In Kashmir, most women don’t adhere to purdah. Kashmiri women
work outdoors and share work with men. They may not be flashily dressed but they
are not the type who would like to live in purdah for all time. If you stand
outside a college for women or a girls’ school in Srinagar, you will see
students wearing the shalwar kameez and no burkha. The only concession they make
to the sentiments of their elders is to have the chunni covering their
heads.
In the early ’90s after militancy erupted in Kashmir, several
radical organisations tried to enforce purdah on women. Because of the fear, for
a while college and university-going girls wore the burkha, as in several
instances acid attacks were carried out on those who did not. But the campaign
didn’t last long and with the situation improving in the late ’90s, women gave
up the burkha once more.
However, a few years ago the campaign for the burkha was raised
by a small militant group, Lashkar-e-Jabbar, to establish its standing. A
little-known outfit, the group’s main objective was to grab the headlines and
earn a place for itself in the ranks of the larger militant organisations. Its
campaign had no deeper purpose. However, the major militant organisations
criticised the dictates of the Lashkar-e-Jabbar.
Syed Ali Shah Geelani, the veteran Kashmiri separatist leader,
had also criticised the Lashkar-e-Jabbar’s move to enforce a purdah code and had
vehemently opposed acid attacks on veilless women in the valley. Although he
supported the observance of purdah by Muslim women, describing it as a symbol of
dignity and self-respect, Geelani said it needed a system and state to enforce
the law of purdah. He had urged those who were campaigning for the observance of
purdah in the valley to go in for persuasive methods instead of coercion. Most
of the Hurriyat leaders had also condemned the move, calling it un-Islamic.
Kashmiri culture has to be properly understood to know why the
burkha campaign will not last here. Kashmiri women and youth are not inclined to
take to the burkha. In the rural areas, most women work in the fields. Most of
them can be seen in knee-deep paddy fields, looking after the crop that provides
Kashmir’s staple diet. As they work in the fields, food is brought to them from
their homes and they eat it by the side of the waterways. How can they wear the
burkha in these conditions?
With the situation improving in Kashmir, more girls are
attending schools, colleges and university. They also attend professional
institutes in other parts of the country.