Its about time we shed these prudish pre-conditioned layers and talk and deal with

sexual explicitness in our books and films with a certain degree of refinement and
maturity, Sreemoyee Piu Kundu, author of the novel Sitas Curse was quoted in a
recent article in Hindustan Times which proclaimed that sex had finally come out of
closet in India, and writers were celebrating this newly-found freedom to write on the
tabooed subject of female sexuality. This article gave voice to women writers who
could now openly explore the theme of female sexuality and steer away from the
stereotypical projection of women as meek and submissive in bed, because the
society has finally accepted women as subjects of desire and not just objects of
desire.

ISMAT Chughtai (1915-1991), one of Urdus most accomplished fiction writers,

epitomised the 20th-century women writers of Urdu: enlightened, bold, iconoclastic,
progressive and feminist.

A woman who used her pen as a powerful weapon to interrogate the oppression of
women and the patriarchal set-up of Indian society at a time (1930s) when such
themes on which she was writing were pushed under the carpet thereby, causing
danger to the social structure of a repressive society. She surely posed a threat to the
traditional established structure of society which expected women to sit silently,
performing their stereotypical roles without questioning any precincts of the
established social paradigm. A potential voice for the silenced and oppressed voices,
she boldly exposed the double standards of society. In words of M. Asaduddin: As
the subcontinents foremost feminist writer she was instinctively aware of the
gendered double standard in the largely feudal and patriarchal structure of society
she lived in and did everything to expose and subvert it (IX).

Chughtai penned her early pieces in the late 1930s but was not much known in the
literary circles until 1942, the year Lihaaf was published. Urdu literature of that era
showed a marked tendency towards Marxism and Realism. The idea of feminism in
its true sense and spirit had not quite arrived in the subcontinent in the 1940s, but
much of what she wrote, with a touch of progressivism, was about the social,
psychological and sexual problems faced by women. Traditional feminine sensibility
of the 18th and 19th centuries demanded women to be virtuous, modest and
obedient. Chughtai stressed that real feminine emotions and sensitivities are hardly
ever understood in an orthodox, male-dominated society such as Indias. Never
before in the history of Urdu fiction were such thoughts expressed so articulately and
vividly as did Chughtai in her writings.

In 1942 she emerged on the literary scene with a bang as her short story Lihaaf
appeared in Adab-i-Latif, a literary magazine published from Lahore. Its central
theme was female homosexuality. Themes related to sensuality have never been a
rarity in Urdu literature, especially in classical poetry, and a few Urdu masnavis
(longish poems, often narrating a romance) are known for being too explicit. Male
homosexuality had not been a taboo subject in Urdu poetry but somehow female
homosexuality was not approved of, except for rekhti, a genre of classical Urdu
poetry that depicted female homosexuality, mostly in implicit and symbolic terms. In
the subcontinents conservative society these covert and occasionally overt
expressions of sensuality were thought to be offensive but were quietly smiled upon.
Gay stories and male homosexuality as a homosexuality existed and wasnt shown
any reprobation to.

Many of Chughtais short stories revolve around the odds faced by women.
Oppressed women fighting it out on their own fascinated Chughtai. In most of her
short stories she points a finger at society for unjust treatment of women. Though
she did write about the problems of women from underprivileged classes too, it was
women from middle-class families she was truly interested in portraying. Describing
UPs middle or lower middle-class Muslim women and homes in a parlance peculiar
to the milieu was her forte. Here, Chughtai excelled, since it was the environment she
was brought up in and had personal experience of.

But Chughtais exposure to trade unionism and political activism, unlike Rashid
Jahan, a progressive female writer and a contemporary of Chughtais, was rather
limited. She could possibly not have been as well-versed in Marxist philosophy
either, as some of her contemporary progressives were. This is one of the reasons
why she, at times, sounds shallow when she tries her hand at depicting economic
issues at length. Considering her leftist leanings and close association with the
Progressive Writers Association, her short stories, based purely on class conflict and
Marxist themes, are not as many as one would have expected.

Chughtais flowing and spontaneous style, occasionally peppered with satirical or

witty remarks, makes reading a delight. Writing idiomatic and colloquial Urdu in a
seemingly effortless manner is something she is known for. Her mastery over
presenting womens parlance or expressions peculiar to native speakers of Urdu,
especially women from UP, is a domain in which Chughtai is unrivalled by any male
or female fiction writer. In this regard, only Qurratulain Hyder is a close second, but
that too only occasionally.

Her life had a lot of influence from her brother, Azeem Beg Chughtai, Rashid Jahan,
Saadat Hasan Manto and quite a few Western thinkers like Sigmund Freud, GB Shaw
Dostoyevsky, Somerset Maugham, Chekhov, O Henry and Prem Chand and DH
Lawrence. She drew a lot of ideas from them and their works which reflects in her
Urdu works.

