Chador aur Chardevari: The Veil and Women’s Agency in Pakistan by Mahnoor Ali Syed

Abstract

There has been growing scholarly attention towards the emphasis on the veil in different forms amongst Muslim women around the world. This paper focuses on veil and its implications for Muslim women in Pakistan. One of the major themes of the paper is to discuss whether or not most Pakistani Muslim women wear the veil, or similar ornaments used for covering, out of choice. In discussing choice, the paper also considers the social contexts and settings under which Pakistani Muslim women often make that choice. Lila Abu-Lughod’s work around how Muslim women around the world make the active choice of wearing the veil is used as a fundamental theoretical framework for the paper to consider possibilities and cases where Muslim women make the active choice to wear the veil. However, using scholarly work including research papers and narratives in literature, the implications of the veil when contextualized in a larger patriarchal society with women’s modesty often used as tools of social control, it is contested that veiling has remained an active choice. Thus, it is also argued that when veiling is a result of social pressures and has implications of concealing, it can be limiting for Pakistani Muslim women’s agency.

Résumé

RésLes universitaires s’intéressent de plus en plus à l’importance accordée au voile sous différentes formes par les femmes musulmanes du monde entier. Cet ouvrage se focalise sur le port du voile et ses implications pour les femmes musulmanes au Pakistan. L’un des principaux thèmes de l’ouvrage est de déterminer si oui ou non la plupart des femmes musulmanes pakistanaises font le choix de porter le voile ou d’autres ornements semblables conçus pour se couvrir. En discutant du choix, l’ouvrage examine également les divers contextes sociaux et les cadres dans lesquels les femmes musulmanes pakistanaises font souvent ce choix. Les travaux de Lila Abu- Lughod sur la manière dont les femmes musulmanes du monde entier choisissent activement de porter le voile servent de cadre théorique fondamental pour l’étude des possibilités et des cas où les femmes musulmanes choisissent activement de porter le voile. Toutefois, en utilisant des travaux universitaires, y compris des documents de recherche et des récits littéraires, les implications du voile lorsqu’il est contextualisé dans une société patriarcale plus vaste où la modestie des femmes est souvent utilisée comme outil de contrôle social, il est contesté que le port du voile est resté un choix actif. Ainsi, il est également soutenu que lorsque le voile est le résultat de pressions sociales et comporte des implications de dissimulation, il peut être contraignant pour l’emprise des femmes musulmanes pakistanaises.

Introduction

“Chador aur Chardevari” (veil and four-walled covering) was a slogan used by Zia-ul-Haq during his military regime in Pakistan in the 1970s and 1980s. The slogan translates to “women veiled and within the confines of home,” with chador meaning veil and chardevari meaning the four walls of home, literally. During his military regime, Zia-ul-Haq imposed policies of “Islamization” which had perpetuating effects on the legal and socio-political systems. In the discourse of dissecting these effects, there has been particular focus on women’s conditions under the regime. Many policies under Islamization and the Hudood Ordinance focused on ensuring that women’s participation in society was limited to the Islamic framework and its constraints. This paper will discuss the connotations and implications that policies focused on policing women’s public and private lives have on women’s agency. Advocating for women’s rights and agency within the constraints of such an Islamic framework has remained a paradox for Pakistani feminists and significant work has been contributed to this discourse. Thus, this paper will incorporate work on this topic to explore and answer the following research question: how plausible is it for women’s movements in Pakistan to advocate for women’s agency within Islamic constraints? With the use of relevant arguments in literature, this essay will explore the limitations around discourse about advocacy of women’s rights and agency within the constraints of the Islamic framework and the legacy of Islamization under Zia-ul-Haq. This paper will argue that feminist movements that operate within the constraints of Islamic framework and Chador and Chardevari would face fundamental limitations in addressing structural issues that surround women’s agency in Pakistan.

The Veil and Implications in Pakistan

In light of Lila Abu-Lughod’s work, in “Do Muslim Women Need Saving?” surrounding cultural relativism and the understanding of the different meanings attached to the veil by different women around the world , this paper will discuss literature to dissect the various meanings Pakistani women attach to veil.1 Abu-Lughod argues that the practise and symbolism around the veil are multi-nuanced as they are products and expressions of different histories, circumstances and manifestations of diverse structured desires.2 This section will discuss the connotations and implications of the veil in Pakistan and a/the women’s reasons for wearing it. In doing so, the veil will be discussed both as a practise and a concept (chador aur chardevari), often used in political slogans, perpetuating values around women’s modesty and conduct.

