a breach of peace owing to acute communal feeling and that on the same
The sensational case rocked the UP press for many months. Many
of the leading papers followed it graphically and gave lengthy details
of court proceedings. 175 Many such cases dragged on for years. News-
papers gave dramatic power to the proceedings in court and bestowed
an aura of public acclaim to the prosecuting lawyers. In this case it
was Bijendra Swarup, a leading lawyer of Kanpur and one of the stal-
warts of the UP Arya Samaj, who was the hero. In a brilliant legal
performance, he secured custody of the girl on behalf of her parents.
She was reconverted to Hinduism through shuddhi at the Arya Samaj
temple in Kanpur, and Swarup even managed to arrange her wedding
to a 'suitable' Hindu man! It is interesting to note that Bimla Devi
herself was never allowed to appear in the court.
Both lawyers and journalists, it should be added, were highly
vulnerable to communal influence in this period. Many of the leading
personalities of the Hindu Mahasabha were lawyers by profession.
Sarkar Bahadur Johari, an advocate of Allahabad, was the President
of the UP Hindu Sabha; Wati Wishnu Swarup, advocate, was the
President of the Bijnore Hindu Sabha in 1939; Ram Mohan Lal,
advocate of Moradabad, and Rai Bahadur Vikramjit Singh, advocate
of Kanpur, were also leading lights of the Hindu Mahasabha move-
ment.'76 At one point, of 24 members of the executive committee of
"* Letter dated 8 November 1938, written by Haig to Linlithgow, Haig Pap-
ers, Eur. Mss. F. 1 1512A (IOL).
See Leader, Pioneer, Vartman, Aaj, Pratap between September 1938 to
February 1939. As to specific dates for example, see Leader, 21 and 23 September
1938, p. 6; 8 October 1938, p.5.
Names gleaned from various sources, like Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha
Papers (NMML); Sri Bharat Mahamandal Directory (Benaras, 1930).
264 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
the UP Hindu Sabha, 16 were lawyers by profession, including peo-
ple like Gokul Prasad, Mahadeo Prasad, Tej Bahadur Sapru, Rama
Kant Malaviya, Sunder La1 Dave and Iswar Saran.177Earlier, Bishan
Narayan Dar, leading lawyer and Congressman of Lucknow, had had
clear sympathies with the cow protection movement.'78 Most be-
longed to the upper castes, being usually Kayasthas or Brahmins.
The urban bias of most abduction stories can also be seen. Most
leading lawyers of U P who had links with the Hindu publicists were
urban-based. A large number lived in Allahabad, for the High Court
was located there. However, although most abduction stories began
principally in urban spaces, they were not confined to them. The
kaccheri was a place where rural litigants picked up news and ideas.
This conduit for abduction scares thus spread to rural areas as well,
and stories came pouring in from there. Abduction stories in the press
stimulated a large number of correspondents from mofussil areas to
write to metropolitan newspapers of UP about instances of abduc-
tions. This created a vast, interactive field that, to some extent, was
self-perpetuating. There was a proliferation of public places where
debates and discussions occurred. Court cases became self-generating
and lawyers and journalists were intertwined as both objects and
subjects, history and historians, actors and agents.
Gossip and rumours added spice to this uproar. Gossip about
Muslim goondas involved curiosity about the life of an 'other'. Rum-
ours of abductions helped in the g o w t h of a collective Hindu body.
They were strengthened by posters and handbills which appeared
specifically on the issue of abductions, either distributed or pasted on
walls. A novel method of propaganda work was adopted in Allahabad
during a week in May 1926. Inflammatory messages were written on
kites, which were then flown over the city.179Innovative lantern slide
shows were screened in many meetings of the Arya Samaj, depicting
'Eaton, Rise, p. 28 1.
' Vijay Prashad argues that in Punjab religion was not syncretic but historical-
ly diverse and popular: Vijay Prashad, 'The Killing of Bala Shah and the Birth
of Valmiki: Hinduisation and the Politics of Religion', IESHR, 32, 3 (1995),
pp. 287-325. Shail Mayaram prefers the term 'liminality' as, according to her,
it suggests a potentially anti-structural questioning of categorical identities and
deliberately fuzzy boundaries: Shail Mayaram, Resisting Regimes: Myth, Memory
and the Shaping of a Muslim Identity (Delhi, 1997), pp. 3 6 4 8 . More recently,
Amiya Sen has drawn a distinction between conscious syncretism and occasional
eclectic borrowing: Amiya P. Sen, 'Bhakti Paradigms, Syncretism and Social
Restructuring in Kzliyuga: A Reappraisal of Some Aspects of Bengali Religious
Culture', SH, 14, 1 (1998), pp. 89-126.
Some have taken this to extreme lengths. It has thus been remarked: 'The
composite culture in India originated in an environment of reconciliation, rather
than refutation, cooperation rather than confrontation, coexistence rather than
mutual annihilation of the politically dominant strands.' See Rasheeduddin
Khan, 'Composite Culture as a New National Identiry', in Khan (ed.), Compo-
site, p. 36. Also see H.K. Sherwani, 'Cultural Synthesis in Medieval India', Jour-
nal of Indian History, 41 (1963), pp. 239-59.
Sudipta Kaviraj, 'The Imaginary Institution of India', in Partha Chatterjee
and Gyanendra Pandey (eds), Subaltern Studies 1.71: Writings on South Asian
History and Society (Delhi, 1992), p. 26.
' O Romila Thapar, 'Imagined Religious Communities? Ancient History and
the Modern Search for a Hindu Identity', MAS, 23, 2 (1989), pp. 209-30;
Vasudha Dalmia and Heinrich von Stietencron, 'Introduction', in Vasudha
Dalmia and Heinrich von Stierencron (eds), Representing Hinduism: The Con-
struction of Religious Traditions and Nationalldentity (Delhi, 1995), pp. 17-32;
C.J. Fuller, The Camphor Flame: Popular Hinduism andsociety in India(Princeton,
1992), pp. 10, 257-8.
