This is the second article in TNM’s two-part series exploring how menstrual segregation is practiced in rural and urban spaces in India, even today. You may read the first article here.
A 22-year-woman who was brought up in urban Chennai recalls how she was scolded by her family members for sitting on a plastic chair in her house and touching a TV remote on the morning of the Pongal festival because she was menstruating at the time. “I was yelled at and the others in the house refused to touch the TV remote until the prayer and other rituals got over. It really made me rethink my value in my house,” she says.
For many women in India, menstruation means that their presence in their own houses would be minimised, and some are even banished to a separate segregation room where they cannot be seen by the other family members. If they stay within their homes, they are barred from entering the main hall and kitchen. One may assume that in this day and age, the practice of menstrual sequestering is restricted to rural areas alone, but the fact is that it continues in urban homes as well, albeit in different forms.
TNM recently visited several villages in rural Tamil Nadu that have menstrual sequestering homes where women have to live for the duration of their period. As a second part of the series, TNM asked women who are born and brought up in towns and urban spaces about their lived experiences. Our conversations revealed that women in urban homes too are often not allowed to access the main hall, sit on sofas, enter pooja rooms, or rest on the beds. The restrictions seem to be lesser in nuclear family units, but this is attributed to spatial constraints and gender roles inside the house, our respondents noted.
Speaking to TNM, RK Srividya, a 28-year-old, Chennai-based journalist recalled what kind of period segregation she had to face in her own house in Tamil Nadu’s Sivagangai town. “Oppression in the form of menstrual segregation among the privileged is seldom voiced out. The rules are different for a menstruating married woman and an unmarried young woman or girl. While the former can access all rooms, except the pooja area after taking a head bath on all menstruating days, the latter is barred from even touching the essentials like clothes. The rules are not the same in different households of the same community, and it is also not consistently followed by all female family members,” says Srividya.
She was not allowed to participate in the ritual of Sumangali Prarthana (a ritual performed in memory of the women who passed away before their husbands) because she was a young menstruator. “Not knowing how to avoid inviting a young menstruator, some completely avoided talking to me or even keeping eye contact,” says Srividya, adding that soon she developed a distaste for her bodily changes which were the cause for the increased restrictions in her already conservative household.
“Many times, I have asked my mother as a teenager: Why theetu (impurity attributed to a menstruating woman) is only selectively applicable in the house. When my mom is "cleansed" after a bath, why not me? She never had anything concrete in response but blindly extolled the "power of Kanni Theettu", which literally means virgin's impurity,” recalls Srividya.
Brought up in a Brahmin household in Tamil Nadu, Dhivya, a Ph.D. scholar from Delhi University, recalls how she had to hide that she started menstruating, for 1.5 years from her family members, and what she learned during that period. "Fearing segregation and the fact that I will be coerced into distancing myself, I hid that I had started menstruating," says Dhivya, adding that those months when she hid this experience were the days she understood that there was nothing wrong, sinful, criminal, or polluting about her body.
"I did not face any harm for having touched others as was believed commonly. I accessed places freely - the kitchen, the deity room, and also temples, and have participated in rituals, functions, and gatherings while in periods and nothing bad happened. It was then I realized that none fell ill or sick because of the touch of my menstruating body. When I entered college and started reading about gender, body, rights, and equality I gained more confidence that there was nothing 'untouchable' about me while menstruating,” she says.
She further explains how she learned about the consequences of menstruation in her household. “I was scolded for walking too close to or sitting close to any family members during periods. Any cloth accidentally touched by me or by my menstruating body was to be washed by me. I dreaded having periods. Any unintended touch would be treated as a sin, for having polluted that particular place, person, or material”, she further adds.
Divya, a professor from the Vaniya Chettiyar community, which is categorised as a Backward Community (BC) in Tamil Nadu, says that she was conditioned into a period seclusion. “I went through too much stress and even depression as I was not allowed to wear new clothes, was forced to sit in one place for three days every month, and take a bath every time I changed my sanitary napkin during my period,” she says.
Segregation is not only followed in Hindu communities. Other communities also practice this to some extent. Talking to TNM, a Muslim woman who wishes to remain anonymous says that there was no such rule of not allowing her to enter the kitchen and or accessing rooms during her period in her house. However, she is not allowed to touch the holy Quran, the sacred beads, and prayer mats. “Elders say that this is prohibited by religion, but I’m not sure whether there is such a rule that has been mentioned in the Quran”, she adds.
Though a practice like menstrual segregation may sound strange in urban spaces that often claim to have modern values in place, the root of such seclusion lies in religion and cultural beliefs. Many scriptures mandate how women should be treated or how they must sequester themselves during their periods, and many still follow these prescriptions.
