Furore over the bare chested children of Vellalur
By: Garima Raghuvanshy
Tags: India, Media, Children, Progressive, Tradition

This piece was written in 2017 in response to controversy around a ritual in Vellalur, Tamil Nadu, India. I believe its arguments stand true for the latest controversy regarding the rain ritual in Damoh, Madhya Pradesh, as well.

Details change, but the media story remains the same

Over the past few days a custom in Vellalur, Madurai District, has been at the centre of quite some outrage and controversy. The custom was reported by the Covai Post, an online startup that published an article on the 24th of September, giving some description of the custom along with uploading a video on youtube. As part of this custom 7 pre-pubescent girls are chosen by the temple pujari as devis who then live in the temple for 15 days under the care of the pujari. They perform several rituals and are “worshipped as the Goddess”, as the Covai Post put it. The video shows the girls being chosen for the ritual by the pujari of the temple, the girls going about some of the rituals of the festival, and also, playing in the open area within the temple.

The video and article, which the Covai Post calls an “exposé” of the “bizarre” practice, has caused much furore on the internet and amongst some citizens and NGOs in Tamil Nadu and in India in general. What is the furore about? apart from living in the in the temple under the care of the male pujari, during their time as goddesses the girls wear saris around their waists, tied like skirts, and their upper bodies are unclothed. The Covai Post described this ritual as “girls being paraded half naked” and being “not allowed” to cover their upper body. The story developed in an all-too-predictable manner over the next few days.

On the 25th of September the story was picked up by NDTV, Zee News, and India Today. The Covai Post published another article under the sub heading “Covai Post Impact”, stating that the collector of Madurai had constituted a probe committee to investigate the custom. It went on to day that the probe committee found no instance of sexual abuse or harassment of the minors, and that the parents send their children to the temple willingly. The committee, while stating that the children involved did not show any signs of attaining puberty, advised the parents of the girls to “allow” them to cover their upper bodies with shawls. By this time, SOCO Trust, a Madurai based NGO had already decided to approach the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) arguing that this “shocking practice gives much scope for harassment and abuse of adolescent girls. By parading them half-naked and making them stay in a temple for a fortnight, their rights are violated.”

On the 26th of September the story was picked up by more mainstream media outlets — Times Now carried the headline In the name of religious rituals, young girls forced to stay bare-chested at Madurai temple. Daily Bhaskar carried Seven Half-Naked Girls are forced to live with the priest in a madurai temple for prosperity; they are handpicked for the bizarre ritual. The New Indian Express carried the headline Topless girls part of temple ritual near Madurai. This article added a new dimension to the discussion, stating that “On the last day of the festival, women from the village and the seven girls are asked to carry pots of liquor as an offering to the goddess. While doing so, women too are not allowed to wear blouses.” The same article quoted Selva Gomathi, a Madurai based feminist, “During the 15 days, these children are forced to stay in temple. What about their safety? There is a chance for child abuse. Will there be an issue if children and women wear their tops and carry out the rituals? This seems like women and girl children are treated like sexual objects. Such practices are against women and child rights. We will take this issue to the Human Rights Commission” The News Minute reported that “The authorities are leaving nothing to chance. The Revenue District officer and social welfare officer have been instructed to monitor this festival every year now, for its entire duration” In other words, in a festival that many claim has been going on for over 200 years, the authorities are now present to leave nothing to chance. Times Now and NewsX published more or less the same information as other media houses, but both added to their articles the same representational image usually used in reports of rape or violence against women. UK tabloid The Daily Mail carried the headline ‘They are forced into prostitution in the name of RITUALS’: Human rights activists say young girls dedicated to Indian village temples are being used as ‘sex slaves’. In the article itself the Daily Mail ended up confusing two separate incidents in Tamil Nadu and merging them into one, taking some bits from the story about the Vellalur temple ritual, and other bits from the story on a ritual in the Tiruvallur district over which the NHRC had issued a notice to the Tamil Nadu government.

