The ire against jeans is not about a piece of apparel but about changing socio-cultural attitudes

Three weeks ago, a khap panchayat (caste council) in Bhenswal village, Uttar Pradesh, issued a diktat banning girls from wearing jeans. They argued that jeans were encouraging couples to elope! This is no isolated incident. In the last couple of years, a number of colleges have attempted to ban their female students from wearing jeans. However, this ire against jeans is not about a piece of apparel but about rapidly changing socio-cultural attitudes. The combination of urbanisation, rising incomes, cable television and mobile telephony is liquefying Indian society at an unprecedented rate. The ban in Bhenswal village, therefore, does not reflect the growing power of caste councils but a losing rear-guard action by an older generation unable to deal with such rapid change.

Much ado about jeans
The clothes worn by the Indian male have been shifting to trousers and shirts since the late nineteenth century. It has been a slow but steady transformation and is far from complete. For reasons of convenience or style, many Indian men still wear traditional clothes in daily life. Still, it is fair to say that western attire is common enough even in the remotest villages to be now considered unremarkable. The story for women is different.

Till recently, Indian women largely continued to wear traditional clothes. Usually this implied the saree although some states had other local attires (for instance, the mekhla-sador in Assam). The wearing of western outfits was rare except for the upper and upper-middle classes in the very largest cities. The first sign of change was the gradual shift from the late 1970s to the salwar-kurta, a dress that was originally from the north-west of the country. By the 1990s, its different variants became the dress of choice for young urban women across the country. Now, we are witnessing a second and much faster change. In the last two years, I have travelled from Ladakh to Tamil Nadu, and from Gujarat to the North-East. The trends are clear. In small moufassil towns and even in villages, unmarried teenage girls increasingly wear jeans. Most will still shift to traditional clothes after marriage but it is only a matter of time before that too will not be a barrier.

One could lament the homogenising effects of globalisation on local culture. It is not for me to pass judgment. However, jeans are a reflection of a deeper transformation in social attitudes, aspirations and even gender equations. Perhaps it is inevitable with literacy, rising incomes, urbanisation, access to mobile telephony, trends in Bollywood and exposure to cable television. Moreover, it shows through in many other facets of life. The thirst to learn the English language is yet another manifestation of the phenomenon. We can see it everywhere — in “English-medium” schools in the slums and villages, language-learning channels on cable TV and guide books sold at the street-corner. Politicians may cry foul, but India’s poor are voting with their feet.

Modernisation not westernisation
There may be temptation to interpret the above trends as westernisation. However, there are many ways in which the trends point the other way. Take popular music for example. Till the mid-nineties, the urban middle class listened to a fair amount of American and British music in addition to local numbers. The older readers will recall Cliff Richards, the Beatles, Michael Jackson and Madonna. Today, one hardly hears a western tune. Instead, rural migrants are bringing their own tastes from the hinterland that find expression in superhits like Munni badnaam hui (Munni became infamous) and Beedi jalai le (Light your cigar). An earlier generation of Bollywood songwriters would have blushed at the lusty lyrics. Yet, it is now considered cool.

Similarly, the new middle-class that is emerging from the urbanisation process has a very different relationship with the English language than the pre-existing middle-class. To the new group, English is just a skill necessary to climb the job market. In contrast, the language was about a whole culture for the old middle-class. Great pride was once taken in speaking “propah” English and quoting Shakespeare. Hardly anyone cares now. The point is that the new India has the confidence to absorb outside influences on its own terms.

From NRI to global Indian
The change in attitude is feeding through even to Indians who live abroad. The lonely and alienated immigrant described by American-Indian writers like Jhumpa Lahiri no longer rings true for most expatriate Indians of today. Indeed, the fate of the US green card is a good illustration of how things have changed. Less than a decade ago, the acquisition of a US green card would be a matter of great celebration for a Non-resident Indian (NRI). Parents back home would proudly announce it to their friends and relatives. The trend has completely reversed at least for the upper and upper-middle class. Successful global Indians now go out of their way to give up their green cards in order to avoid paying US taxes. This would have been unthinkable ten years ago.

Such rapid changes in our social and cultural attitudes will inevitably have repercussions. The diktats of khap panchayats and clerics are only an extreme illustration of this. There are grumblings about the “Bollywoodisation” of our culture. Language purists lament the mish-mash vocabulary of the youth. There is a genuine danger that many local dialects and customs will disappear. However, the process can no longer be reversed. Love it or hate it, the new India is here to stay.