Why I Hate Raksha Bandhan

Woman tying Rakhis to Indian soliders at the Wagah border. Source: PTI

Deepika Ahlawat

I recently tweeted that I hate Raksha Bandhan. People were aghast and horrified. ‘This is new,’ they said.

Why do I ‘hate’ this lovely festival, which though not a Hallmark invention, could very well have been? 

What possible objection could I have to loving sisters tying tangible signs of their affection in the form of silken strands and kitschy tinsel on to the wrists of their brothers? Why would I dislike the spectacle of schoolgirls in Delhi tying a rakhi on the wrist of the Police Commissioner of the city?

Why would the trope of young boys seeking to avoid the girls on Rakhi so as to avoid instant ‘brotherising’ with one silken knot (a fate infinitely worse than the mere friendzoning that teenagers from other parts of the world must negotiate), be anything but amusing?

Raksha Bandhan, for those who may not have witnessed it, either live or in a touching movie or ad film, involves sisters tying a “rakhi” on the wrist of their brother, or any other male with whom they consider they have or would like a ‘brotherly’ relationship. 

They then pray for the long life of this person, and hope that he will protect (Sans. ‘raksha’)  them from any problems in the future. The brother then must give a present to the sister, either in the form of money or goods. Like all human celebrations and rituals, it is distinctly transactional, involving complicated, disguised forms of exchange.  

There are several origin myths of the festival that seeks to give it, if not ancient, at least late medieval antecedents. 

One of the best known involves the Hindu Sisodia queen of Chittor, Karnavati’s plea of help in the form of a rakhi to the Muslim Mughal emperor Humayun when her capital was under attack from Bahadur Shah of Gujarat.  This myth is intriguing because it transmutes a political alliance into a personal relationship, and converts a fairly commonplace historical episode of a wife assuming charge of a kingdom in the absence of her husband, and her quest for alliance in desperate times, into a sentimentalised narrative.  

There is no historical corroboration of this story, but it has been recorded that the archetypal ‘sister’ Karnavati died after the sack of Chittor in 1535. 

The ‘brother’, Humanyun, and his family would engage in several wars with the Sisodias of Mewar over the next century, with his son, Akbar reducing  Chittor to rubble, leading to its abandonment, and  his great-grandson Khusrau finally succeeding in reducing Amar Singh to political vassalage in 1614. 

The origin myth-- with its uncomplicated portrayal of ‘Hindu Muslim’ friendship between the two leading dynasties of the age-- and its widespread propagation, become altogether more interesting, particularly because the Sisodia Mughal struggles have been, and continue to be, co-opted into several revisionist historical narratives for various political ends. 

In my curatorial work on the Rajput courts in Rajasthan where I look at archival material from the 18^th to the mid-20th century, I have yet to come across references to this festival in its modern guise, in any period preceding  the early 20^th century. 

Earlier references to the festival describe a widespread celebration of ‘Rakhri’, where rakhris (Marwari for rakhi) were sent to the dominant male (the maharaja or the crown prince), by women not in maternal or marital relationships with them.  

The ritual called upon the protection of the alpha male, and also formed a formalised setting for gift giving and diplomatic exchange to gain favour. In return, the male would send gifts according to social status and protocol.

In the context of the economic and cultural organisation of the time, when women were not, either in law or in practice, equal citizens of the land, had few defined rights, and extremely limited economic independence, these gifts to women formed part of a calendar of occasions where she was a recipient of goods and money from her paternal family. 

I would concede, therefore, that in those times and in that social context, such social customs and festivals had a place. 

Today, the Constitution of India guarantees women, and all citizens of the country, equality of status and opportunity.  Many women today are financially independent, and a fair few are socially independent too.  

Therefore, social customs that place them in a role of subservience, in need of protection from males bounded by filial ties, need to be abandoned. The State, its laws, and the order it enforces using the public services that my tax money pays for, should have the role of protecting women, (and indeed all it citizens), and this vital duty should not be passed on to  an ad hoc militia of Rakhi brothers co-opted by tying random strands of Chinese-made polyester on their wrists. 

Men should be bothered by Raksha Bandhan too, because in the internal logic of its narrative, all males who are not placed within the confines of safe filial relationships, (whose raging masculinity has been thus curtailed by the cultural constraints of Rakhi), are predators by default.

My tweeted condemnation of the debilitation of women and demonization of men that is inherent in Rakhi provoked people into arguing that mine is an extreme interpretation. 

They said that in today’s day and age no one celebrates Raksha Bandhan as a sign of inequality. ‘It’s just a symbol,’ they said. ‘A bit of pooja, lots of mithai, some posted letters and glorious Indian tradition has been upheld for another year.’ 

But is this tradition really so harmless? 

The Raksha Bandhan narrative normalises the view that one sibling is the protector and the other is the vulnerable gender in need of protection.  

Gender inequality is therefore reiterated and promoted as correct and sanctioned by tradition in the minds of those  of us who receive our practical education from social and cultural mores, not the law, or indeed government information pamphlets. 

It is hardly surprising that one of the more extreme outcomes of such subtle but extremely effective forms of social conditioning is that some Indian parents consider female children a problem to be avoided if at all possible. 

We cannot continue to repeat these ingrained narratives of gender-unequal tradition and expect them not to have terrible impacts, and then argue that our own interpretation of these traditions is not literal. 

If the literal meaning of a tradition is problematic, should not the tradition be changed to reflect a changed society? 

We should not be afraid of examining our culture with critical eyes and changing those aspects of it that no longer have a place in our world.

Yesterday I also retweeted a tweet by a woman who has decided that from next year her two girls will tie rakhi on each other’s wrists, because “my kids, my context, my festival.”

I’m happy to celebrate sibling love in this form. Just let it be gender neutral and non-sexist. Sneh Bandhan, anyone?

Deepika Ahlawat is a museum curator, art consultant, and novelist. Her first novel, Maya’s Revenge, was published by Harper Collins India in 2013. Follow her on Twitter @ahlade .