Nisha Pahuja, an independent Canadian filmmaker makes incredible revealing stories based on real life. Her movie “The world before her” won award for the best Canadian feature in 2012. In the movie she displays two women pursue totally disparate ways in the new, contemporary India. One is Ruhi Singh from Jaipur who sets off to Mumbai to win the title of Miss India and the other one is Prachi Trivedi, an activist of the Hindutva organization Durga Vahini, a group solely for women, who is ready to kill or die for her beliefs.
Twenty young beautiful, handpicked contestants from thousands of hopeful women across the country, come for the Miss India pageant which provides them with an opportunity of standing out in front of crores of people. “For 30 days they undergo a strict grooming and training regime”. Winning the desired title of Miss India would provide them with fame, profitable career and freedom from the patriarchal society. For girls like Ruhi, the path to their liberation is the beauty contests like Miss India, when she herself says in the movie that “I think of myself as a very modern girl and I want freedom”. She came from a background where people would not let girls go out of the house on their own. Despite this conservatism, her parents supported her with her dreams and her only motive was also to make her parents feel proud and earn money. Girls with a strong determination and will power to win the title are ready to do anything, be it botox or skin lightening or walking on the ramp with their faces covered, where they are judged on the basis of their legs.
On the other hand, in the other corner of the country, in the city of Aurangabad, camps are organized for Indian girls to fight against western culture even if it takes the help of violence. The girls in the camp need to wake up at 4am and learn to be a good Hindu woman through self- defense trainings and lectures. Prachi Trivedi being a proud Hindu can kill and die in order to defend Hinduism. For her, the Hindu movement is her life. The young girls in the camps are taught to follow the culture of Hinduism and built fighting skills among them. They are also taught to operate ammunitions. The leaders of the Hindutva organization believe in the proper Hindu femininity where “women should know their duties as women and should be married at the age of 18 instead of chasing their careers, they have a responsibility towards her household work and they shouldn’t become a part of the western culture. Moreover, we should not talk about equality even if it’s written in the constitution because being a woman you cannot hide your natural weaknesses or character”. But Prachi Trivedi has a different perspective which goes against the tradition as she doesn’t want to get married, she mentions in the movie that she was made by God only for the purpose of Hindu movement. She feels that she is blessed to be born in this world where people prefer boys and kill girls even before their birth takes place. Hemant Trivedi, the father of Prachi Trivedi believes that “marriage is the duty of women and that a woman is complete only after becoming a mother”.
The issue presented in the movie is about inequality between male and female, in which a part of the movie talks about 2009 Miss India winner Pooja Chopra whose mother has to walk over her husband because her husband did not want a second girl child in the house, she was asked either to kill the daughter or give her up in the orphanage and he physically abused her for the same. Also, the women were being beaten by Hindu extremists for being seen with the men or going to bars. Another issue presented in the movie is regarding the cultural differences. The leaders of the Hindu movement believe that the Islamic and Christianity are attacking Hindu’s and westernization has become a threat to the Hindutva as people are forgetting their moral values and culture and it is replacing the old traditional Indian culture with the western culture.
According to me, as mentioned in the movie, “In India few avenue offer women financial stability with men. Beauty business is one of them”. Women should have a right to choose their own path. In this patriarchal society, women are bound with certain injustices and therefore it becomes imperative for them to earn money for themselves and gain respect. If they chose to face all the repercussions that come on their way to be independent, then the society must not interfere with their decisions or criticize their choice. If provided with an opportunity to prove themselves, woman can excel in almost every field and make everyone feel proud.
The title of Miss India gives women an identity that they deserve to have in the society. The beauty pageants conducted are not only about external beauty but they also give women confidence, courage and an identity to her voice. Wearing short clothes or becoming westernized does not mean that women are losing their self-respect and judging a women’s character on the basis of what they wear is not justified. “Shweta the contestant of the contest, intelligently points out that a lot of Americans are taking up yoga but that doesn’t mean that they are becoming Indians. There is no Indianisation happening in America”. Keeping up with your moral values and coping with the world is the only requirement that modern society demands.
Even today in contemporary world issues like female feticide takes place and people still prefer boys over girls. There are many instances shown in the movie regarding this issue. Male dominated society still exists in our country though in some parts of the country modernization has taken place but others still believe that women should not wear short clothes or earn money through the beauty pageants. They should be constrained to domesticity.
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Aishwarya Says:
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