Dubbed the Jane Austen of India, Iqbalunissa Hussain left the confines of purdah soon after her marriage and received an education in India and England. As both she and her husband were libertarian and able to withstand societal and cultural pressures, Hussain went on to become an advocate for women, an educationist and a novelist. In her novel Purdah and Polygamy: Life in an Indian Muslim Household, Hussain gives a plausible, fly-on-the-wall experience of life in a zenana [women’s quarters].

Purdah and Polygamy was first published in 1944 and is believed to be one of the first full-length English-language novels by an Indian Muslim woman. It is the story of Kabeer, a polygamist who lives with his widowed mother, Zuhra, and chronicles his personal hardships as well as those of the women living in segregation in his house.

Unhappiness is an expected and thus learned state for women in Hussain’s novel. Zuhra and her female relatives overindulge in petty insults and imagined affronts and have a strange rancour for one another. There is no sisterhood, no togetherness or mutual compassion. As Zuhra says, “An extra, healthy woman at home is no more than an extra servant.” It is vexing to read about the distaste these women have for their gender and the misogyny they perpetuate.

One of the first full-length English novels written by an Indian Muslim gives a fly-on-the-wall insight into the zenana

“It is a well-known fact that man is superior to woman in every respect.” This is one of the defining lines of the novel. What follows is a brief discourse in defence of this statement and on the duties of a wife: “He [man] is a representative of God on earth and being born with His light in him deserves the respect and obedience that he demands ... A woman as a wife should be subservient in everything to man’s comfort and exist for him and him alone ... Her world should ... begin and end with him.” Yet, in contrast to his gender’s godlike attributes, Kabeer is a rogue, a shiftless and weak individual that the reader enjoys hating.

Interestingly, in the next paragraph — and throughout the book — Hussain parries her deification of the male by giving a mother regal superiority over all. A mother is the uncontested dictator of the house with the right to demand complete obedience. This is seen in Kabeer’s odd dependency on Zuhra. He is unable to make any decision without his mother’s approval, “Without consulting her I can do nothing. She is the financier and ruler of the house.” He is ‘man’ enough to treat his wives as his property, but cannot stand up to his mother. This contrariety between the deified man and the iron-handed mother creates a seesaw of contradictions and enhances the duplicity of the environment Hussain portrays.

At the beginning of the novel Zuhra is subservient and mild, an unworthy shadow of her husband. Speaking of him, she says, “I did my duty to the crown of my head for whose happiness nothing in this world will be spared.” However, once her husband dies and her son Kabeer is married, Zuhra replicates her husband’s condescending and oppressive treatment on her daughters-in-law. After a married life that negated her very being, Zuhra, in her “cursed” state of widowhood, finally has dominance. She expects her son’s wives to “mitigate her sufferings” and, finally getting an opportunity to exert her will, takes out years of suppressed angst on them. One wonders if Zuhra’s metamorphosis was inevitable; her cloistered existence as a chattel of her husband, combined with the death of seven of her nine children, surely has embittered her.

The lives of the characters are strongly influenced by superstition. Instead of thinking rationally, they abandon themselves to convictions that have no premise in religion. Upon discovery of Kabeer’s second marriage, Zuhra states to Kabeer’s first wife that she courted her own rival because she combs her hair whilst standing. Further, one of the main reasons Kabeer marries for the fourth time is the belief that 3 is an unlucky number. The level of superstition goes so far as to affect Kabeer when he is deathly ill: Zuhra forbids the use of modern medicine in his treatment, believing it to be evil and incorrectly blames Kabeer’s illness on his consuming heavy food at night. Much to his detriment, she instead uses folk remedies such as amulets and sachets of sugar with healing words written on them in order to cure him.

Although the characters purport to be staunch followers of Islam, religious dictates are used only when convenient and self-serving — by Zuhra and Kabeer in particular. The pair twist doctrine to justify their cruel treatment of Kabeer’s wives and Kabeer gives rein to gross hypocrisy when he uses a tenet of religion to preen himself: “Doing justice to one’s wife is compulsory as it is laid down in the holy book and was emphasised by the originator of Islam. It was his bounden duty to think of her and satisfy all her needs...”

There is no concept of feminism among the women in the book. Kabeer’s third wife, Maghbool, who has been labelled by some as a non-gender conforming character, shows distinction in her learning, skills and thought. Yet even she cannot forge a strong position for herself in her husband’s house. The author dramatically swings Maghbool back and forth from assertive to pathetic and Maghbool eventually succumbs to the old-fashioned, conformist mode of a woman sacrificing her happiness for the perceived benefit of others.

The only slightly progressive thinking towards women is shown, ironically, by men. Kabeer, always inconsistent, is surprising in his attitude towards his mother once his father dies: “My mother is different from other widows. I shall allow her to do anything she likes without caring for the ill talk.” Given the relationship dynamics between mother and son, his use of the word ‘allow’ here is puzzling. Additionally, the first wife’s father and brother are supportive of her and do not take her failed marriage to Kabeer as an affront to their dignity or a smear on their honour.

The one character in the novel that redeems himself is Kabeer’s son, Akram. Despite being raised in an abusive and chauvinistic environment, he comes to understand the situation of his fathers’ wives and the reality of who his father is. “Was he not following his father’s footsteps in his own way?...The miseries of the ladies in the zenana ... How could his father be so heartless as not to guess what were his wives’ feelings and what kind of life he had given them?” With these realisations, Akram ends his part in the tale by behaving with nobility, fairness and empathy.

Much of the book is written in dialogue. While this builds believable characters and vividly depicts the dynamics between each, Hussain’s writing style can be hard to follow. It is difficult to ascertain which character is speaking and her quaint lack of commas also causes confusion: “Nazni knowing of Kabeer’s presence went to her mother-in-law to pay the Eid respects”; or “Munira knowing of a second man at home had reduced her activities.” The passage of time is also unclear, with the reader often having to guess whether days, months or years have gone by.

Hussain has written a wrenchingly sad account about the wives of a polygamist in pre-partition India and how absolute seclusion and subjugation affects women mentally and emotionally: “There is no stronger weapon to tame nature to the point of self-disrespect than the sense of dependency.” Kabeer’s wives must resign themselves to their pitiful conditions. This reduces them to grovelling, needy, fearful individuals who do not even speak out against the abuse inflicted on their children. Thus, it is hard to read this book without harshly judging both the men and women in it. In a statement that best embodies the ethos of the novel, Kabeer’s fourth wife says, “Women can never be just to women.” Purdah and Polygamy is about more than the oppression of women by men, it is also about the oppression of women by women.

The reviewer is a writer, editor and avid reader

Purdah and Polygamy:
Life in an Indian
Muslim Household
By Iqbalunissa Hussain
Oxford University
Press, Karachi
ISBN: 978-0199407569
280pp.

Published in Dawn, Books & Authors, July 29th, 2018