Hindu Women, Muslim Men / 27 1
too fragmented by sub-caste and local loyalties to allow larger reli-
gious allegiances to predominate,11or rather to be sharply articulated,
other than among the privileged and at certain times.12
Scholars argue that structural and cultural links between the
Hindu and Muslim elites of UP became particularly strong in early-
nineteenth-century Awadh.13 Many of the Hindu literate castes had
~ r a ~ m a t i c amastered
ll~ Indo-Persian revenue management,14 and
many north Indian Hindus employed Persianised Urdu as their lite-
rary medium.15 Some lower-caste Hindu families followed Muslim
practices of cross-cousin marriages and burial.16 In everyday life, in
employment, leisure, eating habits, daily economic needs and so on,
elements of sharing between Hindus and Muslims were widespread,
even at the end of the nineteenth century.'' A substantial number of
Hindus, especially lower castes and women, participated in tazia wor-
ship, Muharram celebrations and visits to pirs. Plurality also took the
form of specialist occupations. A large number of mirasis, bhands and
prostitutes were Muslims;ls they were often invited to perform at
began in the late nineteenth century and by 1947 their journey had almost ended:
Raushan Taki, Lucknow k i Bband Parampara (New Delhi, 1993), pp. 23-8.
l 9 Hanuman Prasad Poddar, Samaj Sudhar (Gorakhpur, 1929), pp. 2 6 2 .
20 Nica Kumar, The Artisans of Banaras: Popular Culture andldentity (Prince-
ton, 1988), p. 51.
2' Interview with Dr Anand Krishna, 73 years, at Banaras on 18 February
1998.
22 Shiva S. Dua, Sociery and Culture in Northern India 1850-1900 (Delhi,
1985), pp. 63-74.
23 Muzaffar Alam, 'Competition and Co-existence: Indo-Islamic Interaction
in Medieval North India', Itinerario, 13, 1 (1789), pp. 46-55; Sudhir Kakar, The
Colors of Koknce, pp. 1 6 2 4 .
Hindu Women, Muslim Men 1 273
away Hindus, and especially women, from shared spaces between
Hindus and Muslims in the late nineteenth century. These became
more offensive in the 1920s.
Prostitutes, players on native drums and buffoons, bhagciyas have all been
Musalman for centuries and have all along been sewing in their respective
capacities, all the baniyahs, kayasths, brahmans . . . and the British Gov-
ernment might as well ascertain for itself whether all these professional
persons'have been any other than Musalmans. . . . T h e Government can
now form an idea of what a large number of men have been deprived of
their means oflivelihood on account of the Dharma Samaj Hindus having
boycotted t h e m z 4
1924); Mathura Prasad Shiv Hare, Alarm Bell Arthat Khatre ka Ghanta (Akhil
Bharat Varshiya Sadhu Mahamandal, Haridwar, 1924. This time 4000 copies
to be distributed free); Swami Shraddhanand, Khatre ka Ghanta ArthatMuham-
madi Shadyantra ka Rahasyabhed (Delhi, 1923). It was noted that several copies
of Alann Bell, written by one Ramanand, had appeared in Etah in May 1926:
PAI, 15 May 1926, no. 18, para 473, p. 261. Even notices and posters of it ap-
peared. Avakil distributed notices at Mathura in 1925, with references to Alarm
BelE: PA4 27 June 1925, no. 24, para 195, p. 255. Posters entitled Alarm Bell
were ~ o s t e din Banaras in 1926: PAI, 8 May 1926, no. 17, para 435, p. 248.
Many of these ostensibly claimed that they had been written in response to
Khwaja Hasan Nizami's book Daiye Islam, which purported to teach Muslims
the quickest and most comprehensive way of converting kafirs to Islam. How-
ever, in the process they went far beyond their claims and used it as an effective
pretext to propagate militant Hinduism and aggressively assert a community
identity.
27Updeshak, Alarm, p. 31; Hare, Alann, pp. 4-41; Anon., Alarm, pp. 15-
20.
28 l-41March 191 1, B, Home Poll (NAI).
29 PAI, 1 August 1925, no. 29, para 233, p. 312.
30 PAI, 3 December 1927, no. 46, para 1138, p. 454.
Hindu Women, Muslim Men I 275
the Company had already been boycotted in Agra, Kanpur, Allahabad
and M i r ~ a ~ u r . ~ ~
O n the other hand there was an economic boycott of Muslims, this
time in relation to employment and shopping At the District Hindu
Conference at Dehradun on 4 March 1924, Dr Kedar Nath, a promi-
nent member of the UP Arya Samaj, advocated the boycott of all
Mus~imsand was supported by Swami V i ~ h a r a n a n d . ~ ~a A
Naga
t Kir-
tan meeting in Gorakhpur on 14 November 1925, attended by some
1000 people, Hindus were advised to boycott all Muslim shops.33In
June 1926 the Yatri Sabha at Haridwar prevented Hindu pilgrims
from engaging tongas driven by Muslims.34Posters were distributed
at Badaun in 1926 by the Dharam Rakshini Sabha, advising Hindus
to abstain from social intercourse with Muslims.35At Jaunpur the
Arya preacher Ganga Singh exhorted Hindus to boycott Muslim
vegetable-sellers.36These campaigns seemingly had an adverse impact
on occupations traditionally and largely run by Muslims. Referring
to the general boycott of Muslim bandsmen and makers of fireworks
in Hindu marriages, especially in Meerut, an Urdu paper remarked
that the Hindus who first favoured the Muslim boycott indirectly
were now openly encouraging the movement, with the result that
even Muslim masons, tailors and blacksmiths had been di~carded.~'
A linked aspect of these suggestions, the other face of the coin, was
to employ the services of only Hindu dhunia, kori, chikwa, ~ h u r i h a r . ~ ~
Hindus were asked to take up professions which were exclusively in
the hands of Muslims.39At a private meeting of Hindus held in the
*'The relationship between lower castes and Hindu reformists was tense and
complex in UP. However, it has been argued that, especially from the 1920s,
Hindu organisations felt they must reclaim the untouchables to Hinduism, and
wean them away from all ostensible 'Muslim' practices and rituals. The lower
castes in turn absorbed, accepted, appropriated, contested and reconstructed
these concepts from different perspectives and reasons. See, Prashad, 'Killing',
pp. 287-325; Gooptu, 'Urban', pp. 879-918; Sumit Sarkar, Writing Social
History, pp. 358-90.
