Roopa, Ritu, Anshu and many of their friends have changed the meaning of beauty by coming out in public and challenging the normative patriarchal notion that beauty lies in the ‘face’. Their resilience redefine social ‘gaze’ to look at the world.
Is the imposition of total ban on acid sell possible? Alok who started his journey from Kanpur and roamed around different parts of the country says, “it’s difficult.” In the rural area, toilets are made of cement and the market products like Harpic mostly clean the tiles. “As the number of toilets in the rural area in recent past have increased, the use of acid also got a new life. On one hand, Harpic is extremely costly, on the other it is not worthy enough to clean the rural type toilet pots those are made of cement,” says Alok.
Social activist Atul Yadav and his friends nevertheless have other plans. “People can use alternative of Harpic. In market there are cheap toilet cleaners with less acidic intensity. Whatever the reason may be, the open sell of acid without any regulation is offence and we will not let it happen,” Atul tells Outlook.
While the banning of open acid sell is one part of the story, the other part lies in the empowerment of the acid attack survivors and the changing of the concept of beauty. As Alok says that from the very early days it was her objective that he would contribute to a condition where the survivors would uncover their faces without any social stigma. This objective perhaps drove them to come up with the calendar that showcased the acid attack survivors as models wearing colourful clothes.
“In 2014 we started a crowdfunding campaign and one photographer was working with us. The crowdfunding actually started for Roopa, an acid attack survivor who wanted to start a boutique. Survivors then wore Roopa’s designed clothes and we clicked their photos. As it was placed in social media, it went viral,” Alok says. Then they decided to collect the photos and made a calendar that represented the desires of the women prior to their attacks. In several ways it changed the meaning of beauty and its representation.
For Roopa, it was a moment to showcase her works as well. While talking to Outlook, Roopa said, “I made red dress for my friend Ritu who was attacked wearing a red dress. On that Al Jazeera also made a documentary namely Black Roses and Red Dresses. We actually wrote letters to our attackers and attached a black rose with it. We wanted to write to them that how the incident actually changed our life.”
Roopa, who was attacked by her stepmother at the age of 13 said that she never expected that her life would be changed in such a way. “Now, people know us. We are much confident now. So many works we do a day. We don’t know what our life otherwise would have been without Sheroes café and the support of media and others.”
Anshu, whose 55 years’ old neighbour whom she called ‘Dada ji’ threw acid at her while she was on her way to school, tells Outlook, “When I first went to Agra Sheroes and saw that I was not the only one who suffered such gruesome attack, I explored the reality in a different manner. For the first time since the attack, I uncovered my face and got the confidence to come out in public.”
Such instances were found in Alok’s words as well. “When I went to meet Shabnam, another survivor in Aligarh, one of her neighbours of the same age group came and asked me whether she can join us. She said that Shabnam’s life has been changed and she also wanted such a life,” says Alok.
However, even after such exposures, “they cover their faces in their own localities as the social stigma is still high,” adds the founder of Sheroes.
While talking about the idea of beauty, Roopa was very clear. “Beauty lies in the hearts, not the face. The way you talk to the people, you treat people at the margins show your beauty,” says the survivor who has a plan to start a boutique soon.
As I was leaving Sheroes café with the new definition of beauty, I recalled how Ludwig Wittgenstein once defined beauty. Comparing the beauty of eyes and a Gothic church, he asked, “What do these eyes have in common with a gothic church that I find beautiful too? Should I say they make a similar impression on me? What if I were to say that in both cases my hand feels tempted to draw them?”