Stone Slabs for Shaista Mahal

I just finished reading the first story in Banu Mushtaq’s Heart Lamps which won this year’s Booker Prize.

The author is a 77 year old Muslim lawyer activist and she writes in Kannada, a South Indian language. The book was translated into English by Deepa Bhasthi.

The book is a collection of 12 stories she has written over the years.

She is known to champion women’s issues in particular that of the South Indian Muslim women and their struggles..

I have only read the first story so far. A simple one. Nothing profound. But it sets out some of the issues that these women encounter in their daily lives.

In the story one of the issues raised was the prevalent thinking of the status of a wife vis a vis her husband. How to a wife no matter how much she serves her husband, she will never be able to completely repay the debt she owes him. She is supposed to be his most obedient servant and his bonded labourer even if he is a drunkard, womaniser or abusive.

It then raises the issue of husbands expecting their wives to bear as many children as possible. In this story, the lady already has 6 and is expecting the 7th one. She desperately wants to stop so that she can look after her existing children well and do other things in her life but the husband is not in favor of this. She desperately wants to have an operation to sterilize herself but the husband protests.

It talks about how fathers do not think it is necessary for their daughters to be educated beyond secondary school and want them to be married off young. This is despite the mother wanting her daughter to be educated and be a graduate and have a career instead of marrying young.

It discusses the status of a daughter which is almost akin to that of a servant at home. She cleans, cooks, looks after her younger siblings and tends to the needs of the parents.

There is discussion on the status of a wife and how a wife can do easily be replaced. And in this story the husband remarries immediately after his wife dies.

All this from the first of 12 stories. But these are real life issues women face in certain societies. Although she writes from her own perspective and her experiences with Muslim women, I think these issues are common to most women in India, especially those from the rural areas.

Winning the Booker Prize will certainly create a wider audience for her work. The book was sold out in our local book stores. Hopefully this wider audience reading her work creates a greater discussion of these issues and perhaps solutions to some of these issues.