Tuesday, August 13, 2013

A Journey of Resistance


Human deals with life in their life and struggles hard to understand that what life means. Life is not already made-up plan, but one makes his/her life, understands it. When one is born, there are already formed structures in the present generation carried from the past in changed form. They have their significance, and these structures try to mold individual’s life into its own direction. But the course of life is not unidirectional, there are many direction to the life some hidden and some making noises. But these dominate structures are the desired one, and they are comforting and easy going and reflect privilege for some on the others. There are few people who want to maintain those structures and there are some who show their resistance to those structures in their own way, sometimes only invite troubles but they taste life. But those who challenge those structures by anarchist way or by revolutionary/ rebellion way or by their own screwed way face the maximum criticism because of their resistance. Sabiha was the later one





Sabiha, was the one who never looked at the those comforting ways, leading a dead life, on the dictation of others under the authority, who enjoyed it. She always reflected to herself that their way of thinking can’t be her thinking forcefully! She was always in a mood to understand life on her own terms, and didn’t take for granted anything as it was given and did not take finally anything. When she was too young to understand anything, that is when she was 5-6 years old, her parents tried to send her to the aunt to learn Arabic. She didn’t understand why she and her friend were sent to the aunt when their brothers were never sent. After school past lunch, she and her friend used to go to that aunt. She always used to ran from there, by making an excuse of going for nature's call or getting something which was never asked from her to get. She didn’t show any interest in reading those alif bey pey tey tte sey, as those alphabets didn’t make any sense in her childhood life. She was not familiar with those symbols of language in a life around herself. That subject was not taught in her school, that language was not spoken by her parents and neighbours, her friends and her teachers. She hadn't read the fonts of Arabic on the walls leading to the market, or on any billboard or any shops. It was the Hindi or English which was familiar to her, which she tried to read and understand while peeping out from the window of a moving dtc bus, which dropped and bring her back to her home, along with other bus fellows. Finally driving no connection to her real life, she distanced herself from the language or that language alienated itself from her, and she lost all interest. And her parents too. But on the other hand her friend, started reading Arabic very fluently and even reached to the Quran. Her friend was into the control of  the authority, adjusted herself and her life according to the expectations. It was not that she hadn't resisted, but her resistance in a unnoticed way didn't make any difference to the authority. She peeled onion, garlic and made chapattis in the evening and absorbed the qualities of a good normal and cultural girl very easily. And you can imagine how was Sabiha like. She was like an athlete and always reached in the world unknown to her parents and her normal friend. She was more interested in other things. She walked to the river miles away with friends without telling her kins. She ran towards the forest, watched the chirping birds, hunt for the diverse nests and birds hanging from the diverse trees. She ran alone riding her bicycle, earned through the extensive labour of crying and staying hungry for days and nights, to inhale evening air, and experiencing flying. She ran for many things which were not known to anyone except her. 

After years, it was heard, that her friend was married to someone she didn't know; she is living her normal life, with few children. She didn't realized when her childhood passed, when her adulthood gone, and leave womanhood. She is running, every day, every minute and every second in her thoughts in her home in search of fresh air, in search of heights, in search of life…But she is not reaching anywhere… 

Sabiha is also running,  still running for her choices, running for her job, running to buy books, running to meet her friends, running to reach every corner of the world, running for nights, and running for freedom, but telling and arguing to her authority, her parents about her thoughts...

Sometimes her friend, watches her in a silence, feel a sense of jealousy, a discomfort. She wants to pull Sabiha back. Sabiha also watches her silently; want to pull her towards freedom. Sabiha wants to pull her for hers dreams. At the end decision is hers.

Sunday, April 28, 2013

The Language of Rape

Tahiba Khan
Picasso:The Rape of Sabine Women



The language of Rape,
Is invading forcefully
Not conquering!

Symbol of alienation,
It is frustration

Becomes Communal
It is violence

Subject of Power
It is racist

With patriarchy
It is a norm

With Marriage
It is subtle

In home
It is hiding lust

With caste system
It is Doli Pratha

In Occupation
It is never questioned!

Lost in the history
Slave had no agency!!

