Monday, April 3, 2000
Wonderful Women
Padmini NatarajanI grew up in Madras, Hyderabad and Bombay. Being a sickly child, books were my constant companions. I had an arranged marriage, two kids and am celebrating my fiftieth, my husband's sixtieth birthdays and our 28th Anniversary this year. Over the years I have developed a great interest in drama and act in serious roles though comedy is my forte. Along with scripting skits I write poetry, fiction, first person encounters. I was encouraged, even goaded, to write, by my husband who is my editor and critic. Tend to be verbose and get on to a soap box easily.
Have been part of an all womens drama group and don both male and female roles. I am member of an International Women's Association and volunteer with a suicide prevention group.
I have lived in Mauritius for ten years and have been a globe trotter. |
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Portrait of Women
The new century has dawned. This period in history has been identified as a time when women will emerge as the predominant force in all aspects of industry, commerce, science, arts, literature and governance in addition to the traditional profile of a homemaker and mother. Many women throughout the preceding millennium have made their mark as individuals. However, one half of human beings have generally been restricted and kept subservient for myriad reasons. Through this column, I would like to discuss and examine the different roles that Asian women have played in society, with particular reference to India. We shall also try to trace the change that women have undergone in recent times to adapt and assert their individuality in these roles.
No role is water tight in its singular depiction. All roles merge into one another. Not being an expert in any of the professional fields of study like sociology, psychology, anthropology or women's studies, I shall talk about what I have observed, felt, experienced, read and heard about this subject. I shall place before you my unbiased view and you may agree, disagree, add to or discard some of my views and convince me to think or see matters differently. That is where we are going to interact and have fun finding things about ourselves.
Mother part-1
Let us start with the most important role that the whole world agrees is the primary role of a woman. Yes, woman as mother. All creation comes from the mother though we are led to believe that Eve was created from Adam's rib. Physiologically this cannot be natural and can be relegated to the fantasy of the first storyteller. In the Asian context, Shakti is accepted as the most powerful source of all creation. Therefore, the concept of motherhood is given prime importance. Strangely, this power is disseminated when the other forces of life like creation, protection, maintenance and destruction take over in the masculine idiom. Human qualities of pique, jealousy, inconsistency are attributed to the women goddesses in the pantheon and their veracity is eroded. As a corollary, women have also been marginalised to a secondary role in family and social life.
The Vedic texts rarely speak of a woman's life in the Ashram. The sages wives, like Anasuya, Gautami are just cardboard figures. Maitreyi and Gargi are the learned women who have been presented as learned pundits. But the worship of Ma or Goddess Durga is predominant. The disciples too adopt the preceptor's wife as a mother persona. The only off beat note is struck by the Sage Parasurama who commits matricide for his mother's infidelity.
Shakuntala is the first single woman/mother who decides to deliver and nurture her child in the forest, all alone after she is rejected by her husband Dushyanta. She brings up the boy and takes on the multiple roles of mother, father, and teacher and makes him a warrior who defeats his father in a duel.
The Ramayana has different types of the mother figure. Kausalya, Rama's mother, is loyal to her husband and does not question him when she has to share him with other wives or when her co-wife Kaikeyi, uses her persuasive powers to send Rama to the forest. Sumitra is the sacrificing mother who sends her son Lakshmana to accompany his brother Rama and does not see him for 14 years. Kaikeyi, originally the loving stepmother, turns against her beloved Rama and tries to ensure the succession of her son Baratha to the throne. She fails due to the intense loyalty of her son to Rama and Barata becomes an ascetic until Rama's return. Mandodari, the wife of Ravana, is also more glorified as a Pativrata than as the mother of Indrajit who dies in battle in the war between Ravana and Rama.
Seeta, the epitome of the perfect wife of a perfect man, becomes a woman of great power and admiration when she brings up her sons Lava and Kusa in the Ashram where she is abandoned by her husband. Her self-respect and dignity is displayed magnificently when she hands over her sons as future rulers to their father whom she sees as a representative of the nation and ends her life by entering fissure in the earth etc.
The Mahabarartha presents Kunti as the archetypal mother. She is a woman who experimentally conceives through the powers of a mantra-artificial insemination of those times?-and discards the baby in a basket in the river fearing calumny. She gets married and again due to the impotency of her husband uses the mantra and delivers three boys herself. Her husband's second wife also has two sons who are brought up by Kunti herself impartially. When the choice between her lost and found son Karna and Arjuna is imminent she is torn apart. She is promised that she shall have five sons living after the war is over. Karna is again sacrificed. The strong mother figure is bolstered by the other mother in the story, Gandhari, who loses her one hundred sons in the war of dharma. Strangely enough, Draupadi the woman who strides through the epic in a dominant role has a stronger emphasis as a wife and a woman scorned. She too loses all her sons by a revengeful plot but that is only a small part of the story.
All these women will appear again in our discussion in their roles as wives, mothers-in-law, sisters and daughters. We shall have a look at the modern mother next time.
Credits
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