48 PAI, 4 November 1922, no. 42, para 1269, p. 1577.
49 PAI, 17 March 1923, no. 8, para 170, p. 124; PAI, 9 October 1926,
no. 39, para 904, p. 544; PA/,12 March 1927, no. 10, para 225, p. 92.
50 PA/,5 April 1924, no. 14, para 116, p. 128.
5 1 PA/,6 May 1933, no. 17, para 296, p. 234.
278 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
they bought objects of daily consumption--came under the scrutiny
of Hindu publicists.
In the paradigm which sees the outsider violating the Hindu
household, Muslims began to replace Christian missionaries. Every
Hindu Sabha was asked to keep a detailed list of jobs that Muslims
performed which brought them in contact with Hindu women.52Im-
plicit here was also the fear of Hindu women losing control of their
sexuality and falling prey to Muslim desire. An economic and social
boycott was intended to facilitate the isolation of Hindu women from
Muslims, and to reduce the anxieties of Hindu men. Thus, Hindu
women's lives, experiences and identities were made a matter for ins-
truction by men. A whole new language was employed for women
vis-h-vis Muslims, telling them how to move, whom to talk to, where
to go, and what to do. All places of possible contact between Hindu
women and Muslim men, public and private, came under this surveil-
lance. In the process of regulating their lives, cracks appeared in more
and more shared spaces. It seemed that women themselves had been
guilty of participating in such arenas, and so it was through women
that the intended separation could now be achieved. This was publicised
through Stri Shiksha, an Arya Samajist tract on 'proper' behaviour for
Hindu women, written by a prominent pandit of the UP Arya Prati-
nidhi Sabha:53
(1) Never worship at a grave. (2) D o not worship tazias, Muslim Gods
and jesters. (3) D o not get amulets, charms or incantations done from
Muslims. (4) D o not go to Muslim priests who read prayers in mosques.
(5) At marriage and other times, do not do embroidery of the Muslim
kind. (6) D o not get assessments and measurements done from Muslims.
(7) D o not listen to the invocations of pirs. (8) Stop taking out money
in the name ofpirs. . . . (10) Never visit Muslim fairs. (1 1) Never sit alone
while for help in legal difficulties Shah Mina's dargah at Lucknow was renowned:
Census, 1901, W P , p. 94. In Bijnor, a local saint known as Goga pir was vene-
rated by Hindus and Muslims alike: H. R. Nevill, Bijnor: A Gazetteer, Vol. XIV
of the District Gazetteers of UP (Allahabad, 1928), p. 87. Also see E.A.H. Blunt,
The Castesystem ofNorthern India: With SpecialRcference to UP (London, 193I),
pp. 291-4. Saints' shrines were part of the multifaceted cultural systems of many
regions. See Roy, Islamic, pp. 207-48; Bayly, Saints, pp. 73-86; J.J.Roy Bur-
man, 'Hindu-Muslim Syncretism in India', EPW 31, 20 (18 May 1996),
pp. 1211-1 5; C.W. Troll (ed.), Muslim Shrines in India: Their Character, History
and Signijunce (Delhi, 1989); Ahmad, Studiej, pp. 157-66; Eaton, Sufi,
pp. 19-79.
'* W. Crooke, 'Notes on Some Muhammadan Saints and Shrines in the
United Provinces', Indian Antiquary, 53 (1924), pp. 97-9.
65 Babu Lall Gupta, A BriefMemoirofKL. Gupta(Agra, 1895). Shaikh Saddo,
also called the Miyan of Amroha, was much revered by women who desired to
obtain the upper hand over their husbands: Blunt, Caste, p. 291.
Hindu Women, Muslim Men / 283
provided relief to women from the recurring crises of family life. Here
they could ask for jobs for their husbands, health for their children,
and express their fears of tyranny within the household. Women met
whoever might offer them the promise of an improved life, regardless
of caste, class and religious boundaries. Women also found in such
religious activities an emotional and recreational satisfaction, and
freedom from household chores. Thus, there were potent existential
reasons for women to turn to saints for solace.66Hindu women of
the region considered it particularly auspicious for small children to
walk across from underneath the ta~ias.~'Along with Muslim women,
they chanted dirges in groups, on the night of the ninth and tenth
day of Muharram, and had faith in the supernatural and benevolent
powers of Imam Husain, his family members and companions.68
Equally remarkable was the reach and spread of tazia and pir worship;
equally noteworthy was the way zealous Hindu purifiers made them
a special butt of attack, again addressing themselves to Hindu women
in particular.69
There was a strong element of contempt, of ridiculing the audacity
of women for participating in such cultural and religious practices
that had been identified with Muslims. Women were seen as culprits
and looked upon with disdain for 'corrupting' Hindu society. In the
case of tazia worship, Stri Shiksha said:
Due to lack of Vedic education in present times, women do not have any
understanding. . . . Hindu women should be so firm in their Hindu
religion that no craftiness can sway them. . . . They must understand
that . . . tazia worship . . . is against Hindu religion. . . . Have you com-
pletely lost your mind? . . . Who are Hasan, Husain to you? . . . What is
your relationship with them? Why do you offer sherbet in their name?
Pir Worship
(You are totally senseless because, abandoning your own gods, you wor-
ship pirs. Like mad people gaping everywhere, you go to Muslims, saints
and graves.73)
1905). Though Ghazi Miyan was specially targeted, there were others like Miran
Mulla Sadaruddin, popularly known as Saddo, who lies buried at Amroha, who
were also vilified: see Shankar Dutt Sharma, Miran Puja (Moradabad, 1925).
