The Sabarimala Temple Entry Verdict, You and Me
#opinion
Disclaimer: We are a platform which allows all views to be represented without bias or discrimination. This piece is not to be judged upon as the final stance of MUNner’s daily or MEC MUN Society.
The title might confuse you. How are you and me connected to this Supreme Court verdict? Well, I thought along the same lines too, until a few days earlier. At the onset, let me tell you that I am a proud feminist. I strongly believe in the empowerment of women by all means. So I oppose the social ban on menstruating women entering temples or other “sacred places”. But I always kept it to myself. I never posted about it anywhere, never talked about it openly, never strongly voiced it. Why? Because I thought that since it is a personal choice(whether or not to enter temples during menstruation) I shouldn’t pressurize anyone into accepting my opinion. But a couple of days ago I came across this video on YouTube analyzing whether progressive thoughts and religion could go hand in hand. One of the points put across through the video was :
“When you are a believer and a feminist but you only keep your progressive thoughts to yourself and those in your inner circle, the religious reform occurs only within you. You may ask what is the harm in that? That is where privilege comes in. Religion never works on its own. It works along with social and economic status. If you are socially and economically privileged then you might be able to go against the religious norms and customs and live your life in your way. But oppressive religious customs choke those who are socially and economically underprivileged. They do not have the voice to go against them and thus are affected by the consequences of these oppressive religious norms. Hence it is the duty of the privileged to voice their progressive thoughts.”
This got me thinking and here I am voicing my opinions about a recent event that made us choose between a progressive society and age-old religious customs.
The Sabarimala Verdict
On 28th September 2018, the Supreme court delivered its verdict on the Sabarimala Temple Entry case, and in a 4:1 majority, the bench held that the practice of excluding women of a certain age group from entering the temple is unconstitutional and it violated their fundamental right to freedom of religion. This was a historical verdict from the Supreme Court as it marked the beginnings of a progressive society in India as did other verdicts by the Supreme Court such as banning triple talaq, granting women equal property rights, granting women army officers the right to obtain a permanent commission, etc.
Religion is a way for us social beings to live as a community, supporting each other in times of need. It is never a rule book that we need to abide by and therefore it needs to change along with the requirements of the age. 50 years before, this social ban on menstruating women was not an issue because women were limited to the four walls of their kitchen or the household at the maximum. But today that is not the case. Women have been represented in every facet of life and her opinion is valued. So how can such an active section of society be banned from one of the basic requirements of a human’s life -their religion?
Let me ask you all some questions. Even today most men keep the 41 days fasting before they leave for Sabarimala pilgrimage. Most of these men are working in corporates or government institutions. They are bound to have women colleagues and sometimes they would have to interact with them. What if a pilgrim interacts with a menstruating woman? You may say that the women must stay away from the pilgrims, but what if it happens by mistake? What if the woman didn’t know? What if it’s not a colleague but a client? Is it possible to ask them if they are menstruating before interacting with them? Some of you may feel these are just stupid questions asked just for proving my side. But think about it. This is how today’s society works and we need to reform our religion to fit the needs of the times. In today’s world of a fast-paced life, it is not possible to keep to such hard and fast rules. So people do make concessions here and there while going for such pilgrimages. But do they get cursed or killed by God for this? No! This is exactly my point.
The God who created us to bleed every month for the sustenance of our species will not consider us impure when we do so. It is us humans who categorize everything. Wasn’t that what we did when many years ago there existed castes and untouchability? The “untouchables” were not even allowed to breathe in the direction of the “upper caste” lest they also become “impure”! They weren’t allowed to enter the temples either. However, the Temple Entry Proclamation that came into force on April 14, 1948, threw open the temple doors towards these downtrodden. Since then they have also entered the temples shoulder to shoulder with the “upper castes” and tell me, have our temples become impure? We still consider the them as “sacred places”, don’t we? But wasn’t it claimed that their entry would degenerate our temples?
The Stigma
Most of these social norms stem from the belief that menstrual blood is impure. We have all learned science and we believe in its truth. Let us analyze this belief scientifically. Menstruation is not the body’s way of flushing out toxins. Every month a woman’s body prepares itself for a potential pregnancy and therefore her uterus is lined with new layers of tissues(endometrial lining) and since tissues consist of cells, and cells require blood to remain alive, small temporary arteries called spiral arteries supply blood to these tissues. The woman’s body sets all this and expects fertilization. But when that does not occur, the uterus will want to go back to its original state and hence it contracts, shredding all these tissues and temporary arteries, thus leading to blood coming out of the body called menstruation.
You should note that I said it is “arteries” that supply blood to these tissues and this blood is the one that comes out during menstruation. According to the basic biology we learned in higher secondary classes, it is arteries that carry blood from our heart to every single part of our body. It is some among these arteries themselves that provide the blood to the uterus. So how does blood in all other parts of our body become good while menstrual blood becomes impure? All that red we see during menstruation is not blood. The actual blood content(RBC content) amounts to just 35% of the total amount of menstrual discharge. And yet if this little bit of blood falls in the “wrong place” it can lead to misfortunes, curses, and even instant death! (believe me, I’ve heard people saying this!)
Around 200 years ago, The Sati Regulation Act was passed by our colonial government, banning Sati. At the time the Hindu conservatives held the view that Sati was a practice that would give the husband and wife immediate spiritual bliss. They claimed ascetic widowhood to be suffering. Even though the British government supported this ban only to prove that Indian natives had barbaric customs and practices, it was indeed a step forward in terms of women’s empowerment. Today when we look back we think, “How could the people be so inhuman back then? Purposely pushing a live human being into the fire?!”. But back then women were either praised as heroes for taking the step by themselves or coerced into the act by their family and in-laws. Similarly, we need to take this step today. Remember, we live in a world where women like Malala Yousafzai took a bullet to her head, fighting for women’s right to education. Why did she do it? Her father was more than ready to teach her. He even built a school so that Malala could get the education she wanted. So she could have gone about her life peacefully without questioning the Taliban’s policy. But she still did it because there were millions of other girls who did not have the opportunity she had. And today we look up to her.
As I conclude let me make it clear, I follow theism. I believe in the existence of God. Whether you enter temples when you menstruate or not is completely your choice. But if your choice is not to, you do not have the right to push that choice down the throats of many other young girls growing up, saying they are impure while they menstruate. And to the girls who are listening to such advice growing up, forcing your way into these temples is not a choice. It will create violence like we saw after the Sabarimala Temple Entry verdict came out. But I ask you to boycott that God who treats you any differently when you menstruate. Lastly, this is not a call to boycott theism and follow atheism. After all, God resides within each one of us and the best prayer we can make is by treating each other right and respecting each other as we would want to be respected.
Read More
We are now on LinkedIn! Do follow us there!
Follow us on Medium for more for International events, news, MUN tips and tricks, and detailed analysis. Get in touch with us on Social media to stay in the loop -
Facebook| Instagram|Telegram Channel |YouTube|Twitter|LinkedIn.
We also invite guest writers to publish their material via this blog!
Interested in writing for MUNner’s Daily? Go right ahead and fill out this form. We will get back to you soon!