On the 27th of September several media outlets carried the news that the author of the original Covai Post piece and the website’s executive editor had received death threats and abusive messages, calls, and emails. Meanwhile, the New Indian Express reported that the Madurai collector had refused to stop the temple ritual, and that this had caused outrage amongst activists. NEI quoted activist Sudha Ramalingam: “The State Government doesn’t seem to be very serious about this and that is the reason the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has come into play”, and activist Akila: “It is very dangerous for children to be exposed to such practices in the name of faith or religion. We need to understand that our primary priority should be securing the children, protecting them from any harm that may come to them or participating or encouraging such practices” Times Now presented the same information as its article a day earlier, but added the headline: Priest chooses seven girls who are then forced to live bare-chested — Know all about a Madurai temple’s BIZARRE ritual. Finally, Somak Ghoshal, senior editor at HuffPost India wrote a long article repeating the phrases and terms used in earlier reports by other media houses, and added that while the parents might have sent the girls willingly to the temple, “the consent of adults cannot possibly override the discomfort felt by all the minor children involved in this case.” Quoting the parents’ retorts that “the girls haven’t reached the age of puberty, so what’s wrong with sending them to the temple?” Ghoshal found these justifications “horribly blinkered” in a country with “shockingly high statistics of sexual violence, especially involving minors.” He then went on to write about the “fearless journalism” of the Covai Post, mentioning the deaths of Gauri Lankesh and Santanu Bhowmik, and finally closing with an expression of concern over India’s 136th position in the World Press Freedom Index.

On the 28th of September an editorial appeared in the Hindustan Times titled: Using children in religious rituals is a violation of child rights. The Covai Post reported that People’s Watch, a Madurai based human rights organisation, was also seeking intervention by the NHRC. The story had also reached across the border to our neighbours in Pakistan, and The Express Tribune carried the headline Website editor threatened for running story about half-naked girls in Indian temple.

What is striking about this trajectory? In a way, nothing. It has now become common practice for the media, in India and abroad, to pick up stories and repeat them almost verbatim, without verifying their source. In this case, The Hindustan Times, The New Indian Express, The Times of India, NDTV, Times Now, NexsX, The Daily Mail, India Today, and others, simply took over and faithfully repeated a story from the Covai Post, whose executive editor described it as an online startup. They did this without once checking with other sources and without sending teams to investigate or speak to the people whose festival this is. The only exception, to some extent, was the Deccan Chronicle, which bothered to use the word “alleged” while referring to the coverage of the Covai Post, and which bothered to speak to someone who has participated in the ritual since childhood. In subsequent articles however, the Deccan Chronicle too went the way of other media outlets.

What is noteworthy, though not new[1], is that several important aspects of the festival which were mentioned in the first report by Covai Post, do not find mention in any of the later articles, whether by Covai Post itself or by other media outlets. For instance, the original article mentioned that during the fortnight that the girls spend in the temple, their male relatives also sleep at the temple to ensure their safety, and that during the day they are visited by female relatives. The video uploaded by the Covai Post also mentions that the girls were playing quite innocently amongst themselves while in the temple. The Deccan Chronicle article referred to above, which was published on the 27th of September, also mentions that (i) during the festival the temple pujari usually sleeps outside the “sanctum sanctorum” while the girls sleep inside, and that (ii) “it is common practice in Hindu tradition for those who are engaged in this ritual inside the sanctum sanctorum not to wear upper garment. The practice of children not wearing upper clothes in the ritual is just following that tradition”. None of this gains mention in the increasingly sensational story being bounced off the pages and websites of various media outlets. Instead, we have headlines like “Topless girls part of temple ritual…” What does it even mean to call young children topless girls? Is “Topless” here the same as “Topless” when used in headlines like Grand Masti’s Bruna Abdullah shares topless photo on Instagram, which are carried daily by our august media houses? If not, why speak in this manner about children at all?

However, even sensationalisation, shoddy research, and cherry picking of information by the media is not the root of the problem here. The problem lies in what the Covai Post saw when it went to Vellalur, how it described this practice, and the incredible ease and assuredness with which this description was taken over and adopted as their own by other media houses, NGOs, activists, and concerned netizens.

What did the Covai Post see in Vellalur? A practice during the run up to Dussera, during which girls who are seen as forms of devi are chosen to participate in several rituals done in the devi’s honour. The Covai Post saw female children with their upper bodies uncovered. They saw an aged pujari going about conducting a festival that has been celebrated for generations by this particular community in this particular area of Tamil Nadu. The description that emerged was of breathless shock at the fact that female children were walking around bare chested. The festival was described as a suspicious, disturbing, perverse, absurd practice which puts children in harm’s way, even as their parents are standing around nonchalantly, or rather, quite happily. Importantly, the descriptions state that these children were forced to participate in the festival, that they were embarrassed, and that they will suffer psychological scarring because of this festival.