Also see SPBP, 1924-27. It is interesting that the worship of Ghazi Mian is
repugnant even to orthodox Islamic teachings: Mahmood, 'Dargah', pp. 25,41.
s5The expanding public arena became a major place for Hindu religious
resurgence and assertion in north India: Sandria B. Freitag, ColfectiveAction and
Communiry.
Banprasthi, Isaiyon, pp. 5-7.
Editor, 'Ghazi Mian ki Puja: Vidyarthi Utho-Hindu Dharma ki Raksha
Karo', Kurmi Kthatriya Diwakar, 2 , 3 (May 1926), pp. 2-8; Anon., 'Sri Sabha-
pati Mahodaya ka Bhashan', Kalwar Kerari, 1, 12 (Lucknow, 1923), p. 715;
Yadav, Ahir Jati, pp. 28-32.
Hindu Women, Muslim Men / 29 1
in May 1924.88Next year at Gorakhpur there was an attempt to boy-
cott the fair, and intending Hindu visitors were dissuaded from going
to it. Similar notices were issued at M e e r ~ t . In
~ ' 1926 the movement
spread wider. At Azarngarh a Hindi letter of the 'snowball' variety was
received from Ayodhya, and contrary to the usual custom Hindus did
not give alms to daffalis on the occasion of the Ghazi Mian mela in
Didarganj. At Jaunpur a pamphlet prohibited Ghazi Mian's worship
and the approaches to the mela, held in the city on 26 May, were
~icketedby Jagannath Pandey, a vakil, and other Hindus; no Hindu
attempted to attend. At Azamgarh, khatiks and mallahs were persuad-
ed by the Arya Samaj not to attend the mela that year. Another Hindi
notice appeared at Kheri, and opposition to the mela grew at Gorakh-
pur. At Banaras, Arya Samajists were actively employed in preventing
Hindus from attending the local Ghazi Mian mela.'O In 1927 this
campaign reached its peak. At Fyzabad, Hindi notices printed by the
Narayan press and issued by Baldeo Sahai urged Hindus against going
to Bahraich for the mela. At Bahraich itself the Arya Samajists started
a massive propaganda in April, as the mela was to be held that year
from 18 to 22 May. At Pratapgarh the raja of Kalakankar joined the
Arya Samaj to campaign for the boycott and was successful in per-
suading some Hindus. Parties of pilgrims were turned back to avoid
the rnela. At Gonda, during the annual conference of the U P Kshatriya
Sabha, Hindus were exhorted not to attend the Syed Salar fair at
Bahraich. At Fyzabad, Kedar Nath spoke against the mela and notices
were posted against it. Here some Brahmins forbade Hindu shop-
keepers from attending i t and proposed to outcaste those who did.
In Allahabad handbills appeared against the Ghazi Mian mela held
at Phulpur. At Banaras, notices were circulated and at Sultanpur local
Hindus attempted to discourage attendance at the mela.''
para 379, p. 154; PAL 21 May 1927, no. 19, para 487, p. 186; PA/, 28 May
1927, no. 20, para 500, p. 192; PAI, 4 June 1927, no. 21, para 530, p. 202.
92 PA4 13 March 1926, no. 10, para 233, p. 136.
93 PA4 1 May 1926, no. 16, para 397, p. 227.
94 PA/, 23 April 1927, no. 15, para 371, p. 144.
95 PA4 7 May 1927, no. 17, para 432, p. 169.
96 PAI, 22 June 1929, no. 22, para 3 1 1, p. 246.
97 Banprasthi, Ghazi, p. 4.
98 Sharrna, Ghazi, pp. 11-12.
99 Jaiswal, Ghazi, pp. 52-3.
Hindu Women, Muslim Men / 293
was the fear of a sensuous 'play' between the pir and the body of the
woman, which could subvert authority at home. There were anxieties
about women gaining power o,ver Hindu men. Women's private,
secret alliance with the pir was seen as an open challenge to Hindu
male prowess, and their husband's power to give them a male child
was undermined by their dependence upon Ghazi Mian. The Hindu
male appeared emasculated in relation to the increasingly fertile
Muslim pir. T o overcome the impugning of the sexuality and mas-
culinity of the Hindu male, much was made of the alleged sexual ex-
ploitation of Hindu women by unscrupulous pirs.
The sexual prowess of the pir, and his control over women's
sexuality and reproductivity, were called into question. In one tract,
a character says Ghazi Mian has tremendous powers and once be-
stowed a son on a banjh woman. Another character ridicules this,
saying that Ghazi Mian himself had no son, so how could he bestow
one? Pointing to another worshipper, he goes on to say that this
person has a banjh in his house, but Ghazi Mian had no hand in it.'OO
Another work argued: 'Can there be any progress of Hinduism
through the religion of the Masjid? Can Ghazi Mian show the path
of freedom? Can he bestow any favour? Clearly no."O1
Combined with these persuasive tactics, there were open threats-
a rhetoric which inspired fear on the one hand and promised rewards
on the other. Women and low castes were warned that worshipping
Ghazi Mian would spell disaster, and a sense of foreboding was
created. If they stopped worshipping Ghazi Mian, it would pay them
rich dividends and they would soon be rewarded. Threats of dire
spiritual and material misfortune were raised. At a general level it was
predicted:
Hindus! There has been a forecast at Prayag Raj that no Hindu should
go to worship Ghazi Mian at Bahraich, as Devi is very angry because of
it. It is due to this that small-pox is spreading into every house and causing
you great pain this year. . . . Stop worshipping Ghazi Mian immediately,
else there will be a massive drought in the country, children will face dire
consequences, animals will increasingly fall ill, your clan will decrease and
'02 Banprasthi, Musalmani, p. 6. Also see Anon., 'Bale Mian', Adarsh Hindu,
1, 5 (May 1926), p. 31.
I o 3 PAI, 28 May 1727, no. 20, para 500, p. 192; PAI, 17 May 1928, no. 19,
para 381, p. 187; PA/, 28 March 1727, no. 12, para 147, p. 100.
lo*Jha, Hinduon, p. 12.
lo5 Sharma, Ghazi, p. 13.
lo6 PA(, 21 December 1727, no. 49, para 792, p. 708.
lo' Gyan Shakti, NNR, 30 May 1925.
