Lipstick under my Burkha is one of the finest made Bollywood movies in terms of content and specifically validating how India looks at its Marital Rape Clause.
The status of Marital Rape remains a joke, and Section 375 continues to serve as a tyranny in the Indian society. The loopholes of offenses which stay in the purview of closed doors, surface layers under religious and social renditions. The reaction and feedback I have received as well as personal normative experiences confirm that there are massive undertones of patriarchy gripping India, and this shall serve as our development’s Achilles heel. The same was prima facie proved by CBFC’s decision to reject the film based on its “Female (Feminist) Orientation”
Written and directed by Alankrita Shrivastava, Lipstick under my Burkha left many shock waves and overwhelming moments. With a 100% profit at the Box Office and being acclaimed as a critical hit across the nation, the movie has also left us with many unsettled questions. These questions have gone unnoticed; proving majority has missed the point. In one of the most popular malls of city Pune, the audience could surprisingly be identified as a perfect sample of India’s population. The distinction of silence juxtaposed with demonic laughter at scenes that make you recoil in your gut remains the truth of our country.
Some of these questions are directly targeted at a group of men sitting in the row below in the theatre. What exactly is so funny?
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About a wife being reduced to a baby making object, being repeatedly raped, fulfilling her husband’s needs without consent?
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About a woman taking charge and giving into her instincts of living the life she dreams?
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About being safe and buying condoms and looking after her body instead of resorting to Pills and Tubal Ligation
Set in Bhopal, the movie has depicted India’s reality in the microscopic details of the traditions, taboos, and mindsets of certain sections of society. Lipstick under my Burkha is a masterpiece in its true sense. Among many, one of the most chilling scenes involves Sonal Jha, Leela’s mother, sitting naked as a muse while discussing the oppression of a middle-class single mother raising a single daughter.
The movie’s protagonist “Rosy” manages to transpire everyone’s alter ego (and not just women). Because as humans, we all drive on fantasy, desires, hope, and reality: it simply is the circle of life.
Lipstick under my Burkha comes across as the perfect intercourse of a socio-cultural representation of ‘Bharat’ we have been living for centuries where humans have always been distinguished as male or female. As married or unmarried. As a Slut or a Sati-Savitri.
Indians need to detach from the black and whites and appreciate the grey matter in our society. The void where the patriarchy overrides humanity needs to be addressed. The failure of the Supreme Court to protect women from Marital Rape in India under the IPC is a clear contradiction to Modi’s rhetoric of Women-Led Development Schemes
During AIB’s Podcast the cast of the film discuss why they ended the movie where they did, without a revolt, proving that in the end, we are only carrying on with our lives irrespective of the wrongs and injustices that weaken our country. Lipstick under my Burkha has successfully delivered the view of what’s wrong with the society from the eyes of women under netted garbs of tradition overlooking at betrayal, rape, and rejection.
This article was also self-published on Youth Ki Awaaz
Poetry & Beyond 