For most, Urdu poetry means a lot of elegant sighing about matters of the heart, beauty and existence. What you do not expect is feminism—in-your-face, aggrieved, angry and hurting.
‘Hum Gunahgar Auratein’ (‘We sinful women’), a recent evening of feminist verses in Delhi hosted by Hindustani Awaz at the Ghalib Institute, shattered a lot of stereotypes about the places where Urdu poetry could go. And reciting it were women actors, writers and poets.
The title is drawn from a poem by Kishwar Naheed, a fiery Pakistani poet, and it speaks in the voice of defiance: Yeh hum gunahgar auratein hain/ jo ahl-e jabba ki tamkinat se/ na ro’b khayein/ na jaan bechein (We are sinful women, who are not cowed down by the robes of those in power).
Written as a voice of feminist protest against the oppressive, anti-women regime of Gen. Zia-ul-Haq in the 1980s, it has become a sort of anthem for all such poetry. It was sung by Chinna Dua at the session.
Urdu scholar Rakshanda Jalil, founder of Hindustani Awaz, says her intention is to showcase aspects of Urdu poetry that don’t fit its clichés. “I wanted to bust the myth that all Urdu poetry is only pretty and nice. This myth has done a great disservice to Urdu. Of course, it is pretty but it also has muscle. There are so many more shades to it but even people who genuinely love the language tend to ignore that aspect,” she says.
The poetry came from multiple women writers—apart from Naheed, there were the works of Fahmida Riyaz, Zehra Nigah, Praveen Shakir, Sara Shagufta and Tarannum Riyaz. The themes spread across an unusual spectrum, from abortion and foeticide to rape and the inequitable burden of housework.
Most of the readings by the participants were of works by other writers, except for Delhi-based Tarannum Riyaz who read her own works. Hers was perhaps the gentlest voice because it dealt with greater quietness the unfairness of a woman’s place in conventional society and family.
“As long as there will be inequalities, there will be protests and poetry of protest,” says Riyaz. “But I believe in making a quiet statement in my poetry.”
In the book, Anthems of Resistance: A Celebration of Progressive Urdu Poetry , authors Ali Husain Mir and Raza Mir talk of the evolution of feminist writing in the subcontinent. They point out that till the early decades of the last century, most poets were men and women mostly figured as “an abstraction and as the object of the male protagonist’s desire.”
The arrival of progressive poets such as Majaz, Sahir Ludhianvi and Kaifi Azmi changed many things but not everything. This new wave no longer only saw women as objects of adoration and betrayal in love but as victims of oppression. But as the Mir brothers point out, it was the men who had to “protect” and “save” the women. Among the first landmark references to a woman as an equal in life’s journey was in Azmi’s poems. It was the poetry of Pakistani women like Nigah, Riyaz, Shagufta, Naheed and Shakir that crashed through the gender wall, refusing all condescension. The only Indian feminist poetry that evening came from Riyaz.
“Wherever poetry is written in the face of tyranny and oppression, it is stronger. The circumstances become fodder for rebellious poetry and this is what happened with Pakistani women poets when the Zia rule clamped down on women’s freedoms,” says Jalil.
Among the strongest verses recited that evening, by actor Salima Raza, came from Riyaz’s pen, particularly ‘Chadar aur Char Diwari’. It is packed with understated fury emphasised by the exaggerated courtesy extended to the tormentors—the clergy and political overlords of 80s Pakistan: Huzūr maiñ is siyāh chādar kā kyā karūñgī/ ye aap kyuuñ mujh ko baḳhshte haiñ ba-sad ināyat (Sir, what do I do with this black chadar (veil) you have blessed me with). Among the most radical feminist voices, her works pull no punches when they talk of sexual oppression.
Nigah’s dramatic and touching poem on female foeticide is a popular work that lends itself beautifully to stage reading, something poet Indira Verma pulled off beautifully: Main bach gai maa main bach gai maa/ tere kache lahoo ki mehndi mere por por main rach gai maa/ gar mere naqsh ubhar aate, wo phir bhi lahoo se bhar jate/ meri aankhen roshan ho jati to tezaab ka surma lag jata (I was saved mother, I was saved, every pore of my being coloured by the henna of your blood/ if my features had been formed, they would have been filled with blood, if my eyes had begun to see they would have been filled with the kohl of acid).
The feminist poets who spoke up against the politics of patriarchy often had to pay a terrible personal price for it as well. Shagufta whose work was read by actor Fouzia Dastango was among these. Her very short and troubled life—she committed suicide at 29—was chronicled by Amrita Pritam in Life and Poetry of Sara Shagufta . Among her best-known works is ‘Shaili beti ke naam’, addressed to a daughter. Tujhe kabhi koi dukh de/ us dukh ka naam beti rakhna (If anyone ever gives you grief, call that pain ‘daughter’).
Praveen Shakira was another bright poet whose life was cut short early by an accident but managed in a few years to craft a new matrix for Urdu poetry.
A freelance journalist, the writer has a deep interest in the place of Urdu in our cultural and social lives.