I o s ~ n o n .'Bale',
, p. 31.
Hindustani, A ~ y aMitra, l'rarap, all in NNR, 23 May 1725.
Hindu Women, Muslim Men / 295
of outrages committed against them at the fair."' Vartman said
Hindu volunteers recovered 99 Hindu women from the possession
of Muslim rowdies at the Syed Salar fair. The ill treatment of Hindu
women was shocking and it was too 'indelicate' to say what had be-
fallen them inside the mausoleum.'" Muslim goondas were accused
of outraging women at the fair almost at all times.'I2 The circle was
completed with an inverted proposition: 'If you stop worshipping
Ghazi Mian, you will be blessed with a son.'Il3 By such claims the
Hindu male asserted power over the Hindu woman.
In the process, the very history of Bahraich was reformulated. It
was argued that before the coming of the Ghazi Mian dargah, there
had been a celebrated Suryakund here, as important as Tirthraj Pra-
yag, which was host to a big mela. This was known as Balakarth Tirth.
In the month ofJeth, when the sun was at its peak, people would come
and bathe in Suryakund's holy water and it cured all their illnesses-
the blind could see and every skin ailment was healed. But ever since
Feroz Tughlaq built the grave of Ghazi Mian in 1351 by filling the
Suryakund, people were no longer cured at Bahraich. The holy place
of sun worship of a single community of worshippers had thus been
transformed into the grave of Ghazi Mian. Now, on the very same
day, the Bahraich mela of Ghazi Mian was celebrated. Hindus still
gathered, but instead of worshipping the sun, they worshipped the
evil Ghazi Mian. It was also hinted that other Hindu holy places had
been converted in a similar manner into dargahs and graves of pirs.''4
The story, a part of 'a new Hindu history',Il5 at once attacked the
violent invasion of Muslims, stressed the power of Hindu beliefs,
evoked a golden age of Hindu civilisation, denied the capacity of
Ghazi Mian to heal, and built a Hindu history of the place on which
Bhikshu: Mahmud Ghaznavi was the uncle of Ghazi Mian who destroy-
ed temples at Mathura and Somnath. . . .
Puttu: T o kill kafirs is not against religion.
Bhikshu: Thus a cruel Muslim killed the King of Hindus-Swami
Shraddhanand.
Puttu: Take his name with respect. He is Ghazi. His photographs are
sold.
Bhikshu: Photographs are even sold of Tantiya Bhil robber.
Puttu: Ghazi is one who kills kafirs. . . . This is the speciality of Ghazi
Mian's family.
Bhikshu: What are those hairs on top of the Ghazi Mian flag?
Puttu: They were the chotis of people that were cut to make them Mus-
lims . . . Some were tails of cows."*
13' Lucy Carroll, 'Law, Custom, and Statutory Social Reform: The Hindu
Widow's Remarriage Act of 1856', in J. Krishnamurty (ed.), Women in Colonial
h d i a (Delhi, 1989), p. 379.
13' Rosalind O'Hanlon, 'Introduction', in Rosalind O'Hanlon (ed.), A Com-
parison Between Women and Men: Tarabai Shinde and the Critique of Gender
Relations in Colonial India (Madras, 1994), pp. 1-62; idem, 'Issues of Widow-
hood: Gender and Resistance in Colonial Western India', in Douglas E. Haynes
and Gyan Prakash (eds), Contesting Power: Resistance and Eveyday Social Rela-
tions in South Asia (Delhi, 1991).
'39 Lata Mani, 'Contentious Traditions: The Debate on Sati in Colonial
India', in Kumkum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid (eds), Recasting Women: Essays in
Colonial History (New Delhi, 1989), pp. 88-126.
I 4 O Prem Chowdhry, The Veikd Women: Shijiing Gender Equations in Rural
Hayana, 188&1990 (Delhi, 1994); idem, 'Popular Perceptions of Widow-
remarriage in Haryana: Past and Present', in Bharati Ray (ed.), From the Seams
ofHisto~y:Essays on Indian Women (Delhi, 1995), pp. 37-66; idem, 'Customs
in a Peasant Economy: Women in Colonial Haryana', in Sangari and Vaid (eds),
Recasting, pp. 312-21.
Hindu Women, Muslim Men 1 30 1
the widow was seen as a profound danger to Hindu patriarchy. What
was most valuable to the husband in his lifetime turned into an
awesome menace to his community after his death. Outside the pro-
tection of the domestic identity of the chaste female, the widow repre-
sented both an invitation and a threat. Ascetic widowhood thus
remained the highest model. At the same time, as in Haryana, widow
remarriage became a focus of common concern in early-twentieth-
century UP, though not through levirate, which was rare. Instead,
especially in the 1920s, the desire to control the sexuality of the widow
was linked to questions of Hindu-Muslim population ratios and
increasing fears of a supposed decline in Hindu numbers.
Attitudes to widows had divided Hindus in UP, at least at an ideo-
logical level. There had been grave differences between Sanatan Dhar-
mists and orthodox Hindus on the one hand, and the Arya Samaj on
the other; and also between upper and lower castes. In early-twenti-
eth-century UP, the widow provided an occasion for wider, abstract
Hindu unities that camouflaged deeper differences. In the 1920s,
especially, when the focus was on shuddhi and sangathan, abductions,
and a declining Hindu population, there were related anxieties about
conversions of Hindu widows by Muslims and suggestions that the
reproductive capacities of widows could enhance Hindu numbers.
This led to subtle shifts in debates around widow remarriage, even
though the actual condition of widows may have remained the same.
Though the widow's sexuality remained a problem, the reassertion
of Hindu community identity enabled Hindu publicists to turn it to
their advantage, not only by suppressing it but also by valuing it. Thus
the alleged carnal desires ofwidows and their ability to reproduce, for
which they were greatly chastised, provided in some senses the key
to their acceptability and utility in the construction of Hindu identity
in this period.
