Page 85 - DENG503_INDIAN_WRITINGS_IN_LITERATURE

Unit 9: Rupa Bajwa: Sari Shop—Concept of Feminism

The sari imagery reflects both beauty and ugliness of life real and reel. The ‘rust red, blood red Notes
stains on Kamla’s purple sari’ and vomit stains on her blouse after her rape and violence become
a profound motive for Ramchand to avenge her wrong. The sari image is convulsed, decontrolled
and deconstructed with masterly superbness & intensity of pathos. After Kamla’s death, the place
inside the sari shop turned claustrophobic and grave, saris flew out at Ramchand whipping
around ‘engulfing him like a shroud’ its black border suffocating him as if coercing him to take
stock of situation and bear the burden of a saviour, a role which nature had imposed on him.
Marxist/ socialist feminism rests on the creed of woman as tertiary consumer and primary producer
in society, be it producing offspring in the womb or cooking and cleaning or reproducing and
writing. The theorization and over theorisation has destabilized the whole system of study and
epistemology, regarding women. The debate has rested more on patriarchy in every form and
subordination of woman by it. Women’s rights, demands and desires have reverberated all the
corners by now. Rape, violence, prejudice and household inequities have become highly contested
issues among women on behalf of women. The cumulative effect of publicising deficiency in social
system for deprived women by affluent and economic advancement by few has generated a
‘cultural lag’ between the two, in which the basic values are eroded or changed for two groups
and practically even in the name of feminism no cultural and intellectual intermixing is viable.
I see this onslaught of global capitalist consumerist culture on Indian scene in light of Rupa
Bajwa’s Sari Shop, which is a fine mimicking of welfare feminism. The class solidarity among
opulent group of Mrs. Sandhu, Mrs Sachdeva, Mrs. Kapoor and types is empowered by class
consciousness which they feel and generate by ignominious and condescending values to ‘have
nots’. The Sari Shop explains the meaning of existence in spheres of capitalism, chaos and conflict,
when women themselves have fell a prey to consumerism. In the words of Ram Chand, the shop
assistant :
“Life was grubby, clumsy, mean, flabby and meaningless.. Sick, sick, sick,” (The Sari Shop, pp
111) enough to remind Burning Burning Burning Burning of Eliot’s waste land. The Sari of Indian
woman is exploited maximum as a potent metaphor, a vehicle for all kind of feminine expression.
Sari is a symbol of womanhood and courtesy, but it also constraints their movements and gait,
providing a negative implication of concept and The Sari Shop would be a fit and plausible
metaphor of restricted and reserved life, compartmentalized thoughts, associated with various
women groups, a fine camouflage behind which all the actual selves remain mystified. Hordes of
women visited it daily, some as a part of routine activity which ended in cheap shopping bout at
sari shop, some for weddings and parties, some need not visit, they could pedal saris some like
Kapoors or some occasional visits by sombre lecturers like Mrs Sachdeva etc. The idiosyncrasies
and oddities of women in choosing a sari or touching it brings out their common shared shopping
idiocy. The pervading tone of buying, bargaining and spending sums a bizarre sentiment of
meaninglessness in life, which Ramchand feels as “Money. Congestion and noise danced an eternal,
crazy dance here together, leaving no moving space for other gentler things.” (Sari Shop, pp, 5)
The remarkable thing is why only Ramchand, the traditionally unfair male protagonist is forced
into the situation, to save, revolt and protest moved by helplessness and misery of the rape victim.
For it is Ramchand who instead of getting numbed by social pressure and worldliness remarks, “
What constant injustice! What a warped way of living! How wrong it all was! He felt reckless,
strong enough to do anything, fight anyone for justice, for truth.” (Sari Shop pp 222) The two
women rich, intellectual and powerful Ramchand chooses to narrate Kamla’s story for ‘more
importantly they were women’ are enraged by ‘the whole ugly, sordid, jigsaw story.’ This
breakdown of gynocentric world in which women can’t live in perfect harmony and friendship
with each other for their double standards or sub standards is alarming! Mrs. Sachedeva pushes
away the Saris on her lap and speaks in clenched teeth, “I don’t want to listen to all that rubbish
again that too in Hindi. How dare you, tell me filthy stories about the kind of women you seem to
know”. Thus, women overdo and cut each other to size, especially the pearl faced, upper-upper

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