But controversy chased the writer even after her death: she was cremated, which,
according to some relatives of hers, was her will. But some contradicted this and it
remains a mystery what her real will was. Chughtai is relevant even today. No study
of the Urdu short story, feminism in Urdu literature or Progressive philosophy in
Urdu literature can truly be called complete unless her works are taken into account.

For Chughtai to have written this play in the 1940s was an amazing act of defiance
against hypocritical social mores. Writing about sex was shocking enough, but
exposing the sexual perversions that lay beneath the so-called respectability of the
nobility, was truly an act of courage. Young boys being lured under the garb of
philanthropy, the masseuseplaying sexual politics by taking advantage of the
begums repressed desires, the begum, herself, trying to exploit a helpless Ismat
the grand haveli, which once fascinated Ismat, soon reveals itself to be suffused with
evil.
Witnessing Begum Jan's husband indulge himself in the company of "young, fair and
slim-waisted boys" and subsequently catching Begum Jan herself engaging in
intercourse with her servant Rabbo under the eponymous and symbolic lihaaf.

At the time of Lihaaf's publication in 1942, homosexuality in itself was a highly

tabooed subject and punishable offence despite its prevalence in Indian mythology.
Chughtai herself claimed that she did not know about lesbianism while writing the
story:

"When I wrote Lihaaf, this thing [lesbianism] was not discussed openly. We girls
used to talk about it and we knew there was something like it, but we didn't know the
whole truth"The fact that Chughtai herself was not adequately aware of lesbianism
as a concept or movement underscores the genuine ignorance of the narrator
in Lihaaf.

The titular quilt or lihaaf acts as a symbol used to connote a spectrum of messages.
The broadest symbolism objectified in the quilt is that of a Pandora's Box that leaves
deep scars on the narrator upon its unveiling but somehow captures the hope of the
narrator's eventual healing. From a strictly Pavlovian perspective, the narrator is
conditioned by the aversive stimulus (witnessing the "unspeakable" act) in such a
manner that the quilt continues to elicit the narrator's regression to the "dark
crevasses of the past". The quilt also acts a symbol of the discreetness that
surrounded the activity and how it was to be kept "under the wraps" and away from
the prying eyes of judgment.

Other than exploring the taboo homo-erotica in her story, Chughtai also implicitly
examines the violation of a conventional master-servant relation that serves to defy a
system fuelled by feudal caste and class divisions. Even the constant reference to the
couple as "Nawab Sahib" (prince) and Begum Jan (princess) emphasises the
aristocratic position of the family in terms of social hierarchy. Despite the riches and
the status, Begum Jan seems to be leading a miserable and listless existence. In a
beautiful oxymoron, it is the arrival of the bonded servant that liberates Begum Jan,
from her constant state of "melancholy and despair".

Lihaaf portrays a Muslim princely household, the rules of which are dictated by
conservatism and the need for discretion. A direct consequence is the acceptance of
the purdad or veil as a way of life behind which women live, post puberty. In a
cultural context, a purdah is a veil meant to hide or protect the sanctity and purity of
a woman. However, the purdah and by extension Chughtai's lihaaf bleakly conceals
an unspeakable and "shameful" act.

Feminist literature seeks to dissect and explore power structures and patriarchies,
social practices and institutions, all of which have collectively entrenched inequality
between men and women. In the context of Partition-era India, feminist literature
focuses on the prevalent notion of violence and assaults on women as a means to
seize and defile their family's honour. The female body was thus a mere tool or
object, violation of which was used to make a larger statement of community
dominance. Thus, the literature of this era encompassed misogyny in its essence.
This bubble of confinement encompasses all members of the family, denoting an
institution of oppression even within the household. However, the Nawab (a man)
freely violates this the discreetness of the purdah by engaging in homosexual
debauchery of his own. Consequently, the frustrated Begum Jaan begins to explore
her own ways of defiance while remaining behind parda or inside the
aforementioned bubble.

She further shatters notions of class inequality by engaging in physical relations with
Rabbo, who stands at a much lower rung of the hierarchical socio-economic ladder.
Thus, both parties indulge in disobedience of protocol within the confines of their
own home lest they sabotage the family's reputation. Thus, in the case of Lihaaf, the
obscenity lies in the transgressions from heterosexuality, fidelity and respect for
social order rather than the sexual nature of the act.

Whether India is going through a sexual revolution and women writers now have the
freedom to explore womens sexuality, without shying away from writing about
closed bedroom romps and intimate love-making scenes is still a contested subject.
But what cannot be contested is that Chughtais bold stride of discussing female
sexuality in her work, enabled people to see that it is possible for women to explore
and to write bold stories and paved the way for a succeeding generation of women
writers.