An apparent ideological acceptance ofwidow remarriage in various
writings was a way of projecting a humanising face of Hinduism,
reflecting the 'flexibility' in Hindu society to fulfil a 'larger' object-
ive. Conversely, widows provided another effective channel to cen-
sure Muslims as the 'other'. The question of widows remained very
302 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
much at the heart of debates among Hindu reformers, revivalists and
publicists in the early twentieth century.141 The literature produced
around widows in this period far surpassed that of the previous
century. In fact the 1920s and 1930s in UP were marked by most
extensive and intense public deliberations on women, including
widows.
Dharma Press, Moradabad, 1906). This tract was as thick as 428 pages, trying
to prove that widow remarriage was against Hindu shastras and so should not
be brought into custom. The Sanatan Dharma Press at Moradabad brought out
a large number of tracts at this time, slandering Arya Samaj, Dayanand Saraswati
and his teachings, and a chief target of attack was widow remarriage. See Shib
La1 Ganeshi Lal, Dayanand Charitr (1906); idem, Dayannnd ki Buddhi (1906);
Jagannath Das, Dayanand Mat Darpan (1 907).
AAlmora Akhbar, 15 October 1898, NNR, 19 October 1898, p. 554.
I5O Advocate, 11 October 1898, NNR 19 October 1898, p. 554.
15' Sharma, Vidhwa, pp. 413-15.
15' Mahopdeshak, Stri, p. 11; Poddar, Samaj, pp. 7-12; Editorial, 'Sati aur
Vidhwa', A ~ y aMahila, 12, 1 (April 1929), pp. 3-5; Surajbhan Vakil, Kdhwa
Kartavya (Saharanpur, 1927).
'53 Talwar, 'Feminist', pp. 216-20.
Hindu Women, Muslim Men / 305
that some widows referred education to re-marriage,15* and that
some educated, upper-caste widows adopted this ascetic model to
their advantage. They found that functioning within the norms of
'purity', 'virtue' and 'austerity' offered them implicit power and ena-
bled them to develop professionally. Many opened schools.155
O n the other hand, the Arya Samaj reformists, while still consi-
dering the ascetic model as the highest, thought it impossible for a
large majority of widows. They were also guided by a certain human-
ist and social zeal and their arguments implied some criticism of
Hindu society. This small but articulate minority advocated modest
change and argued for widow remarriage, especially for virgin wid-
O W S However,
. ~ ~ ~ reformists from the outset located themselves in
what they regarded as 'real' tradition. They did not concede that they
were pushing for innovation; rather they claimed to be 'restoring the
days of our past history'. They pointed out that they were attacking
specific social evils and priestly despotism while preserving the gene-
ral authority of the Vedas.15' They thus gave evidence from the shas-
tras that if a widow had had no sexual relationship with her husband,
if she was a virgin, then she should be remarried.lsg However, one
of their main arguments when advocating widow remarriage remain-
ed that widows were unable to control their lust, and that this led to
abortions, infanticide and p r o ~ t i t u t i o n . 'Some
~ ~ newspapers sup-
ported widow remarriage to check moral laxity: they were seen as
It has long been known that Musalmans are more fertile than Hindus and
that their chances of life are better: and the figures of the last decade
merely strengthen this view. . . . T h e prohibition of the remarriage of
widows does not affect the Muhammadan. T h e figures bear this out. . . .
T h e Muhammadan widows are only 14 percent of the female population
as against 1 7 percent among Hindus. . . . At the child-bearing ages (1 5-
40), when this factor will chiefly effect the rate of increase, under 3 per
cent of Muhammadan women are widows whilst the Hindu rate is over
4 per cent.I6'
Census figures were used in newspaper reports and magazines to lament the
supposed decline in Hindu numbers: Saruswati, July 1902, NNR, 9August 1902,
p. 491.
IG8 Census, 1921, UP, p. 53.
169 Babu Bhagwandass, Hinduon ka Sangrakshan aur Atmarakshan (Kashi,
1922).
170 Chandrika~rasad,Hinduon ke Sath Kshwasghat (Awadh, 1917, 4000 co-
pies), p. 14.
Ganga Prasad Upadhyaya (ed.), Humarz Desh Sewa (Prayag, 1923, 2nd
edn, 1 lakh copies printed till date), p. 3; idem, Kdhwa Kuah Mimansa (Allaha-
bad, 1927, new edn), pp. 226-33.
172Editorial, 'Hinduon ka Bhayankar Haas', Chand 7, 1, 3 ('January 1929),
pp. 450-60; Kunwar Chandkaran Sharda, 'Hindu Jati ki Durdasha ke Karan aur
uske Nivaran ke Upaye1,Madburi, 3, 1, 3 (5 October 1924), pp. 290-5; Daya-
shankar Dube, 'Bharat mein Hinduon ki dasha', Madhu~i,4, 1, 2 (23 August
1925), p p 146-53; Anon, 'Kshatriya Sankhya', Kwhwaha Krhatriya Mitra, 1 5 ,
9-10 (September-October 1928), pp. 43-4.
Hindu Women, Muslim Men / 309
a significant component of communal consciousness, and helped
stabilise Hindu identities around new orientation^.'^^ With such
arguments, even a demographic majority could yet perceive itself as
an endangered minority.
O f the various reasons given by Hindu publicists for the alleged
decline of Hindus and the simultaneous proliferation of Muslims,
one of the most important was the increasing frequency of alliances
berween Muslim men and Hindu widows. A tract said that large
numbers of widows were now entering the homes of yavanas and
mlecchas, producing children for them and increasing their num-
bers."* Another said that Brahmin, Kshatriya and Vaishya widows,
particularly, were walking into Muslim hands and decreasing the
number of Hindus.'75 The famous Hindi poet Ayodhyasingh Upa-
dhyaya 'Hariaudh' penned these lines at this time:
Gode mein isaiyat islam ki
betiyau bahuein lita kar hum late!
Ah ghate par humen ghata hua
man bewaon ka ghata kar hum ghate.!'
