The centuries old bias against Parsi women is set to be put to its severest test this year. A five-member bench of the Supreme Court will decide if former Valsad resident Goolrookh Gupta (née Contractor) has a right to enter the local fire temple and be present for funerary prayers at Doongerwadi. The Valsad Parsi Anjuman (VPA) had passed a resolution barring Parsi women who had married non-Parsis entry to these institutions even if they are married under the Special Marriages Act.
Two out of three Gujarat High Court judges had ruled in March 2012 that women married to men of other faiths took on the religion of the spouse. That ruling took everyone by surprise and left non-Parsi women married to Parsis in a piquant situation: they no longer belonged to their original religion while the Parsis refused to accept them or give them entry to places of worship. While their Parsi husbands and children could enter a fire temple, be present at jashans and gahanbars and have their bodies consigned to the towers of silence if they so chose, the women were denied these rights.
The Originating Summons filed by Prochy Mehta and her daughter in Calcutta regarding who has the right to enter the local agiary will take years to decide. The Association of Inter-Married Zoroastrians (AIMZ) has not intervened on Mehta’s side but the Federation of the Parsi Zoroastrian Anjumans of India (FPZAI) has joined in opposing entry to the fire temple to children of Parsi women married to non-Parsis. At the AIMZ’s annual general meeting held this October 11, there was a brief reference to the Calcutta case. Their silence on crucial issues concerning the intermarried serves as a fillip to the traditionalists to continue unopposed their campaign for racial and gender based discrimination.
At the Ripon Club (RC) a debate is raging over whether Parsi women should be permitted full membership. At present they are allowed associate membership without a right to attend the annual meeting and without voting rights. Their family members presumably cannot utilize the Club facilities if the associate member is not present. (Text messages to trustees Mehli Cama and Jimmy Pochkhanawalla to verify the position drew no response while trustee and managing committee president Xerxes Dastur replied, "Will have to check and revert.") The wives and children of men who marry outside the faith, can, however, enjoy all the privileges. Several WhatsApp texts are doing the rounds warning that if women are admitted as full members, their non-Parsi husbands and children will be able to use the Club.
One text purported to be by Rustom Jamasji reproduced from the Parsi Irani Proud Zarathushtis Facebook Page around September 3, 2017 states, "Demographic change will be detrimental." He termed the move to admit Parsi women as full-fledged members to be "immoral and unethical." The Jam-e-Jamshed issue of October 8 carried a letter from former Bombay Parsi Punchayet (BPP) chairman Dinshaw Mehta claiming, "No purpose will be served in opening doors of RC to non-Parsi spouses and their children except further heartburn and further escalation of the orthodox-liberal divide. It is, therefore, in the larger interest of the RC if we stick to our original constitution as framed by our founding fathers and give up the widely held notion that we must necessarily change with the times." He mentioned the inevitability of the matter going to court "if we change the original constitution." At which junction the FPZAI, the defender of the race, may decide to intervene!
Many may not be aware that the Club at one time denied entry even to non-Parsi guests. The move to permit non-Parsis as guests was opposed by the more fundamentalist members. But the Club changed with the times. But with or without guests, the RC on most days is bereft of patrons. Aside from a handful of raucous diners at the main table, on most days the only other sounds are of the traffic on Mahatma Gandhi Road. The Club management bemoans a lack of funds stating that fighting a court case for eviction filed by the landlord, the N. M. Wadia Trust, is a drain on the treasury. But at the same time RC refuses to augment the coffers by admitting women as full fledged members. Women would not only pay the entrance fees but would also avail of the dining facilities. By December, however, the management has promised to hold a referendum on women’s membership.
In the meanwhile WhatsApp messages are making the rounds personally maligning N. M. Wadia trustee Burjor Antia and accusing him of wanting to unhouse the Club.
But the RC is not the only institution that is underutilized. Ninety percent of fire temples are bereft of devotees. Despite this reality, worshippers are turned away. Women married to non-Parsis and their children are unwelcome. During menstruation women are instructed not to enter agiaries or be present at religious functions.
The bunglis at doongerwadi are idle 70 to 80% of the time yet out-married Parsi women have to provide affidavits claiming they underwent a civil marriage and still follow the Zoroastrian faith, before their bodies can be consigned to the dakhmas. And funerary prayers for those opting for cremation or burial are denied.
Instead of tackling these issues, energies are diverted to more frivolous issues like opposing any restrictions on the area marked for a no-fly zone at Bombay’s Doongerwadi. The government authorities want to limit the zone from one kilometer to 500 meters for emergency operations. The fear is people in helicopters will peer into the towers. But as it is from the Google Earth app anyone can view the dakhmas and the corpses.
Tunneling for the Bombay Metro caused several fervent petitions to be launched calling for a change in the corridor’s alignment even though the civic authorities and the courts are attempting to protect heritage buildings and other structures along the route. If the same concern was lavished on the other agiaries in Bombay that are in need of attention, a more constructive purpose would be served.
The voices of reason and propriety are being drowned in a cacophony of irrationality and sentimentality. But perhaps by the year end good sense will once again prevail.