‘Pregnancy a cruel enemy to women’s liberation’: Remembering Periyar and his book ‘Why Women were Enslaved?’

The English version of the book translated by Meena Kandaswamy reveals how Periyar urged women to give up pregnancy, fight masculinity, struggle for property rights, opt for remarriage, and denounce chastity. He argued about the sex-selective application of the words ‘chastity’ and ‘prostitution’ and viewed love as nothing more than desire, affection, friendship and passion. He put forth the idea of Self Respect marriages, a social contract, glaringly different from the sacred union practised by religion.

Here are the key elements Periyar had written in his book:

‘Pregnancy a cruel enemy to women’s liberation’

According to Periyar, pregnancy is an enemy to freedom and liberation of women. He perceived that the campaign for birth control should be more significant than the campaign against liquor and communicable diseases. “In today’s world pregnancy and delivering children has become an obstacle to the independence of men and women. Pregnancy is especially a cruel enemy to the independence of women. Because women lack wealth, income and a profession, they have to expect the support of others to raise their children. So we say that women should certainly stop having babies,” he wrote.

The social reformer termed pregnancy as the root cause for women contracting diseases, developing signs of premature aging, having reduced lifespan and their lives cruelly cut short.

“Pregnancy is the obstacle that prevents women from creating the female categories of brahmacharini and sankarachari like the categories that exist for men (such as brahmachari, sanyasi, sankaracharya, tambiran and pandara sannidhi) and consequently women are unable to capture such elite places where they can live with freedom, own several crores and be worshipped by several men and women,” Periyar wrote.

Nivedita Louis, author and social feminist historian, shared her thoughts about Periyar feminism with indianexpress.com. She said Periyar wanted women to make choices for themselves and often asked “why do you need uterus?”.

However, Nivedita opined that Periyar’s view on women denouncing pregnancy is practically inferior. “An individual should decide whether she needs to get married, have children or not. She should make choices for her own body and have autonomy over it.”

“Nowadays, young women are reading Periyar’s works more and they are independent, career oriented. In Tamil Nadu, a majority of the people are not using caste surnames and such a change can be attributed to Periyar,” she said.

“We as a society are conditioned to think that all women love children and being a mother literally thrills her that takes her to heaven. In reality, around half the women who took part in a survey have said that they are not interested in parenting. Even today we see slogans outside infertility centres which claim that ‘motherhood is a boon’. How outright insulting! A woman is more than just a live person with a uterus whose function is to beget heirs for her husband and eventually been given the sole responsibility of child rearing and to carry the guilt if her children grow up the way not intended by society,” Dr Radhika Murugesan, founder and CEO of Chennai minds, consultant psychiatrist told indianexpress.com.

Even today, a woman is considered a child-bearing machine, she said.

Widow remarriage

Periyar took inspiration from his own life to shape his opinions and fight for women’s rights. Sharing an anecdote, Periyar mentions how his 10-year-old niece burst into tears in front of him when her 13-year-old husband died. In the book, Periyar says the girl asked her uncle why he threw such a huge stone on her head and said she never asked him to get her married. The child’s plight left Periyar in tears and later once she attained puberty, Periyar got her remarried to a relative, despite opposition from the family members.

“Even though she might not have even tasted any worldly pleasure, if a woman (even if she is a 16-year-old beauty) loses her husband she must tightly shut away all her natural desires for a lifetime and die in dejection and sadness. What an injustice! It is very regrettable that the so-called Hindus passively watch their society being unjustly destroyed in this manner. In short, it is a kind of social suicide,” Periyar wrote.

Property rights

Periyar found denial of inheritance rights as one of the key reasons why a woman is enslaved and as a bane to Hinduism. “No one has ever given a reason why women are not granted property rights. If parents provide education and a profession to women, they will acquire the power to earn property. Later, they might be able to select their husbands, or live a life of independence with the husband selected by their parents,” Periyar wrote.

Prostitution

Periyar dissected the gender disparities of prostitution and said that words of blame, abuses, and curses do not exist for men. He also wrote about how a man boasts about their sexual exploits, whereas a woman is made outcaste, chased, beaten, scolded, tortured, murdered for prostitution.

“When we closely study the practical philosophy behind the word ‘prostitution’, we feel that the word merely signifies that women are nothing but slaves. This is because the ‘sin of prostitution and immorality arising out of prostitution are applied only to women and never to men,” he wrote.

He said that the word prostitute signifies that women are the slaves of men, they are the objects of men’s lust and are mere commodities that can be sold for a price or rented out.

The right to divorce

Periyar stood for marriages which are based on mutual consent and he was of the view that it is natural for people to fall in love with others. However, when a couple finds they do not experience pleasure, passion and their needs are no longer satisfied in a marriage, they should opt for divorce rather than suffering misery for the rest of the lives, according to him.

“It is highly important to make space for the annulment of marriages so that women are emancipated and acquire human nature, human rights and self-respect and men should acquire satisfaction, pleasure, true love and morality. Until this happens, there will be no space for real pleasure and an independent life for men and women…Somehow we have got married, whatever happens we should bear it and continue to experience sadness and dissatisfaction and force others to undergo the same. Because, doing so is nothing but way of life devoid of human nature and self-respect and never an act of intelligence,” he wrote.

According to Dr Radhika, women are enslaved by the emphasis on purity and a design where a “good woman” puts her family first and all her needs next. “She has grown over decades to internalise it so that even she believes that her place is first as a wife who cooks and cleans or a mom who feeds and changes nappies before her aspirations in life,” Dr Radhika Murukesan remarked explaining why women stay in marriages that do not work.

“Periyar encourages women to leave marriages that do not work and not stay purely due to the significance of ‘Karpu’ which incidentally does not have an equivalent English term attached to being a slave to her husband. Even today in families we see women being ostracised purely due to the fact that her husband is no more. We have come a long way from enforced widowhood or Sati and women who want to move on into another relationship either after her husband dies or following a divorce is socially, culturally getting an acceptance here. In short, Periyar encouraged women to think,” Dr Murukesan added.

Fight against masculinity

Periyar argues in his book that women should lead their movement for liberation and that’s the way for true emancipation. “I read the book ‘Why Women were Enslaved?’ when I was in Class 5 for the first time. Everytime I keep reading the book, it gives me a new vision,” Nivedita Louis remarked.

“People from different walks of life took part in Suyamariyathai Iyakkam (Self Respect Movement) including lay people, those were not much educated. It started in 1920s when Hindi was imposed by Rajaji. However, the movement culminated into something else. Women with Dravidian ideology in the households were ingrained into the movement. He instigated women to come forward and support men in the struggle. Five or six women, including Dr Saminathan Dharmambal, took to protests and they were arrested for agitating against Hindi imposition in a Hindu theological school. Women like Dr Dharmambal believed in Periyar’s words and Periyar also got arrested for instigating women to protest,” Nivedita added.

Criticisms
Periyar received criticism for his own first marriage with Nagammai. In his obituary to Nagammai, Periyar had admitted that he did not follow “even one-hundredth” of the ideas he put forward in his marriage. He was also questioned for his marriage at 70 years to Maniammai, who was younger to him by 40 years. He also received censure for asking women to have multiple sexual relationships.