(We have made our daughters and daughter-in-laws lie in the lap of Islam
. ' ~ ~have suffered loss after loss. By not respecting
and C h r i ~ t i a n i t ~We
widows, we have dwindled in numbers.'77)
The loss of a Hindu widow was not just the loss of one person,
but of many more. These numbers subtracted from the Hindu popu-
lation but added to the Muslim, doubling the loss to Hindus.178One
'73 Bhai Parmanand, Hindu jati kaRahasya(Lucknow, 1928), p. 90. He stated
that the main reason for Hindu-Muslim conflict was the question of numbers,
where Muslims were constantly increasing and Hindus declining. In such a
situation, the main aim of shuddhi and sangathan was to stop the decline of
Hindu numbers.
Maharaj, Hindu, p. 172.
Bhumitra Sharma, Niyoga Mardzna ka Wmardzna (Meerut, 1917), p. 9.
Also see Upadhyaya (ed.), Humari, pp. 3-9.
'76 There were references made to Christians in early-rwentieth-century de-
bates amung Hindu publicists, but the central attack remained on the Muslims.
It was in the late nineteenth century that Christianity was much mentioned in
other contexts, but there is no space to deal with it here.
ln Quoted in Upadhyaya, fidbwa, p. 1.
Upadhyaya (ed.), Humari, pp. 3-9; Sharma, Niyoga, p. 9.
3 10 1 Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
tract, Humara Bhishan Haas, a collection of articles reprinted from
the newspaper Pratap, dwelt on the catastrophic decline of Hindus
via conversions. A calamitous picture was painted by quoting exten-
sively from census reports: 'Our sexually unsatisfied widows espe-
cially are prone to Muslim hands and by producing Muslim children
they increase their numbers and spell disaster for the Hindus . . .
Muslim goondas are especially seen outside the houses that have
Hindu widows. . . . Pray, tell us, would you like our Aryan widows
to read nikah with a Muslim?"79The numbers obsession is combined
here with 'negative' portrayals of Muslims, and stereotypes about the
sexual desires of widows, as well as fears of the widow's agency.
The anxiety over declining Hindu numbers and widow's reproduct-
ivity helped in focusing the attack on the enemy without-the Mus-
lim goondas who were charged with abducting widows. Now, blame
could be targeted on Muslims to justify widow remarriage. The at-
tacks on Hindu society concerning the condition of widows had
remained general and abstract. However, when Muslims were ac-
cused of abducting Hindu widows, the attack could acquire definite
form and be applied to specific individuals. Moreover, child mar-
riages, and with them the increase in widowhood, were attributed to
Muslim rule in India. It was claimed that the number of Hindu wi-
dows had increased because Hindus had been forced into child
marriages to protect their girls from the clutches of mu slim^.'^^ Thus
was created both the myth of a glorious Hindu past and a negative
image of Muslims. Muslims were depicted as behaving according to
their 'nature' in enticing widows, and hence increasing their num-
bers.'*' Such essentialisms were as crucial to the definition of the
17' Mannan Dwivedi, Humara Bhishan Haas (Kanpur, 1924, 3rd edn, 2000
copies), pp. 1, 26, 35.
Is' Swanli Shraddhanand, Hindu Sangathan: Saviour of the Dying Race (n.p.,
1926), p. 95; Sharda Kumari Devi, 'Vidhwa', Chand 2,2, 5 (September 1924),
p. 433; Aryn Darpan, May 1902, NNR, 14 June 1902, p. 397.
Is'PAI, 12 July 1924, no. 27, para 216, p. 219; PAI, 19 July 1924, no. 28,
para 229, p. 233; PAI, 9 January 1926, no. 1, para 6, p. 5; At Jalaun, Arya Samaj
lecturers warned Hindus against four Muslim beggars who, according to them,
had come from Bijnor intending to entice away Hindu widows: PA/, 24 April
1926, no. 15, para 371, p. 219. Some Urdu newspapers protested against the
manner in which certain Hindi newspapers were conducting propaganda for the
Hindu Women, Muslim Men / 3 1 1
'problem' as of the community. A tract stated that two and a half crore
Hindu widows had been enticed by Muslims through devious meth-
ods. ls2
The Vidhwa Sahayak Karyalaya (Office to Help Widows) at Agra,
which appears to have been one of the biggest homes for widows in
UP at this time, reiterated: 'At places Muslim goondas sing romantic
love songs near the houses of widows; at others Miss Sahiba knits
socks and reaches the gate of widows. Muslim leaders have now even
decided that to win over Hindu widows, they must open an ashram
in every city and in front of it stick a signboard in bold letters, so that
widows come immediately to them.'ls3 Thus widows were instructed
never to reside as neighbours of Muslims or Christians, and to keep
away from all Muslim males-friends of their brothers, masters who
came to teach in their homes, doctors and 1 a ~ ~ e r s . l ~ ~
More crucial was fear of widow's agency, leading to a condemna-
tion of widows themselves as the enemy within who brought shame
to their community by eloping with Muslims. Widows were depict-
ed as vulnerable by 'nature' and elopements and conversions some-
times came to be rewritten as cases of abduction.185The widow's
selfconscious-ness as a woman, as a convert, as a person with sexual
agency, was here consistently and completely denied. It was not pos-
sible for Hindu publicists to recognise that women were capable of
exercising control over their bodies and minds.
It was also unthinkable that a woman could be happy when
protection of Hindu widows in the 1920s, as they were inciting Hindus against
Muslims in the process: A1 Barid NNR, 29 August 1925.
Is2 Gaurishankar Shukl Chaudhry, Kya Swami Shraddbanand Apradhi The?
(Kanpur, 1928), p. 12.
Is3 Narayan Duct Sharma, Kashyap, Bhartiya Vidhwaon ki Karunapurna
Kntl~ayenArthat Hindu Vidhwaon par Atyachar, Part III (Agra, 193I), p. 1.
Is* Mahopdeshak, Stri Siksha, p. 14; Updeshak, Alarm, p. 32; Jha, Hinduon,
pp 5 4 .
