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ABSTRACT
This paper is a review of the discourses generated in the media after the September 2018 verdict by the Supreme Court of India which ‘allowed’ women of all ages to enter the Sabarimala temple. I analyse the discourses primarily in these three groups – first, the advocates of the ‘subaltern’ subject, second, the advocates of the ‘pious subjects’ and the last group that emphasises the historiography of the temple. While making a case for an ‘emergent female subject’ that is not located in either but is ‘unstable’ with regards to time and space, I argue that the discourses fall short on representing the specificities of the rights of menstruating bodies within the religion itself, although they form one of the core legal arguments that resulted in the Supreme Court verdict.
Acknowledgements
I am very thankful to the guest editors, Dr Nazia Hussein and Dr Saba Hussain, for their constant encouragement, and faith in me. I am very grateful to the anonymous reviewers for their supportive and critical comments on my paper which strengthened my arguments significantly.
Notes
1. Mohan, “They Entered a Forbidden Hindu Temple in the Name of Women’s Rights in India,” 4.
2. Indian Young Lawyers Association vs The State Of Kerala, Writ Petition, 1.
3. Ibid., 2–3.
4. Dube, Anthropological Explorations in Gender.
5. Risling-Baldy, We are dancing for you, 6.
6. Chawla, “Mythic Origins of Menstrual Taboo in Rig Veda,” 2820.
7. Bobel, New Blood, xii.
8. Lugones, “Decolonising Feminism,” 747.
9. See, Dr. Noorjehan Safia Niaz And 1 Anr vs State Of Maharashtra And Ors Mumbai.
10. See, Shayara Bano vs. Union of India & Ors.
11. See, Sri Venkataramana Devaru and Ors. vs. State of Mysore and Ors., 1958 SCR 895.
12. Nandy, “Why Nationalism and Secularism Failed Together,” 5.
13. Anzaldua, Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza, 20–39.
14. Das, “Encountering Hindutva, interrogating religious nationalism and (En)gendering a Hindu patriarchy in India’s nuclear policies,” 3.
15. Jagannathan, “Sabarimala: Bindu And Kanaka Are Just Pawns,” 6–7.
16. Ludden, Making India Hindu, xiv.
17. Keating, Transformation Now!, 5.
18. Sabarimala: Bindu And Kanaka Are Just Pawn.
19. Basu, “Mass Movement or Elite Conspiracy,” 78.
20. Kapur & Cossman, “Communalising Gender/Engendering Community,” 37.
21. Spivak, “Can the Subaltern Speak,” 100.
22. Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, 33.
23. Rakesh, “Young and in sari, transgender women pray at Sabarimala,” 2.
24. Spivak, “Can the Subaltern Speak?,” 67.
25. Mahmood, Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and The Feminist Subject, 3.
26. Mignolo, “Epistemic Disobedience,” 17.
27. Devika, “Egalitarian Developmentalism, Communist Mobilisation,” 800.
28. Indian Young Lawyers Association vs The State Of Kerala.
29. Ibid., 83.
30. Devaiah, Here’s why women are barred from Sabarimala; It is not because they are ‘unclean’, 3.
31. Indian Young Lawyers Association vs The State Of Kerala, 83.
32. Ibid., 82–84.
33. Ibid., 106.
34. Ibid., 106.
35. Kerala High Court in S. Mahendran v. The Secretary, Travancore Devaswom Board, Thiruvananthpuram and others.
36. Koonthamattam, “The Sabarimala Controversy: Women And Their Right To Pray,” 5.
37. See note 28 above.
38. Ibid., 5.
39. Dutt, “Scent of a Woman,” 1.
40. Indian Young Lawyers Association vs The State Of Kerala, 154.
41. Chatterjee, The Politics of the Governed, 51.
42. See note 28 above.
43. Ibid., 6.
44. Jeetesh, Appropriation of Ayyappa Cult: The History and Hinduisation of Sabarimala Temple.
45. Wedemeyer, Vajrayana and its Doubles: A Critical Historiography, Expostion, and Translation of the Tantrik works of Aryadeva.
46. Mignolo, “Epistemic Disobedience,” 16.
47. Mani, Contentious Traditions, 191.
48. Spivak, “Can the Subaltern Speak,” 102.
49. Keating, Transformations Now!
50. Kannabiran, “Denying Women Entry to the Sabarimala Temple Amounts to Untouchability.”
51. Ibid., 4.
52. Ibid., 7.
53. Ibid., 9.
54. Arasi, “Why Atheist And Communist Women Are Fighting For Entry To The Sabarimala.”
55. Koonthamattam, “The Sabarimala Controversy: Women And Their Right To Pray.”
56. Alok, “On Feminism, Religion And Right To Worship,” 1.
57. Ibid., 2.
58. Ibid., 9.
59. Mohanty, “Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses,” 334.
60. Ibid., 338.
61. Rege, “Dalit Women Talk Differently: A Critique of ‘Difference’ and Towards a Dalit Feminist Standpoint Position,” 41.
62. Deviah, “Here’s why women are barred from Sabarimala; It is not because they are ‘unclean’,” 3.
63. PTI, “SC to hear pleas seeking review of Sabarimala verdict allowing women entry on February 6,” 1.
64. Gopinathan, “Vivek Oberoi Goes Public About Womens’ Entry To Sabarimala,” 2.
65. Mahmood, Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and The Feminist Subject, 6.
66. Mahmood, Politics of Piety.
67. Bose, “Entry of Women in Sabarimala Unnecessary’: Shashi Tharoor’s Hypocrisy on Gender Rights,” 4.
68. Ibid., 5.
69. Mahmood, Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and The Feminist Subject, 8.
70. Jayakrishnan, “I am a Woman from Kerala. Here’s Why I am Against the Sabarimala Verdict,” 7.
71. Rajagopal, “Ready to wait till 50 to enter Sabarimala: Women’s group.”
72. Ibid.
73. Lugones, “Decolinial Feminism.”
74. Lugones, “Coloniality of Gender,” 12.
75. Keating, Transformations Now!, 51.
76. Nandy, “Why Nationalism and secularism Failed Together.”
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Rashmi Kumari
Rashmi Kumari is a PhD student in the Department of Childhood Studies, Rutgers University, Camden. Her primary research interests are at the intersection of gender, childhoods, and indigeneity. She recently completed a certificate programme in Women and Gender Studies from Rutgers University. Rashmi has a master’s degree in Sociology from Delhi School of Economics, India and an MPhil in Social Sciences from Tata Institute of Social Sciences Mumbai.