On Wednesday, February 7, the Rajya Sabha witnessed Prime Minister Narendra Modi making remarks against Congress MP Renuka Chowdhury, who had burst into laughter as Modi claimed the concept of Aadhar being mooted in 1998.
It was not only PM Modi who took a jibe at Chowdhury. Vice President Venkaiah Naidu had intervened and admonished her for laughing, termed her behaviour as “loose, dark and unruly”, and suggested that she “go to a doctor please.” Then Modi, in a matter of pointed rebuke, said that the Vice President must not say anything to Chowdhury, and compared her laughter to the kind heard in the Ramayana serial: “Ramayana serial ke baad aisi hansi sunne ka saubhagya aaj jaake mila hai (After Ramayana serial, we’ve now had the privilege of listening to this kind of laughter).”
Post the utter pandemonium, Union Minister of State for Home Affairs, Kiran Rijiju posted a series of tweets, joining the fray and playing the loyal servant to his boss. He implied that the Prime Minister was capable of keeping his cool and tried to pass off his statement as a jovial comment. However, the opposition claims that it shows inherent misogyny in the garb of wit and sarcasm.
Before this, Modi faced severe criticism in 2012 for making a sexist jibe against Sunanda Pushkar, the (now deceased) wife of the former Union Minister Shashi Tharoor in an attempt to attack him, “Wah kya girlfriend hai. Apne kabhi dekha hai 50 crore ki girlfriend? (Wow, what a girlfriend. Have you ever seen a 50-crore girlfriend).” Modi received scathing responses from Tharoor and social media users, who called his remarks deplorable.
In June 2015, Narendra Modi caused outrage, triggering an avalanche of criticism when he praised Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s resolve against terrorism “despite being a woman.” As a result of his sexist compliment, he was branded a bigot and a chauvinist.#DespiteBeingAWomen became a top trending hashtag.
It is no secret that the Indian society is notorious for sexism, misogyny and patriarchy, and Indian politicians especially are no angels in this matter. From Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti to Yogi Adityanath and Sakshi Maharaj, India’s sexist politicians have left no stone unturned, spewing venomous speeches and offensive statements at women.
The word “prostitute” (its Hindi variation randi, raand, and its Sanskrit origin – “vaishya”), was repeatedly used by the (now sacked) BJP’s UP Vice President Dayashankar Singh to describe Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati. “Even a prostitute fulfils her commitment to a man after she is paid. But Mayawati, such a big leader in UP, sells party tickets to anyone who pays her the highest amount. If someone gives her ₹1 crore for a ticket, she will give it to the other person who is offering ₹2 crore”.
In 2012, fresh controversy was sparked over protests against the gang-rape of medical student Jyoti Singh in Delhi. Former president Pranab Mukherjee’s son Abhijit Mukherjee termed the anti-rape agitation as nautanki (drama). He also made sexist remarks at women protestors, characterising them as “dented and painted women”. To add to this, several politicians sought to blame the rise in the number of rapes on western influences such as short skirts, tight jeans, low cut blouses, concluding that women bring rape upon themselves.
Coming back to Vice President Naidu’s indignation, his disparaging words come with a tone of moral chastisement which also deserves scrutiny. He went on to further insinuate that Ms Chowdhury was suffering from mental health issues. Are we to treat laughter as a medical illness that needs clinical treatment? Or are women seen as a risk or a disease for expressing and marking their positions, which they are entitled to in a male-dominated space, that Naidu wants to treat? Or is it a sign of the fragile male ego?
Diagnosing people, in this case, a woman with the term ‘mental’ has a long, complicated and dark history. It’s the history of authoritative men pitting a woman against her own mysterious, unruly body, a body that disqualified her from positions of power and a general sense of autonomy. When we begin to understand this, we then start to understand that calling her ‘mental’ or labelling her with a mental illness is particularly dangerous.
In 2014 an unprecedented low was witnessed when Congress MP Lagadapati Rajagopal used a can of pepper spray to protest against the introduction of the Telangana Bill, which resulted in the hospitalisation of three MPs. Kerala lawmakers from the Left Democratic Front party went on a rampage destroying speaker’s chair, loudspeakers, computers and lights. Talk about hypocrisy.
Men in parliament and assemblies have used pepper sprays, watched porn, taken videos- all unparliamentary and you are trying to tell me a cackle is inappropriate. I cackle at your logic! #RenukaChoudhary
— sunetra choudhury (@sunetrac) February 8, 2018
Have men in the parliament ever been asked to go see a doctor for their unruly and delinquent behaviour? Is a woman’s full-throated laughter enough to trigger these supposedly liberal male intellectuals into making misogynist and chauvinist remarks? Was the disruptive, effortlessly, rebellious laughter by “Renuka ji” enough to deflate and destroy the insecure male ego?
Modi supporters have passed the inherently sexist statement off as everyday jovial banter, but the reality is that it represents misogynist behaviour, reinforcing patriarchy at its worst. In today’s time, we need laughter more than ever. Especially to use as an antidote to retort to the painstakingly constructed rhetoric of saffronised lies that are being preached pompously by our Indian politicians.