The manifestation of the veil embodies different forms in Pakistan, and some of these are the following: hijaab (a headscarf), niqaab (covering of the face), burqah (loose clothing that covers the entire body), chaadar (a shawl used to cover the chest) and dupatta (a shorter version of the chaadar). Hanna Papaneck (1982) worked in Pakistan and did research on the veil; she described the Burqah as “portable seclusion.”3 According to Papaneck, many women found the Burqah liberating because it made it possible for them to have interactions, work and step outside the confines of their households (chaardevari).4 The men in Pakistani households held power over decision making and were largely considered guardians of women and their modesty. As the veil was seen to ensure women’s modesty in public and especially when interacting with unrelated men, it became an important ornament for women to step outside segregated living spaces while still maintaining moral requirements of appearance and conduct in public. In extension of Papaneck’s idea of “portable seclusion,” Abu-Lughod thinks of the Burqah as “mobile homes.” Even when the women move, they embody the values of their communities and households.5

According to Anjum Alvi, one of the core values associated with women’s conduct, interaction with unrelated men, appearance in public and confinement to the privacy of households is sharam. In the literal sense, sharam translates to shyness or shame; in the Pakistani context, however, the concept of sharam encapsulates many values including modesty, morality, piety, the maintenance of honor and the control of female sexuality.6 Similarly, Carroll Pasiner notes that sharam refers to concepts of correct conduct, and in particular, the sexual conduct of women. The women’s sharam reflected upon the status of male family members.7 Based on the findings from research in an oasis named Panjgur in Balochistan, Carroll argues that it was considered male relatives’ responsibility to control women’s sharam to maintain the family’s honour.8 Thus, it can be argued that sharam is a rather gendered concept skewed towards women bearing the burden of maintaining their male family members’ honor and the men ensuring that the women remain modest. The stress on physical modesty of women and the covering of specific body parts also reflects the sexual connotation of such values.

Anthropological reflections on cultural relativism and Its Others. American Anthropologist, 104(3), 785. 6Alvi, A. (2013). Concealment and revealment. Current Anthropology, 54(2), 178. 7Pastner, C. M. (1972). A social structural and historical analysis of honor, shame and Purdah. Anthropological Quarterly, 45(4), 250. 8Pastner, C. M. (1972). A social structural and historical analysis of honor, shame and Purdah. Anthropological Quarterly, 45(4), 251. 9Alvi, A. (2013). Concealment and revealment. Current Anthropology, 54(2), 181. Anjum Alvi discusses the manifestation of such a value system in “Concealment and Revealment.” Through her fieldwork in a village in Punjab named Malot, Alvi found that men wanted women related to them to stay confined within households--the chaardevari. The village men met each other outside in deras (meeting spots) because the households were considered to be women’s spaces.9 Such norms had the implication and connotation of keeping women’s contact with unrelated men limited because this was considered part of safeguarding their sharam. Alvi notes that the women covered their sharam with the dupatta; they were conscious of wearing the dupatta correctly in front of close male relatives as well.10 Such norms demonstrate how women’s interaction with men, even close relatives, was controlled. This nature of interpersonal relations and control over interactions has the effect of limiting women’s agency to access opportunities outside their households. Moreover, Alvi also found that Punjabi men gave their daughters chaadars (shawls) as gifts upon marriage as a symbol of safeguarding their modesty.11 Such norms and rituals indicate that men make consistent efforts to ensure that women continue to live up to the values of modesty; it is safe to claim that women are seen as carriers of the men’s honor and reputation. In a culture of men actively trying to maintain honor and control female sexuality, women’s agency over their own lives remains limited. This concept has been summarised precisely by Papaneck in the following words: “Women’s proper behaviour, as sheltered persons, becomes an important measure of the status of their protectors.” (Papaneck 1971: 519).12 Alvi further notes that families of particularly high or law status often choose to form marriage bonds in exchange for women to ensure the safeguarding of the women’s sharam. 13 This means that women have to conform to the same frameworks of morality and modesty after they are married, and in fact, the institution of marriage plays a role in ensuring this conformity. With the moral responsibility to, then, maintain their husband and in laws’ honor, the woman’s agency over her life physiologically remains arguably limited.

As discussed, authors have written on how the concept of Purdah (veil) does not remain limited to what women wear but extends to other manifestations like segregated living arrangements and limited interaction with men. This concept is presented in Ismat Chughtai’s novel “Purdah,” where she describes women in Purdah as caged animals.14 The cage is a metaphor for living arrangements controlled by men. Chugtai further notes that in such arrangements women remain dependent on men for resources for survival, since their own activities remain significantly limited to the household.15 In Purdah, women thus competed against other women to gain influence over the men who were the source of survival. Thus, the relationships between women were arranged such that there were hostilities between wives and mothers in law, sisters in law etc. According to Chugtai, such a competition between women ensures that they do not unite against those responsible for their condition and lack of agency: men. Purdah, thus, played a role in ensuring they never united against men and the systems and arrangements perpetuated.16 Even though the days of Purdah have ended in the literal sense, values of modesty and sharam perpetuate and so do hostilities in women’s relationships with each other. With values like modesty and control over female sexuality and life, the patriarchy creates women who actively embrace norms that perpetuate their own subjugation in the long run.17 Women try to fight from within the system; while maintaining the values of Purdah and competing against other women, it is not very probable for women to unite against the larger value system and consequently claim agency over their own lives.

