by Javed Jamil
many a man has not properly behaved with women, it is also true that many a woman have also caused unbearable mental anguish and torture to their husbands. History is witness how the women of the palaces have played extremely significant roles -- openly or behind the scenes, in administration and have time and again been entangled in conspiracies to overthrow one king in order to install the other. Throughout the human history, woman has been loved, sung and eulogised by men who would risk their relations, their precious possessions and even their physical safety to win her over. It will also not be true to say that man loved woman only for the sake of his sexual desires. There have been innumerable men whose love for their wives did not diminish even after their deaths and who spent their wealth in their memory, the Taj Mahal being the most beautiful and outstanding symbol of on extraordinary emotional love of a husband for his dear wife. And the instances are not rare when a woman extorted somebody's fascination or love for her own selfish ends.
The feminists had their eyes fixed only on the atrocities committed on women by men. They miserably failed, or to be honest, deliberately refused to look on the other side. If they had done so with the earnestness of purpose, the consequences could not have been as horrendously damaging to mankind as they have been. They could then have closely watched the developments, and could perhaps have forestalled the march of time from going the wrong way. They might then have saved womankind from becoming the most obedient slaves of man's desires which it has lately become. They could still have campaigned for the improvement of women in appropriate fields. The woman's lib might then not have become a mere tool of exploitation in the hands of foxy and covetous merchants. She might then have walked ahead triumphantly, albeit with grace and without annoying the tranquillity of family and society, to her desired status in the world. But alas, this was not to be. The so-called feminism, in perspective, turned out to be either sham and contrived or ill-informed and ill-conceived. It did not deliver any good and in addition burdened woman's shoulders much beyond her physical and mental capacity.
As I have pointed out earlier, this feminism was only an escapade for the economic fundamentalists who were busy masterminding a long-term strategy to convert woman into a consumer item. But, before striving in that direction, it was imperative that women must relinquish forever their reluctance to mix with men. This vision of "freedom" was too fantastic for women to resist. They had little idea as to what actually was behind the sudden urgency for bestowing on them their long-desired "rights". The participation of women began to increase in common gatherings; the parties, proportionately, grew in colour and in frequency. Men and women would assemble either in a banquet hall of a hotel or in a private rendezvous in their most persuasive dresses. They would then sing and dance together to haunting, often provocative melodies. The excitement in those parties would entrap both men and women, and their over-increasing proximities would enthral their spirits.
The closeting of men and women was the key to major developments in future merchandise. This required therefore to be importuned at all the possible levels of human life. The schools attracted the urgent attention of the think-tank of big business, and co-education soon made its appearance as the symbol of highest quality for the schools till the primary or secondary level. There was absolutely no problem for the parents to get their sons and daughters admitted in these schools. But they were a bit unwilling to send their children, particularly daughters, to higher secondary and degree colleges because by that time the children had started entering adolescent periods of their lives. They feared that the exuberance of early puberty could mislead them and land them in jeopardy. Their discomfort would however vanish at the thought of the academic prospects of their children, which they were made to believe emanated from these co-ed institutions.
There was no serious impediment in the burgeoning of co-education schools in the Occidental part of the world. But in Oriental countries, particularly where Islam was a dominant force, these attempts were met with stiff resistance. During the life-time of Prophet Muhammad and in the early part of the Post-Muhammad era, the dress code applicable to men and women did mean neither a specific type of dress like burqua for women nor total segregation. Women with their heads covered and their bodies adorning simple, non-provocative, decent garments and their bosoms further protected by chadars used to offer congregational prayers in mosques along with men. Their participation had been remarkable in almost all the battles Muslims had to engage in. While some women took arms and fought valiantly at the battle front, most of them worked behind the ranks nursing the injured with religious fervour and passion. The advent of Muhammed brought education at the top of the agenda of the activities of his followers. Women did not lag behind. They used to furnish themselves with knowledge along with men in the classes conducted by Ali, the most acknowledged expert of the religious sciences. Women used to present their points of views and cases in the assemblies of Caliphs Abu Bakr and Umar. But all these assemblies stuck to certain regulations to prevent any mischief. In the mosques, women's row would be behind those of men and children. They would be the first to leave mosques and when all of them had left men would come out. In the classes, women would sit on one side and men on the other. With the passage of time however, the provisions of purdah took the form of a specific robe, bruqua for women going out of their houses. Their participation in congregational prayers was forbidden by the latter clerics and segregation became too impervious to allow any scope for their participation in educational and other pursuits that could require going out of their houses.
Islam had wonderful counterpoise in its social system. It had no scope for dominance of either men or women. It gave women extraordinary rights and at the same time took extremely effective steps to safeguard them from all types of physical threats and exploitation. It bestowed on them economic rights comprising the right to inherit (in proportion to their economic obligations), share in the properties of their fathers, mothers, husbands, sons and daughters, made a provision of dower for them (in consideration of their marriage), which was obligatory on their husbands and had to be given before the consummation of marriage, and the right to own properties. It awarded them, like their male counterparts, the right to earn but did not make it obligatory for them, thus giving them not only the right to earn but also the right not to earn; in that case, the husbands were duty-bound to maintain them in a way befitting their status. Besides the economic rights, Islam also excelled in giving them equal rights in social life, such as the absolute right to choose their spouse, the right to seek from their husbands or sue them for divorce, the right to receive maintenance from husbands till their divorce was formalised, and maintenance for their children till they were looked after by her, the right to remarry after divorce, and after her husband's death, the right to have or not to have children in consultation with their husbands and the right to look after their children, in case they are divorced, till a certain point of time. Islam not only endowed women with the right to learn, equal rights in religion, education and prayers were made obligatory on them just in the same way as they were on men. Of still greater social significance is the fact that Islam imposed such restrictions on men (and women) as would ensure physical and mental security of women. These include total ban on alcohol, gambling and adultery. Purdah was not obligatory, as is commonly understood, on women alone; men also could not reveal most parts of their bodies and would preferably cover their heads.
Unfortunately however, several of these rights were compromised with in successive Muslim societies. This provided the economic fundamentalists an opportunity to malign Islam as anti-women. Their obvious aim was to incite women against their religion. The game-plan met with partial successes, especially in those countries, which either had either a foreign rule or rulers influenced by the West or Westernism. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, many governments in Muslim countries including Iran, Tunisia, Egypt and Lebanon strove to impose western values on their people. The purd
ah was forcibly abolished and the women of these countries willingly or unwillingly started participating in the same form of activities as the western women were engaged in. At one time, night clubs flourished in Tehran, Cairo and Beirut.
But the roots of faith were too strong in Muslims to allow it to continue for long. Within half a century, men and women in these countries developed aversion for the new values in increasing numbers. The on-going nakedness stopped and women again started wrapping themselves in the garb of purity; they continued to engage in the educational and other social pursuits in a way as would not make them vulnerable to exploitative practices.
As mentioned in the previous pages, the feminists throughout the world had been raising a hue and cry over the alleged atrocities on women by men. This was aimed at convincing women that they were their sympathisers and then they instigated them to open rebellion against the "male chauvinists" of their families and societies. Poor women, eager to earn absolute independence, fell