What do we make of this description? Is it indeed deeply shocking and concerning that pre-pubescent female children are walking around bare chested? For anyone who has lived in this country, no, it is not. We are used to seeing children in all states of being unclothed in all stages of their childhood. Even if it is shocking, the question is, shocking for whom? As the New Indian Express article mentioned, on the last day of the festival, both, the young girls chosen as devis and adult women of the community carry liquor on their heads as an offering to Yezhaikaatha Amman. This practice has been carried on for generations in this community. When it is an annual practice for adult women of the community to walk bare chested in the context of this festival, who in the community would be shocked to see the bare chests of these children? Importantly, who would be embarrassed? In all likelihood, the shock and embarrassment the reports discuss remain confined to the reporter of the Covai Post and to many readers of this story sitting in all parts of India and the world, imagining all kinds of diabolical events taking place in this “bizarre”, sinister ritual described by the outraged Covai Post. The shock and embarrassment is not shared by the people whose festival this is, and whose children participate in the festival. We get a hint of this from a conversation between the Covai Post reporter and a woman whose daughter is participating as a devi in this year’s festivities. The conversation appeared in the original Covai Post article; “A mother of one of the girls who have been bequeathed this year has no remorse when questioned about how her daughter who is showing the signs of puberty, would be feeling to stay in a place other than her house with no upper garment. “She is a goddess for us now. How could you even think wickedly?,” she retorted in anger. “It is Amman’s will that she should be bequeathed to Her this year. We are honoured,” she added.” (emphasis added) The mother was not embarrassed. She was angry that the reporter was making her own actions, the actions of her daughter, into something perverse, something wicked.

One could disagree with the stance of the mother, or dismiss it, arguing that the safety and wellbeing of the children is at stake, and that parents are not always good judges of what is best for their children. We can claim that it is our duty as a “civilised” “secular” “progressive” “humane” society to stop the practice and protect these children. In a way this is true. If it is clear that a practice is causing harm and suffering, by all means it should be stopped. In the case of this festival in Vellalur, do we know whether this festival is causing harm and suffering? Do we have a good basis to say so? We do not. All we have is outrage and assumptions. The activists and NGOs are raising concerns over the psychological effects of this practice without having once spoken to or observed the children involved in this festival. Since the tradition has been going on for a long time, there will be several women in the community who would have been chosen as devis during this festival in their childhood. No one has spoken to them or approached them to assess whether participating in this festival is indeed dangerous for the psychological wellbeing of the children. No one has ascertained that they are suffering because they had been once chosen as devis. One of the activists interviewed by NDTV stated that she thinks it might have been haunting for the children and that we do not know what impact the practice could have on their psychology. Precisely. We do not know. Unfortunately, this has not stopped us from going about with staggering self-assurance trying to rescue these children from the supposedly wicked, sick people in whose midst they were born.

One could dig in their heels and claim that it is not right for female children to go about bare chested, arguing that this can lead to exploitation, claiming that we live in a time and place of rampant child abuse. This would mean that while mothers in the West are arguing against the paranoia that is gripping that society, while they are calling out the hyper sexualisation of the female body, we in India are going the opposite way, arguing that everyone is a potential paedophile and a potential pervert, and that the female body is sexual, in all times and places, whether it is the body of a child, or an adult, whether it is in a temple or on instagram.

Even if you are in agreement with me so far, we are still confronted with one more problem — the reported absurdity of this practice. Perhaps, as the media is telling us in all caps, this practice is BIZARRE and that in itself might be reason to put a stop to it. So, lets ask, is the practice of female children being seen as the devi, of them living in a temple for 15 days, bizarre and absurd? Let us begin with the first adjective — is it practice bizarre? For anyone who is familiar with the traditions of Navratri, it cannot be. Seeing pre-pubescent female children as a form of devi is a widespread practice all over India. In the north it takes the form of kanjakanya and in Kerala as kanya puja, but there are many variations across the country. The practice in Vellalur is one such.