Imtiaz Dharker, as a Pakistani Muslim woman herself, criticises the Purdah in her poem “Purdah.” Dharker views the Purdah as an agent of patriarchal control, making the wearer eventually feel suffocated.18 According to Dharker, the Purdah when imposed, either directly or through values, violates women’s individuality, expression and freedom.19 The following is an extract from Dharker’s poem: “Purdah is a kind of safety. The body finds a place to hide. The cloth fans out against the skin Much like the earth that falls On coffins after they put dead men in.” 20 Perhaps, Darker uses death imagery to symbolize how women lose individuality and agency over their own choice with the kind of politics and social control mechanism which manifest in many ways including the veil. It is important to consider that many Pakistani women actively choose to wear the veil and view it as liberating because it enables them to access opportunities and resources outside their households. As highlighted by Hanna Papaneck and extended by Lila Abu-Lughod, the “portable closet” is necessary to free women from the confines of the household, without challenging prescribed Islamic framework and male domination in its entirety. 21 In “Concealment and Revealment,” Anjum Alvi argues that concealment has different meanings to different women. For instance, some of the women who wear Burqa in the streets of Pakistan are sex workers. For them, wearing the veil means freedom of movement without sexual harassment, embarassment and signifies escaping social stigma. 22 However, it can be argued that what limits women agency to the extent that they have no option but to “conceal” themselves is the patriarchal system producing values of keeping female sexuality in control and consequently marginalizing groups of women like sex workers. Thus, the very fact that women have to wear Burqah to avoid harassment and to escape stigma is a manifestation of limited agency. Amber Riaz describes this dichotomy as a paradox; the veiling system protects a woman’s honor but also ensures a gender hierarchy and maintains a status quo ensuring patriarchal control over women’s lives.23

Islamization and Women’s Agency

The culture around keeping women both covered and sheltered became legitimized and imposed by the state during Zia-ul-Haq’s military regime (1978-1988). Ziaul-Haq started a system of Islamization of law and society in Pakistan in the 1970s and 1980s and used Chador aur Chardevari as a slogan. Zia-ul-Haq introduced the Hudood Ordinance in 1979, under which there were strong regulations as to how women were to live their lives in modesty. Zia also introduced gender-purdah norms which promoted the segregation of public activities by gender.24 The state no longer allowed the participation of women in some public activities; for instance, the state blocked women’s sports teams from going abroad.25 Moreover, women’s appearance in public was highly scrutinized; for instance, in January 1983, a government directive calling for Pakistani women newsreaders to stop wearing heavy makeup and experimenting with fashion. Women were also banned from appearing in advertisements unless the advertisements were for domestic products like detergents and sewing machines. Women who did appear on the media had to follow a strict dressing code: the national dress, shalwaar kameez, and a dupatta or chaadar over their heads.26 Such socio-legal regulation had very strong consequences for women in the labour force. The 1981 consensus figures showed that around 90.6% of all working women professionals were employed in education and medicine. Women journalists were only allowed to report on women’s activities and had to refrain from informing or speaking on economics and politics. The majority of women had to keep their options limited to traditionally acceptable jobs for women.27 This had the effect of producing gendered work; women’s agency remained limited because they had to either by choice or by virtue of discriminatory laws only choose professions considered acceptable. Amber Riaz notes that women’s mobility and participation in the labour market are both compromised when they have to use the veil as symbols of their chastity and religiosity while navigating the male dominated public spheres of cities.28

It is important to note that it has been questioned whether such regulation was actually in accordance with Islamic principles, as portrayed. In “Architectures of the Veil,” Amber Riaz quotes the following Ayat from Surah Noor to be the supposed foundational source for the Hudood Ordinance29: “Believing women to lower their gaze and to be modest, and to display of their adornment only what is apparent, and to draw their veils over their bosoms.” (24:31) However, feminists in Pakistan have questioned Ziaul-Haq’s intention behind Chador and Chaardevari; the slogan and the institution of veil are believed to be used for political reasons in a society dominated by men believing in a culture of ensuring women’s sharam. Rahat Imran, in “Islamic Laws, Gender Discrimination, and Legal Injustices,” argues that Zia used the “women’s card” as a symbol for his plans knowing that a large majority of the male population would be very accepting to it, given their belief systems.30 Moreover, Sitara Khan notes that Purdah can be used as an institution and agency for debarring women from full socio-economic and political life, controlling women’s mobility and spaces in the form of domestic arrangements to ensure premarital chastity and post-marital fidelity.31 Thus, when dissected as an institution, the veil has the effect of limiting women’s agency in the socio-political sense through manifestations such as domestic arrangements and gendered work.