In wars, 
It was abduction!

At high level
It is trade...

With Masculinity
it is liberating!

The language of Rape, 
Is the language of  worst oppression!
It is cowardice 
which needs resistance!! 

Saturday, April 27, 2013

Who is Responsible?


     
On December 13( Three days after which The Delhi Rape happened), a teenage girl had been raped by 16 boys, of whom nine were minor, six were 18 and one was 19 years old in Meghalaya. Meghalaya is one of the seven sisters in the Indian Territory. I didn’t hear about the incident earlier and read about this in a story titled ‘A cry in the dark’[i] (The Indian Express, 7 April, 2013). On the night when she walked, her Vagina was mutilated, her body was attacked, and her thoughts were harmed. Who is responsible? Was she responsible when she asked her parents to visit the show supposed to end by 8:30pm, which she wanted to see with her two friends? Was she responsible when she decided to walk without any her male relatives? On  19th April a five years old girl was raped, and the neighbour who raped her inserted objects into her body. Who is responsible? A poem in dialogue form sprouted out my hand, to ask, who is responsible?   


He raped her,
They raped her,
Who was responsible?
Who was guilty?

The teenage who raped?
Or the adults who tried to escape?

Or walking in the night raped her?[ii]
Or walking without a veil raped her?
Or questioning to your authority raped her?
Or did saying NO rape her?
Or did saying hey!! stop beating my friend rape her?
Who is responsible?

They say,
Be ‘NOT ‘adventurous to walk at night,
It might have saved her…
Be ‘NOT’ modest in her dress
It might have saved her…
Oh seriously, here is where the problem lies?
But I do have a question,
Who is responsible then,
When a five years old is raped?

I have another question,
Are they watching and waiting, and lusting
When She will be out at night
Or alone at her house,
Or trapped in a non-consensual marriage
Or will be unveiled…

Seriously I’m asking who is responsible,
You pathetic man minded feudal world?

Then who is to Culture and who is to Nature?

Who is responsible for the death of a bird?
Flying in her world of skies and clouds…
The hunter or the bird?

Who is responsible?
When a man excretes urine on the road,
And a woman waits for the same to reach her home!
Is it man’s anatomy or his privilege to express himself.

Who is responsible 
When FIR is not made?
Who is responsible,
When protesters against rape culture are detained?
Who was responsible, 
When Asiya-Nilophar was raped?
Who was responsible 
When Soni Sori went through custodial rape?

Who is responsible?

Thursday, April 18, 2013

It Was Dream or Hallucination?


Tahiba Khan

In a deep dream, in a half sleep
I hallucinated

A man with a bald head,
With a light beard
Came to me, lying perpendicular to my body’s position.
Don’t remember what he was wearing
He began showering his love,smiling,winking
And then he vanished…

"Where is he?"

He came again
And scared me,
With his long scary teeth
Feeling scared I closed my eyes…
And tried hard to let him go….
After a while I realized it was in dream…
It was a dream… only dream.

After a while, with my half opened eyes
I saw another man in a white lungi,
Running to the kitchen,
I saw his half naked leg and the fluttering of his lungi
I stood up to look for this intruder

Arey! Nobody was here? The gate was closed..
"How he made his way into my house…"
Again I lied down…

After a while I watched some kids coming and going out
Laughing and chatting…
What?
I again got up…and looked... 
Nobody was there.
I lied down again…

Then I thought I'd get up and study…
I went to the bathroom and felt something in my hand
A soap case, with soap in it…
"How did it come to my hand..?"
Oh! I was still in my bed... lying…

"Oh shit! What the hell is happening!" I thought

I thought to get up
But left with no energy
I pulled myself while holding the bed side table.
I didn’t make it…Not even inch of me was shifted
Though I tried hard…
Uff… It was still not real… It was in dream..!

