The sequel to 'Mother India'

One of the great joys of modern life is Youtube. It brings to us a thousand little diversions that would have been very hard to access a decade ago. Like the sight of 007 in drag.

There was a video doing the rounds around March 8, with Daniel Craig in a skirt and Judi Dench’s voice telling us why the world wouldn’t be so kind to Ms Bond.

It got me thinking about Hindi films. Nearly all male actors have joyfully gotten into drag at some point in their careers, while all female actors long to play something meaty and ‘real’. Something like Mother India.

Now Mother India is hard to do again. But a Daughter India can still be made. In fact, it could be an international production because the role reprised by Nargis is a global figure. Data suggests that one in five farms is headed by a woman and women farmers produce 50% of the world’s food. They will identify with this kind of film.

I think the script would go something like this. As in the original film, Mother India is abandoned by her husband, and must bring up two boys alone. She scrapes a living off her tiny farm. She also has a baby daughter.

When the two boys grow up, they take over the farm. If Mother didn’t have to shoot Birju for his bad behaviour, and he didn’t want a split of their land, they work together.

Daughter India grows up and has to be married off. The land has to be mortgaged. The interest rates are high. The brothers’ backs are almost broken with the effort of trying to pay off the debt. Their own marriages must be delayed.

Daughter India works too, even if she doesn’t yoke herself to the plough when the bullock dies. She sows the crop, cut the harvest, processes the wheat partially and stores it. She also takes care of farm animals, cooks, fetches wood and water. But she gets no share of the land.

In the best case scenario, she is happy despite the hard work because her husband loves her. Her brothers get a bumper crop, pay off their debt, find girls to love and marry.

In the worst case scenario, the brothers fail to pay the debts and the family land is lost. Daughter India is unhappy with her husband. But if she leaves, she turns into a double liability for Mother India. Her share of the property has already been spent on her wedding. Her husband can take away her jewellery and she cannot do anything to stop him.

Research on land ownership and gender (conducted by Bina Agarwal and her colleagues) in Kerela showed that women who do not own property face a 49% higher risk of domestic violence. Which means Daughter India will probably get thrashed.

She could try to lease some land on her own, but which bank will give her a loan without collateral? In India, 78% of women workers are farmers — often classified as being ‘involved in food production’ — but only about 10% own land. So how will Daughter India buy seeds or fertilizer? If the land in not in her name, how will she get free electricity?

On second thoughts, in the Mother India narrative, there isn’t that much room for Daughter India. Is there? And it shows. It showed up in the 2001 census. It showed up again in 2011. And if we don’t fix this land and inheritance of income-generating assets thing real soon, it will show up in the next census too.

Annie Zaidi writes poetry, stories, essays, scripts (and in a dark, distant past, recipes she never actually tried)