Of Women 'Inside'

Prison Voices from India

Rani Dhavan Shankardass

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• Topic: Law
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000059205
• Subtopic: Creative Writing
• Index: Law

Based on original research and personal encounters, this book narrates the real-life-stories of women locked up in Indian prisons for alleged or actual violations of the state's criminal laws. It contextualises women offenders' experiences of the criminal justice system and of state custodial institutions within the larger narratives of their particular lives, thus interrogating the social as well as legal frameworks within which women face adversities in their lives and in custody. It argues that the sex and gender issues that affect women 'outside' are carried over 'inside', with extremely damaging consequences for the lives and mental health of women prisoners. The volume will be of interest to those in gender studies, legal studies, sociology, and human rights organisations, as well as to policy makers and the general reader.

1
Saloni’s Choice

She’s young; she’s pretty and she seems sure of herself. She stands there in a well-fitted kurta — yellow, with a dark red patterned border on the sleeves, neck and hem-line. Her dupatta is maroon with a small yellow bandni print. She has it draped across her bosom and repeatedly adjusts it as she moves across the room to the chair I have indicated. Her fingernails and toenails are painted bright red and she seems to have spent time trying to look good. Somehow if a woman tries to look attractive in jail she is asking for trouble, particularly from the staff. She gets more than her share of distasteful adjectives from one and all, delivered in downbeat muted tones, and she either grins and bears them, or brazenly retorts.

I know that Saloni has been arrested under the Prevention of Immoral Trafficking Act (see note at the end of the chapter). So, I also know that if a woman is in prison for a ‘sexual offence’ or, as the law would label it, ‘immoral trafficking’, she doesn’t stand a chance of being accepted. Prisons may classify prisoners according to their legal offences but a prison’s social grouping, especially in a women’s prison, is not all about legal offences: it’s about them having crossed the barriers of social and moral taboos set out over the ages by custom, tradition and often religion, and are expected to be a stronger sanction than the law. Such offenders just don’t fit in with the others — whether they are viewed through the eyes of those in charge of them, or those who are locked up with them. Every nuance of their behaviour is noted — how they dress, how they talk, who they move about with, whom comes to visit them, what they eat, how they eat; the scrutiny is constant.

I look at Saloni curiously without betraying any emotion at all. She still hasn’t sat down; I ask her to sit and offer her some water. She declines with a shake of her head. She is so young and really quite attractive. Dark, almost beautiful, she has a rich crop of hair, neatly braided, and she keeps fiddling with the braid as it hangs across her left shoulder, down her waist and almost into her lap.

It seems that Saloni is not about to start her conversation the way that many others do. She sits there determined to be a little resistant.

‘How old are you Saloni’? I ask.

She looks at me almost indignantly. ‘Does it matter’, she replies almost cockily. ‘Why should my age be your concern? I’m here aren’t I and you probably want to know what I was booked for, how did they catch me, what I do in the prison and so on. I might tell you that, but other things are really irrelevant to your work and I am not interested in a long conversation with you the way other persons here may be. You will probably be interested in preaching to me about morality assuming that I have no clue about such issues. But I am not here to be converted.’

I do feel the need to protest. ‘No Saloni, I think you have it all wrong. I am not about to make you a guinea pig in my project. Yes, my objective is to set up counselling units in our jails, especially for vulnerable prisoners, but I am not here just to make you a statistic in my book. And for us counselling does not mean preaching, moralising, or judging. This is intended to be confidential activity conducted without judgement and with utmost professionalism. It might help us all understand why people do the things they do and above all, my colleagues and I want to understand, as women, the compulsions that structure women’s lives. It might also enable you to express what you may have kept bottled up inside because there was no one to listen.’

‘I really am not interested’, Saloni retorts. ‘I do what I think I have to do when I have to do it. And my reasons and compulsions are neither important nor comprehensible for you. So, forget about helping me. Just leave it. You asked all of us to come once to your room, so I have come. I am not likely to come again. I know how everyone views our types. Yes, and we are a “type” because you call us a type; the law calls us a type. So, let’s just leave it at that.’ She makes her way to the door, and I still beseech her to stay. But she is gone before I utter another word. Clearly, she is bitter.

