Ismat Chugtai, who though born in British India, was much ahead of her times as she wrote extensively on femininity and female sexuality, on the conflict of desires and the so-called “ethics” and on the plight of women and men embodying institution of marriage. We live in a society where women are expected to display conventional feminine qualities of obedience, abstinence, and modesty; a society where even the nursery rhymes may end up portraying the lop-sidedness of a culture, where men and women have been segregated – this forms the basis of a patriarchal attitude, which has been reinforcing discrimination, against the females since ages. It is this society she attacks on. Ismat Chugtai’s “Lihaaf" is a text that explores into the deep conscience of an indi-vidual who is deplored and into a quest for identity. The work foreshadows the idea of exploitations of another corporal body to fulfil one’s desires. An ambiguous representation of a child’s sexual abuse is also illustrated as the child seemed incapable to comprehend the manipulation of her body for someone else’s desire. ‘Lihaaf ’ epitomizes the excessive degree of suppression that one undergoes. It aptly suggests how the life of a woman by training is confined to her body; how one’s desires are manipulated and how one swings between hopes and ethics. Chugtai also focusses on channelizing her will and motivation to influence the psyche of a society that treats women as mere objects that are installed in the house of their male counterparts. The story received attention and approbation and this paper attempts to depict the insulated and suffocating life of married women in our feudalistic society.
M.A. (English) Central University of South Bihar, Gaya