I s 5 For an interesting look at the way colonial law intervened to side with
Hindu patriarchy in the case of those women who converted to Christianity in
the nineteenth century, see Gauri Viswanathan, 'Coping with (Civil) Death: The
Christian Convert's Rights of Passage in Colonial India' in Gyan Prakash (ed.),
Afier Colonialism: Imperial Histories and Postcolonial Di~placements(Princeton,
1995), pp. 183-99.
3 12 / Sexuality, Obscenity, Community
moving outside the Hindu fold, not even if she did this voluntarily.
Even sympathetic accounts of Hindu widows which criticised Hindu
society for its oppression could not resist highlighting the 'sad' state
ofwidows because of their alliances with Muslims. T o enhance their
message and make their narrative more convincing, some of the maga-
zines and widows' organisations themselves started speaking in the
language ofwidows. In 1926-7 Zahur Bakhs (1897-1964), a teacher
and prolific writer for children, began writing in Chand (the most
popular Hindi magazine in UP) a series of 'first-person confessions'
under the heading 'Samaj Ke Agni Kund' (Well of Fire of Society).
In these he frequently took the woman's voice and wrote pieces like
'Main Musalman Kaise Hui' (How I Became a Muslim)1s6and 'Main
Isai Kaise Hui' (How I Became a Christian).ls7 While ex-pressing
compassion for widows and blaming Hindu society, these articles ar-
gued that conversions had actually made the state of wi-dows worse
and blamed the 'other' community for abducting and converting
them. There was a mixing up, here, of realitywith fiction, instruction
with entertainment. The supposedly personalised accounts height-
ened the impact of a melodramatic narrative.
The Vidhwa Karyalaya of Agra brought out a three-part series on
widows in the 1920s. One of the main themes here was the moral
contamination of Hindu society due to widows running away or
being abducted by Muslims.18sThe introduction to the second part
stated that the first part had received a very warm reception and had
been translated into Urdu, Bangla and Gujarati. Not only did the
author of the series adopt the language of widows, the widows
themselves came into these accounts. The series had short stories, sup-
posedly based on true accounts narrated by the widows themselves,
recounting their miserable plight. Accompanying them were pic-
200 U~adhyaya, Vidhwa, pp. 230-52; letters and replies by editor on the
question of abortion for widows: Chand 8, 1, 6 (April 1930), pp. 998-1001.
20' Chaudhry, Kya, p. 23. Also see Upadhyaya, Vidhwa; Parmanand, Hindu,
pp. 70, 94; Mahopdeshak, Stri, pp. 12, 15.
202 Aaj, NNR, 27 March 1923, p. 5; Aaj, NNR, 15 September 1923.
203 Kunwar Madansingh, Hinduon Kab Tak Chetoga (Mathura, 1923), p. 8.
Mannan Dube, Hindu Vidhwayen (Mathura, 1924). This tract was published
by the Secretary, Vidhwa Sahayak Ashram, Mathura, and advocated remarriage
of widows not as a rule but only under certain undesirable circumstances,
especially in relation to eloping with Muslims. Also mentioned in SPBP, March
1925.
204 Sharmishtha Devi Mathur, 'Vidhwa Vivah', StriDarpan, 37,5 (November
1927), pp. 495-7; Bajaj, 'Bal', p. 11.
205 Badrinath Joshi, Kdhwodvah Mimansa (Prayag, 1928, 2nd edn)
20G PAI, 28 July 1928, no. 29, para 569, p. 282; PA/, 11 August 1928, no.
31, para 61 5, p. 305.
H i n d u Women, M u s l i m M e n 1 3 19
of remarriage in front of those dear widows who are lost in the love
of their deceased husbands. But remarriage must be used in situations
where due t o their lust and carnal madness, Arya widows are convert-
ing t o Islam or C h r i ~ t i a n i t y . ' ~And
~ ' thus:
This is the period of Kaliyug for all Hindus. . . . The stage at which Hindu
community proposed the ideal of no widow remarriage, and when this
ideal became a practical reality, was the highest moral stage of Hindu
community. . . . At that time there was only Hindu community, Hindu
culture and Hindu religion in the country. . . . We ourselves severely op-
pose widow remarriage. . . . There can be nothing more tragic than the
remarriage ofwidows. This is a clear proof of the moral decline of Hindu
society. But the acceptance and willingness of Hindu widows to live, reside
and many with Mzrslims is so appalling andfeatfir1 that widow remarriage
by comparison appears very good indeed.208(emphasis mine)
Interviews
Interviewwith Dr Anand Krishna, 73 years, at Banaras on 18 February 1998.
Interview with Dudh Nath Chaturvedi, ex-Vice-Chancellor KashiVidyapeeth,
at Banaras on 18 February 1998.
Interview with Ganpat Rai by S.L. Manchanda on 7 July 1974, Oral History
Transcript, No. 330 (NMML).
Interview with Kshem Chandra Sumen by Hari Dev Sharma on 17 Septem-
ber 1971, Oral History Transcript, No. 210 (NMML).
Interview with Shyamdas Singh of Bharat Mata Temple, at Banaras on 18
February 1998.
Interview with Sri Prakasa by H.D. Sharma on 18 December 1967, Oral
History Transcript, No. 103 (NMML).
Index
riots, 6, 23, 191-2, 214, 225, tazia, 271, 278, 281, 283, 286,
228,258-9,268,316 290
railways, 15, 18, 146, 150-1,
violence, 6-7, 27, 235, 250, 266,
192,265 268
railway stations, 56, 123, 146,
152-3, 191, 194,256,259, widow, 9,28-9, 134, 146, 173,
265 182, 193, 198, 249, 280,
rumour, 190-2, 251,264-6 299-307,309-13,3 16-20,
Radha, 31,35,40-2,47-8,58, 328-9
176 widow remarriage, 25-6, 29,
Ramchandra Shukl, 39,43,336 299-301,303-6,310,
Riti Kal, 41, 43-5,47, 56 318-21.324