This was not how I had seen myself conduct the conversation. I was concerned about how I would have a dialogue with someone whose world was so removed from mine. How was I going to try to build Saloni’s confidence in me and my colleagues? As it is, I was having a problem with intruding into prisoners’ lives, having asked myself repeatedly how I would like my private life probed by a stranger. But then, how can anyone ever really know the ‘why’ of the offences of all those persons dumped into ‘lock ups’ and forgotten about by the rest of the world that has decided simply that they are criminals and prison is where they belong.

Two days pass and I get a chance to talk to several other women in the jail, about their experiences here, where they come from. A handful (five or six) of women visit the room each day as they have been told that I am here with my colleagues to listen and to ‘chat’.

Mid-morning on a rainy Tuesday, the curtain of the room is lifted and Saloni steps in. There is an elderly woman already with me at the time and I don’t want to send her away. So, I ask Saloni to wait outside or come back in an hour. She winces and goes out and I am desperate to get her back. Perhaps I should have let her come and asked the elderly woman to go and come back later. But that wouldn’t be right. So I wait in hope.

I finish my conversation with the older woman and assure her about confidentialities again. I ask her to come back whenever she wishes but with a proviso that she must not lie to me at any point: the session has seen more than a fistful of lies. She leaves and I am just about to get up to make a round of the jail when Saloni steps in. Clearly, she had been waiting for the other woman’s departure. She comes in, and as I beckon her to sit I notice she has a slight limp. She pulls up her knee slightly to assume a comfortable sitting position, and then gives me a glance. She then quickly lowers her eyes. This is certainly a change from her previous visit.

‘I’m sorry that I was so sharp the other day. I really get so tired of the inane questions people ask of me. Anyone whose offences have anything to do with sexual activity seems to arouse not just curiosity but a prying inquisitiveness that borders on disdain and contempt. It is as if they want to hear what they want to hear. There is such a burdensome background to everything — how can one explain to those who are not likely to understand.’

‘And you thought I was yet another one of those. No reason for you to think otherwise’, I say.

‘No, now I do have reason to think otherwise — that is why I have come. Otherwise, I would have stayed away. I have heard people in the prison talk about you all and they seemed happy, so I wanted to unload my burdens too.’

I smile and think that she almost did too. ‘So, are we going to have a free and frank chat then? Or am I still a suspect?’

‘I really haven’t had a free and frank chat in years, so I don’t even know if I know what that means anymore. But I still need to know why you are interested’, she insists.

‘You know even I don’t really know why I am interested. But I am, that I do know. And I am passionately interested, that too I know. Is it because I am a woman? May be. Is it because I have a daughter not much older than you, I think and I wonder. May be. And it may also be that after I talk to you, I can even tell you why I am so interested in you, your life, and your reasons. Right now I can’t really answer your question with honesty because I am at a loss, just as you are when I ask you questions that you may find awkward.’

‘What do you want to know then? And how much time have you got to listen to my pathetic story?’

‘What I want to know is more about you, and I have all the time to listen. I must warn you also that it is possible that lurking inside me are all those innate prejudices and the built-in biases that come with my ‘baggage’: I can tell myself that I have got rid of them, but they may sneak in from time to time. So, let’s just say we need to be patient with each other and you need to see me with the same openness that I wish to see you with. Right?’ I look at her, quizzing her with an expression of assurance that may or may not register.

‘You wanted to know my age? I am twenty-two.’

‘Holy Moses’, I whisper to myself.

‘Jee? Kya kaha aapne? [What did you say?] Are you horrified or what?’

I have obviously interjected inappropriately. She is too young and I am horrified. But I needn’t have been so quick to express the horror. Just what I had promised I would not do. But it did hit me.

‘No’, I say sheepishly. ‘Not horrified. Just a little saddened. You are younger than my children and I assume that all mothers wish the best for their children.’