For instance, in Manusmriti, which lays down various codes of conduct for Hindus, menstruating women were equated with animals. Manusmriti, in verses 41, 42, and 57, states that the wisdom, energy, strength, sight, and vitality of a man will increase if he avoids women who are in their menstruation period and suggests that he not converse with a menstruating woman. Verse numbers 239 and 240 of the text also say that a menstruating woman must not look at the dominant caste Brahmins while they eat, or look at any object or food item they use.
Chapter five of the Vasishtha Dharmashastra, one of the few surviving ancient Sanskrit Dharmasutras of Hinduism, mentions that a woman on her period is impure for three days and nights. It also says that during her period, she shall not apply kajal to her eyes, nor anoint her body, nor bathe in water; and that she shall sleep on the ground, among many other mandates.
“There are no reformists directly talking against the restrictions that women face during their period. The change, that we are seeing today, was not brought by either EV Ramasamy (famously known as Periyar) or Narayana Guru, a Kerala-based reformist, but it was the women who changed the scenario and challenged centuries-old restrictions after they got access to education”, he says.
Education, access to period products, and awareness of menstrual dignity are interconnected. The lack of any of these leads to period poverty, which eventually coerces girl children to stop getting an education, the only available medium for them to understand the biological process of menstruation – a topic our patriarchal society actively discourages. UNICEF has noted that the lack of information about menstruation leads to damaging misconceptions and discrimination and can cause girls to miss out on normal childhood experiences. Stigma, taboos, and myths prevent adolescent girls -- and boys -- from the opportunity to learn about menstruation and develop healthy habits.
Social media platforms and online educators have also contributed to countering period taboos and shame attached to menstruation, and normalising periods, at least among t,he section of people who could afford smartphones.
Menstrual segregation, though manifesting inside individual households, is also a systemic problem that requires governmental interventions. It is to be noted that Supreme Court, on April 10, 2023, directed the Union Government to create a uniform policy to ensure menstrual hygiene among school children by providing sanitary pads, vending and disposal mechanisms, and exclusive washrooms for girl students in schools.
To ensure the uninterrupted education of girl children and to reduce the dropout rates due to a lack of period products, the Union government hasso far launched three initiatives since 2011. The “Menstrual Hygiene Scheme” provides sanitary pads to girls aged 10 to 19, at a rate of Rs 6 for a pack of six napkins. In 2019, the government launched the Suvidha scheme to distribute eco-friendly and biodegradable pads at a subsidised rate. Rashtriya Kishor Swasthya Karyakram (RKSK) program of the Union government focuses on promoting sexual and reproductive wellness for all adolescents and was introduced in 2014.
In 2011, a few months after Jayalalithaa became the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, an order had been passed to provide free napkins to female students, women prisoners, and lactating mothers. A fund of Rs 44.21 crore was allocated for this program.
In 2022, as an extension of the government's measures in advocating menstrual hygiene and the healthcare of women, the Gender Lab of the Greater Chennai Corporation launched a project called Kanniyam, which aimed to address menstrual hygiene by providing sanitary napkins. The project has been implemented in 159 corporate schools in Chennai through which a girl student can avail of 10 napkins per month. In addition, the corporation also provides extra 150 napkins to each school to avoid shortage.
But despite such affirmative action on the part of the government and non-governmental organisations, menstrual segregation still continues to exist. “The main reason is that menstruation is connected to religion”, says Geetha Ilangovan, writer and filmmaker, who did a documentary on taboos attached to menstruating women, titled Menses.
“To monitor the chastity of women and to ensure that she is not sexually active or pregnant (in case she is not married, she is widowed or divorced), the practice of segregation followed. It is nothing but a by-product of a patriarchal society and the simple act of segregation questions the bodily autonomy and choices of women. Women follow the segregation because they don’t want to bear anything that questions their chastity or character,” she further adds.
She points out how many educated, self-sustaining women are still not willing to talk about periods to their adolescent sons, daughters, or husbands. “That is where the problem also lies. They have stopped talking about it and it remains unaddressed. Younger women are willing to change this narrative, but it's their family members who need to unlearn and rid themselves of the centuries-old concept of segregation,” she says.
Bhamathi, retired judge of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) of Chennai, says that if any change is happening, it is definitely in the urban sector, partly because of spatial constraints, as well as migration from rural to urban places, which gives people anonymity. “However, where communities are huddled together, especially among low-income groups, more homogenous than heterogenous, social cohesion and norms are compulsive to be practiced and change in mindsets is difficult to bring about,” she says.
Urban space constraint is a boon for facilitating the reduction if not elimination of physical segregation of women during their period. “However, menstrual hygiene still continues to be poor even in cities given the inadequate civic amenities and inefficient, pollution-causing waste disposal mechanisms,” she further added.
Agreeing with Geetha Ilangovan, Bhamathi also says that we tend to address only women when it comes to menstruation, and not boys or men. “In co-education schools, even biology teachers are shy to discuss this biological phenomenon,” she says, adding that as long as we treat this as a female-only issue and not as a public health issue, as well as a rights issue and a gender issue, we may not help the cause.