How one local artist is shedding light on a controversial religious practice in India
When Charlotte-based multi-disciplinary artist Indrani Nayar-Gall lived in India 32 years ago, she didn’t know about the atrocities happening to young girls in the remote villages of her own country. Years later when she returned home to get her masters degree, she learned about the Devadasi girls, a caste of untouchable girls who are promised as sex workers as young as three-months-old.
Here’s how it happens: In the first ceremony, called a dedication, the girl is promised into this religious system. Once she reaches puberty, her family gives her away to the man who pays them in gold and gifts, and usually has a wife and children. From this point on, the girls are not allowed to get an education, to get married or make any decisions in their own lives.
Today, Sept. 22, Nayar-Gall is previewing her film, “Devadasi_NOW Project,” at The Light Factory, where you can learn more about how you can help these women and continue the project. Here, she talks about why people should help these girls in India.
CharlotteFive: What made you want to start this project?
Indrani Nayar-Gall: I was born in India. I grew up and spent my college life in India and I had no idea what this is, and that’s disturbing. When I grew up, all I knew were the romantic views of this tradition as if this is really beautiful women who have been trained in this classical form of performing arts like dancing, music and so on, devotional songs, and that dedicated [themselves] to a deity where they lived almost the life of a nun. That’s what you knew. That’s all I knew and even people from that state, some of them don’t know much about it. So this… to me was really this well kept secret, this ugly secret.”
In 1993, I went back to India and I decided to do my masters at university. I was examining women’s issues and looking into human issues and stumbled upon a film that was made by this director who has made very few films. And I had no ideas what I was watching. It was like a docudrama and at the end, you realize oh my god, this is really what this tradition really is. It was really a horrible revelation. The question I asked was “Why a little girl?” Prostitution has always been there and everyone should have freedom to decide what their sex life should be, but why should a little girl be deprived of a stable, normal life?
C5: Tell me what that felt like that it was happening in your home country.
ING: Well we can always say, “It’s not my problem. It is happening in some remote part of India, some remote corner of the world. Why should we bother? But to me, sex trafficking and abuse of young girls and so on is not new and even in relation to religion, it happens everywhere and happens in every single religion that becomes so rigid it turns towards negative things than more positive things about life. In the U.S., there is a lot of underage sex trafficking and I have learned about practices with different cults, but sometimes something is happening next door and you never know. Charlotte is very high in sex trafficking and I came to Charlotte with no knowledge about it. How do I live knowing that my daughter shouldn’t fall into something like that but it doesn’t bother me when it happens to someone else’s daughter?
C5: You have a 30-year-old daughter. And she went with you on your second trip on location into these locations in India. How did that affect your relationship?
ING: The fact that I’m a mother probably hit me harder than probably (if) I was not a mother. At least in my case, I couldn’t imagine me doing that to my daughter, or this is happening to my daughter and that got me more emotionally involved. … She has been instrumental to exposing this issue to me.
C5: What are you hoping take from this preview of the film?
ING: The majority of people don’t know much about it. One of the reasons I’m doing this is I’d like to create awareness and create an opportunity within USA and other countries because fortunately for us we live in the global world, so it’s also to create an opportunity for individuals to learn and to help these communities. I’m raising funds for a sequel because this one was a no budget film and I had to spend money from my own pocket. So I’d like to do a sequel which will be really exploring, more character-driven, more experimental, and follow a character so one can see how she is, how she is in her natural surroundings, what her aspirations, dreams, and sadness. What is she experiencing in the world in a very natural setting?
A preview of the “Devadasi_NOW Project” premieres tonight at The Light Factory from 7-8:30 p.m. Free admission, and donations made here are appreciated. More event information here. The Light Factory, 1817 Central Avenue, Charlotte, NC 28205.
Photos: Devadasi_NOW Project
This story was originally published September 21, 2016 at 10:20 PM with the headline "How one local artist is shedding light on a controversial religious practice in India."