‘Nonsense! That is not so at all. I only wish people didn’t take all these things for granted. How do you assume that every mother is looking at things that way? Well, here’s the horror part if you wanted to be horrified. My mother sent me into this work, if work is what one calls it. Is that horrifying enough for you? So, you see — so much for you people’s assumptions.’

I sit silent with my head bowed for several moments. She can see I am perturbed. I am disturbed, and yes, I am now truly horrified. I can feel her silent stare and she clearly knows my thoughts. As I lift my head I see tears in her eyes. There is no need for me to say anything, this is the moment signifying a feeling on both sides that I had to be excused for my ignorance even if I needed to be humbled for that brief minute. I was humbled and felt from that point on that we were equal, for I was not in any way superior in my understanding or so-called knowledge of the world. I had made some fundamentally erroneous assumptions and I was truly and rightly put in my place — me and my middle-class morality.

‘I can’t pass judgement on your mother. But I am interested to know how such a thing came to pass. I must know — I must know what passes through a mother’s mind when she feels she has to suggest to her daughter that her body can be a source of living not by working it for what is conventionally called “work” but for sexual work. There has to be a reason that is very compelling even if repelling.’

‘I don’t know all these intricacies: If you say “work” is legitimate then this is treated by some as “work”. You people refer to us as “sex-workers”. So, what is all this about conventional work? You need to earn and you find the quickest way — so long as it is not thieving or robbing from other people does it matter? All I know is that when a family desperately needs money, they set about ensuring that all those in the family who are able-bodied somehow, anyhow, work and get that money. In our case this had to be done on the basis of urgency.’ She is getting a bit agitated about the fact that she is having once again to justify to someone why she does what she does: addressing again that semi-moral plane. This is work, that is not. This is good work, that is not. Why does she have to do this? While I can feel her frustration and know what is passing through her mind, she is distressed and uneasy.

I apologise. ‘I didn’t intend to take you on this “explain yourself” path. Yes, it is about earning, but you can’t blame me if questions arise in my mind and I just wonder if they arrived in someone else’s mind as well, someone like your mother or you for that matter. That is all. No, I am not judging. I am baffled beyond my own belief. What prompts a mother of a twenty-year-old to send her daughter down this path of earning money? What? Am I so wide off the mark to ask the question?’

I am obviously sounding concerned and perplexed to the point of being angry, an emotion I am trying hard to suppress. But she detects it before I am able to conceal my querying eyebrows and my puckered lips, and before I remove the hand that has touched my forehead in dismay. How shall I tell her how desperate I feel that I am unable to turn the clock back and wipe out all that had happened, or offer some alternatives that would remove the ‘label’ that she must carry for all her life — and label it is. Those in jail for violating the PITA (Prevention of Immoral Trafficking Act) regulation find the proverbial finger pointing viciously at them. The moral condemnation and social ostracism that destroyed these ‘criminals’ (or ‘victims’) follows them in here as well.

I need a rest from this conversation: I have (erroneously for a counsellor who proclaims a certain neutrality from partisanship and emotion) started getting entangled in the sensitivities and subjectivities that inevitably accompany my own ideas of motherhood and womanhood: I am looking at this girl as if … clearly I am going along another route!

I take a break and offer her water and have some myself. I ask her if she would like to carry on, or would she like to come back later, may be even tomorrow. This is a risk I am taking but there is a moment, a juncture, at which such a dialogue must stop and be resumed later.

She smiles. ‘I may not be here tomorrow. After all we do get bailed out you know. So, I can take a break if you wish: but then there are even chances that we [and there are more here for the same ‘offence’] will get bail in a day or so and whereas I am not usually glad to talk to people, I have learnt about you from others here and I do believe you want to know and you are not about to condemn us for life.’

She is right. I have more to lose than she if I don’t take this opportunity. I need to keep the exchange going. There are many girls in the jail for the same offences. But disregarding her earlier attempts at being cocky, this girl actually believes our conversation might be of use. Others were cocky and rudely dismissive; assured of being out in a few days they were less interested in interacting politely with anyone.