Feminist Resistance in Pakistan

Considering the many implications in the institution of the veil including gender segregated spaces and domestic arrangements, many Pakistani feminists have viewed it as a cultural issue , signalling misogynist values which favor women’s invisibility. To quote Amber Riaz: “I argue that women’s lack of access to education, the workforce and the denial of other basic rights in Pakistan stems directly from the belief that Muslim women must remain out of sight.”32 Zia-ul-Haq’s system of Islamization brought about legal changes which became major set-backs for the feminist movement in Pakistan.33 Feminists resisted such systems in multiple ways including organized protest, and the protest against larger cultural values remains prominent even today. In 1982, urban based women’s groups formulated the Women’s Action Forum (WAF) to provide women with a platform for nationwide resistance through advocacy, research, protest, writing and press campaigns etc. The WAF remains operational even today and continues to promote women’s advocacy and discourse on value systems that limit women’s agency in Pakistan. In 1983, women organized a protest rally in Lahore to march to the High Court to present a memorandum to the Chief Justice of Punjab High Court, condemning a law that General Zia-ul-Haq had proposed. Over 300 women participated in this march and faced repercussions like police intervention and tear gassing. The police arrested over 50 women and engaged in violent behaviour but several women still managed to march to the High Court.34

Since 2018, women from all over Pakistan have been protesting together, as an “Aurat March,” against cultural and legal injustices under the banner of “Hum Auratain” (Us Women). Much of the discourse under the Aurat March movement is based on women wanting to reclaim agency and rights over their own bodies. This includes discourse against systems such as Chaador aur Chardevari which have reconfigured in Pakistan over time and limited women’s socio-economic involvement. In her paper “Faithless vs Faithful feminism,” Aiesha Qureshi notes that the 21st century Pakistani woman is allowed to work outside households in a chaadar “but without compromising on their responsibility of providing the labor of social reproduction within the confines of Char-diwari” (Hussain 2016).35 Under the Aurat March, women have used slogans such as “Mera Jism Meri Marzi” (my body, my choice) to initiate discourse around reclaiming autonomy over their own bodies. “Mera Jism Meri Marzi” can be analyzed in light of resisting cultural systems and values like sharam which place control over female sexuality and modesty in men’s hands. Thus, “Mera Jism Meri Marzi” spurs discourse around women’s agency. In her article about “Mera Jism Meri Marzi,” Mehr Tarar describes the slogan in the following words: “Mera Jism Meri Marzi is a four-worded assertion to take control over what is already hers, mine, yours. The issue is agency. The purpose is to define authority. The goal is real autonomy.”36 The Aurat March organizers refrain from taking a position on religion and argue that religious discourse is rather manipulated and exploited to promote female oppression when Islam, in actuality, promotes female empowerment.37

Despite organized resistance against female oppression in Pakistan, discourse around the veil, in particular, remains limited because critique of the practise of veiling and gender segregation is interpreted as a critique of Islam itself. Amber Riaz describes the dichotomy as a paradox whereby Pakistani feminists continue to support a woman’s choice of wearing the veil because it connects them with opportunities and simultaneously also see this vestiment as an institution of control over women’s agency and mobility.38 I argue that critique of the veil as an institution should be an active part of feminist discourse in Pakistan for there to be an increased resistance against a system which gives women no choice but to adhere to patriarchal frameworks in order for them to access opportunities and resources.

Conclusion

This paper has discussed the veil, and its implications for women’s agency, as an institution in the Pakistani context. It has dissected the manifestations of the value system which goes beyond the veil itself and includes gender segregated spaces, work and domestic arrangements. It has been discussed that value systems like sharam in the Pakistani context have implications such as those of men controlling female sexuality and bodies. Feminists have tried to advocate for women’s rights and agency within the realms of this framework as it is considered a part of the Islamic religion. However, this paper has argued that women’s agency over their own bodies and social lives in the physiological sense would remain limited if the patriarchal status quo is perpetuated with value systems like the Pardah. Thus, to conclude, for women to gain agency in any true sense, it is important to include critique against the veil as an institution in the feminist discourse in Pakistan.

References

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