Of locks & tresses

India, addressed on and off as the rape capital of the world, needs to work relentlessly to change this image in the perception of many, writes Malathi Rao

Medusa in Greek mythology was a mortal whose beauty attracted Poseidon. She was cursed by Athena for breaking her vow of celibacy. The curse, which was not so much a punishment as protection, turned Medusa’s locks into writhing snakes. She turned into a monster — fierce, terrible and grim.

A powerful weapon

The Medusa gaze was known to transfix men who looked at her into stones. Feminists turned to the Medusa myth in order to fight patriarchy, the fierce aspect of Medusa with the writhing snakes on her head (woman’s hair symbolising her power) as a weapon given to a woman to protect herself from the male gaze.
Akkamahadevi, the 12th-century poet, who went about with only her tresses to cover her nudity, wedded to her god Chenna Mallikarjuna whose praise she sang in mystical verses, was mocked by men and rejected by the clerics of the time with whom she would successfully argue on spiritual matters. But what the clerics saw when she entered the hall of learning was not her wisdom but her naked body. When one of the men pointed out, ‘you still cover yourself with your tresses,’ she replied, ‘that is for people like you; as for me I do not care.’ Akka took her cue from Lord Shiva himself, the Ardhnariswara, the Androgynous God. Open hair or shaven head is the emblem of a woman in rebellion against conventional male dominance. The image of a woman, stereotyping her as the Devi of the house, seen with all the traditional marks of patriarchal sanction, was not for Akka who went about as bold, androgynous, her intellect her badge of liberation.

Unbound

The sexual revolution at the beginning of the millennium has made the other half of humanity that was always hidden, highly visible today. The mobile phone has equalised the sexes and the sexual revolution is alive and kicking. However, targeting women as victims hasn’t stopped like in the recent rape case in UP. The Nirbhaya story, which resulted in more stringent laws against rape, hasn’t seen any closure. Crimes against women show them as vulnerable targets in an aggressively male world.

India, often addressed as the rape capital of the world, needs to work relentlessly to change its image in the perception of many.