‘Yes. You are right. You could be out on bail tomorrow and far be it from me to grudge you that. And I will always regret the fact that I would not have learnt from you why this happens and how you and your mother feel about it. I wish I could meet your mother — but perhaps it is best I don’t for I may betray the same accusatory tone that I might have adopted with you had we not had the candid exchange at the beginning of our conversation. In fact, I may have been more accusatory towards her for I am a mother and would have difficulty concealing my maternal indignation if I faced her. So, let it be between you and me then.’

‘So, tell me about you. How many brothers and sisters are you? Where is your father? What does he do for a living? How educated are you? What kind of life did you have? Were you a happy child? Was there unpleasantness in your home?’ I had to stop even though I could have lined up another half a dozen questions for her: I didn’t want to inundate her with so many queries about her past unless and until I had had a glimpse of that past.

It’s always difficult to find a delicate way of getting into someone’s life, someone’s past. I couldn’t stop reminding myself that this was an intrusion at the best of times, and in cases like this when there is such a baggage of mistrust and prejudice on both sides, one always seems to need greater doses of delicacy and acceptability than I was managing to muster up. The need to measure the words and the silences was clear enough and yet one wished for a certain amount of freedom in the exchanges but treading cautiously was probably a wiser choice and that is what I needed to do.

‘If you don’t want to answer something, tell me and I won’t press you: it is your personal life and you have a right to keep it personal.’ I am hoping I will elicit something extra if I start with the reassurances. There is no telling, but I somehow feel she will say something; how true all of it is will be for me to evaluate.

‘My father left us for another woman when I was about eight; my brother and sister were five and three. He was a mechanic and worked at a garage and earned enough to feed us. For a couple of years I went to a local primary school. I loved school and made friends and thought I would be able to work in some half-decent place after a few years in school. Then all the problems started. There was a teashop across the road from the garage where my father worked where people in the locality had tea. It was “run” by a couple, and the routine was that twice a day the wife would cross the road and serve the tea to the garage employees. She often just sat down while they drank tea and chit chatted with them.’

‘Over time, I believe, my father became attracted towards her and she too responded by hanging around longer in each tea session. It is not difficult to surmise what followed. I was too young to know what triggered off the unpleasantness at home and what shape and form it took. These details of the whole story were only told to me by my mother a couple of years ago.’

There is a long pause and I am not about to interrupt it. She is fiddling with her dupatta, then with her braid, and then looks up and says somewhat impatiently and desperately, ‘Why should I be remembering all these things when so much has happened to me since then?’

I don’t want to rush in, so I stay quiet for a moment. The silence continues. Do I break it or should I wait till she might? She answers that for me by saying, ‘I suppose I have to face these realities from time to time, otherwise I will become a cog in the machine and won’t even rethink what I am doing.’

That is what I want to hear — the part about the rethink. This is the feature that, for me, is so crucial and I wonder how we came to it so soon. But there is a pause again.

And then she speaks, very softly, ‘My mother worked in the house and was a hard-working woman. She slogged each day to make sure that we were all well-fed and clothed and had dreams that all of us would go to school. I went to school for two years or may be three, and I remember her making my braids and sending me off with a black slate and chalk pieces and some notebooks. My siblings stayed at home and she went about he...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents
• List of Plates
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 Saloni’s Choice
• 2 Rukhsana Doesn’t Belong Here!
• 3 The Maiming of Mumta: ‘Put Out Your Cigarette on Her Breasts Guys!’
• 4 Bina’s Fourteen Years of Jailvaas
• 5 Hasina, the Husband Slayer
• 6 ‘Vimla to Pagal Hai!’ [Vimla is a Lunatic!]
• 7 Shobhavati: Married at Ten, Thirteen Children, Three Survived
• 8 Urvashi: ‘In a Woman’s Body’
• 9 Lakshmi: ‘Long Live the Revolution!’
• 10 Raziya: ‘I am Staff and Imprisoned!’
• Conclusions and New Beginnings
• Bibliography
• About the Author
• Index