I finally opened my eyes… 
Felt the real room,
Went to the bathroom 
Washed my troubled face…
And sat down to study…

Sunday, April 14, 2013

He Followed The Same Path


Photo by:Abneet Chauhan
Tahiba Khan

Mangu’s house was located on the periphery of the village. Only mud paved roads were the way he used to follow everyday to reach his place of work and to come back to his small two yard spaced home. Mangu was always positive about his work. He always worked hard. But he was very skeptical about rain; he sometimes hated the trouble it caused him. His house was almost wet and cracked whenever rains showed their way to his village. He along with his family had seen many sleepless nights while collecting the rain drops in the small tumbler used for bathing to save his beloved house from further wetting. This was not end to his trouble, whenever rain got finished, he and his wife with their children, spent days and nights rebuilding cracked floor and walls made of mud and cow dung. He doesn't own anything except his labour, he always asked for cow dung hesitatingly to his master in exchange of work done by his wife in their kitchen.

His family resided in one room, cooked on chullah. In that room he, along with his family shared the anger, love, jealousy with the different generation and sexes. It was looked as if there were no concept of the young and old. Sometimes Mangu behaved like a boy and sometimes his children behaved like an old man.

Mangu had three children, among whom first two were the girls and last one was boy. Mangu always wanted to have boy instead of girl similar to the other fellows of his locality. 

When Sabina, his wife was pregnant first time he was sure that he will be blessed with a boy but his desire of a boy was washed away when her wife gave birth to a girl. He walked away from the house, and didn’t even think of seeing the new life sprouted in his house. When he came in the evening he looked at the bud with a side look trying to ignore her partially and at the same time felt thirsty for her glimpse. Days passed he didn't show his affection towards the baby.

One day he, finally broke when he saw the baby smiling on her own, when a squirrel entered from the open window in search of the few grains scattered on the mud floor, inside the room. His wife was out in neighbor’s house. Feel attracted by her smile he automatically drove towards the only cot on which the baby was lying on her small-flat tommy. He went near and sat on the cot for a while and touched her with his index finger, and a tear rolled from his eyes. His dry hands took seconds for the tear to extinct. As if it was never existed.
Mangu's life had never changed after that; he used the same mud paved roads to his work and hated rain for the trouble it caused him. He worked from morning to evening, for the money to keep him and his family alive for the next day labour. 

Mangu’s wife was again blessed with the God’s gift. That time Mangu was hopeful towards his destiny. But it was again a girl. A girl, whose featured were so beautiful that her mother immediately planted a kiss on her tiny-soft forehead, and forgot her post delivery pain.

Mangu was in distress.  But he again involved in his work as always, using the same mud paved roads.
His wife was in labour pain surrounded by the locality women. He was not concerned when his wife was pregnant third time, and was not expecting anything. But it was a boy. Everybody was happy, there was celebration. Mangu was overwhelmed by this desire of which he was expecting since the first birth to his wife. He took loan from his Malik to celebrate his son’s birth. He distributed boondi ki ladoo. He went again and again to his wife and pressed his kiss on the head of an infant, and in return his body felt the dreams he was expecting in future. 

He again involved in his work as always, he children grew more, with time. His son was pampered one, his daughters were also loved partially. In their limited resources, his son was given the first option to have anything. His daughters started working in the fields along with their mother, and helped in accumulating some income. That accumulated income never actually accumulated. Their extra labour adjusted with the rising prices. His son was involved in the habit on drinking. He all the day roamed with his friends, and whenver came back fought with his sisters on petty issues like why they were standing out, or staring at some boys in locality, or not wearing dupatta etc...He also shouted on her mother, when she not fulfilled his wish to cook of his choices. He never understood his family conditions. 

His father was on doubt about his drinking and intoxication, but one night he was confirmed when his son didn't come to home. He searched for him around the fields and village. Occupied with weird thoughts, Mangu didn't sleep that night. Next morning some men took him on their shoulders, from the distant place to his home. He was drenched in mud. He was unable to stand on his feet. It was last night hangover which was not passed away. When his father was called off from fields, he saw him lying on cot, his wife was crying, and her daughters were standing silent. He was heartbroken and remembered the day he wished for a boy. He went to her daughters, hugged both of them, and said "I'm lucky that you were blessed on me.... "

Mangu followed the same path, mud paved roads...he was always cynical about the rain, despite it flourished harvest he worked on master's fields.