The second question then is, is it absurd? In their exclamations about the absurdity and possible harms of this practice, the burden of proof lies with those making these claims. When labelling a practice absurd or implying that it is superstition the Covai Post, mainstream media houses, and the scores of concerned, outraged netizens shouting themselves hoarse would have to present some very clear, cogent arguments as to why it is absurd to practice rituals in which several young girls are seen as devis for a few days of the year. So far none have been forthcoming. It is not enough to say that “worshipping” children or human beings in general (or trees, cars, instruments, books, tools, stones, cows, etc.) is idolatry and superstition and hence must be stopped. This is an argument based in Christian theology, the words idolatry, worship, and God are not neutral, but rather, theological terms.[2] We can use this argument only if we are comfortable with taking Christian theology as the basis for our judgements, actions, and policies. If we choose to do so we can no longer claim to be arguing from a “neutral”, “rationalist” point of view.

It is worth noting that no proof or arguments have been offered by those claiming this is an absurd practice because, importantly, none seemed to be required. A media startup called the Covai Post goes to a village, sees a practice, decides that it is absurd and dangerous without having any grounds to do so, and immediately, enlightened, progressive Indians pick up their usual banners and begin marching. Nothing has to be proven, nothing has to be explained, since it is a foregone conclusion that Indians are immoral and that they follow strange, perverse, harmful practices and traditions. Worse, they force their children to do the same. All that remains to be done then is to find the next instance of this pre-determined truth. The Covai Post did just that.

There might be this unspoken understanding and shared premise between the Covai post, the media, and enlightened, progressive Indians. However, there was no such meeting of minds between Covai Post and the people participating in this festival. As mentioned earlier, the day after the story was published, the editor of Covai Post began receiving a barrage of calls. In the beginning, as she describes it, the callers were fairly decent and said that Covai Post “shouldn’t have covered the ritual the way we did”. Later, she began receiving messages such as “‘what the hell does she know about our customs?’, ‘we will finish her’ and ‘ask her to be careful’,”” Thus, even as the paint dries on the media’s depiction of the people of Vellalur as superstitious potential paedophiles and child abusers, the sketch work for the next painting is already underway — not only are they superstitious and potential paedophiles, they are also violent thugs who cannot tolerate anyone shining the light of truth on their dirty rituals and customs. It is an old story we have heard many times — it happened with Wendy Doniger, it happened with Jeffrey Kripal, and now Covai Post and its editor Vidyashree Dharmaraj are touted as the latest victims of this widely recognised, pre-proven intolerance of India’s sexually perverse, fanatic, Hindu masses.

Violent threats are never the answer, neither is harassment. But perhaps we might want to ask ourselves where this is coming from. Why are the people of Vellalur reacting like this? If they are truly potential paedophiles and if they have been putting their children in danger through this purportedly terrible, absurd custom, surely, the parents of the girls, the mothers at the very least, should be deeply grateful for being alerted about the actual state of affairs. But, as we saw with at least one of the mothers, the reaction was of anger. So then there are two possibilities. Either the people of Vellalur are truly wicked, they sit and gawk at the flat chests of their nieces, sisters, daughters, and grand-daughters, and then they willingly send their daughters to be abused by the pujari. Or, the people of Vellalur are extremely hurt and extremely angered by a twisted, sickening portrayal of a custom they have practiced for generations, which they see as a source of honour and prosperity, and they don’t know how to contest this terrible portrait, except by threatening to harm or kill the painter.

In the meanwhile, the Madurai collector has stated that once this year’s festival is over, the parents of the girls will be counselled so that they can be convinced to “allow” the girls to cover their upper-bodies. Which means that once the festival is over well-meaning activists, counsellors, and government employees will go down to Vellalur to tell the people there how the chests of their young daughters are in fact sexual, and that the people of their village are perverts, the pujari, even worse. Since this is not enough for the NGOs gustily protesting this practice, SOCO Trust and People’s Watch, both based in Madurai have sought the intervention of the NHRC, also demanding action against all the village heads responsible for conducting the festival. The NGOs has called upon the NHRC demanding that this practice be brought to an end, or, at least modified to their satisfaction, ie., to the satisfaction of the NGOs.

We do not know what path the NHRC will choose to tread on this matter. We do not know whether the sensationalism of the media and the holier-than-thou attitude of the NGOs will succeed in destroying this tradition. However, before the NHRC, the NGOs, and the media take their next steps, they must seriously confront and answer the question raised by the people of Vellalur: what do you know about their customs?

What indeed, do you know about them?