Advocate Aaliya Waziri On New Book Around Law And Gender, Feminist Upbringing And More

Delhi High Court advocate and former International Consultant (Women, Peace & Security) with UN Women Office for Timor Leste, Aaliya Waziri grew up meeting imminent personalities, people in power and from the legal framework as she accompanied her father to important functions and, almost always, she heard questions like, “Waziri, only two daughters?” She saw her father answer with a broad and proud smile, “Yes, only two daughters.” Her awareness of frameworks of gender and the fight women had to put up to claim an equal space shaped not just her ideology but also her professional choices.

Drawing from her experiences as a woman and a lawyer, she is now out with her new book 'In The Body Of A Woman: Essays on Law, Gender and Society'.

In an interview with SheThePeople, Aaliya Waziri discusses her book, gender-based challenges in Law, female representation in the Judiciary, and the urgency to have a judicial gender sensitisation system for survivors of crime.

Aaliya Waziri Interview

What got you interested in law and further making a career in it?

Even since I was a little girl, I wanted to be a lawyer just like my father was. Even when I was a teaching volunteer with Teach For India, the impediments I faced with the curriculum designed for young boys and girls led me to the path of law. Whether I was working in a Public Relations firm or during my time as an international consultant for the UN Women, all roads led me to law. I believe that we can either pretend we aren't a part of the system that is the law or we can acknowledge that we form the very fabric of society that evolves with time and shapes the law itself. So, I decided I wanted to find solutions to issues within the system because somebody had to.

What led you to write 'In The Body Of A Woman: Essays on Law, Gender and Society'? 

I wrote this book because law and gender are two rivers and culture is the bridge that we use to cross the intersection of the current that flows beneath it. This book is as much about that intersection as what occurs on the banks of these rivers, the lives they touch and the crops they harvest.

Originally, this was never intended to be a book; it was a collection of essays I was driven to write during my limited time as a lawyer, first working at the UN and then practising before courts in Delhi. I began writing to fill a void that had emerged where gender-responsive literature answering loopholes within the laws should have existed. The question I sought to answer was simple: How does one live/survive in this patriarchal world? This book acknowledges that there is no guide, no manual, no contemporary relatable or accessible piece of literature narrating a how-to.

There are writers such as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie in the USA, Laura Bates in the UK, and Mariana Zapata in Iraq who provide many relevant and intelligible writings for women and the evolving nature of their needs vis a vis their respective societies but I found there is no Indian counterpart that offers a holistic understanding of the different facets of everyday sexism faced by the average Indian women. Historically, this can be attributed to the mistaken notion that gender-related issues are unworthy of time, energy and more importantly, of resources.

What are the most significant challenges in lawmaking that you aim to bring out with the book?

I don't know if I can precipitate any changes in lawmaking but through this book, I do aim to generate a larger discourse on the existing definition of consent in the laws penalising rape; the need for a gender sensitisation curriculum at schools and higher education institutions as well as for police personnel and the judiciary as has been elaborated in many judgments of the Supreme Court and perhaps the closest topic to my heart - the need for targeted legislation addressing ">cybercrime and cyber harassment against women.

While there’s been some progress, we’re still asking for female representation in India’s Higher Judiciary. What do you have to say about this?

I think we should follow a two-pronged, multidimensional approach and that is by inculcating legislative reform while simultaneously having more women lawyers and judges. We must understand this is a solution where one cannot exist without the other. This must be done by challenging gender bias. Changing the demographics of the judiciary can help modernise it, which can greatly contribute to how it is viewed and regarded. The people constituting the judiciary must necessarily mirror the fabric of the society, only then can the judiciary be perceived as approachable and illustrative of the latter.

The bias teaches us that men are born to rule and lead while women are born to care and nurture. At the same it is worth asking - How can the citizenry have faith in the judiciary if the latter continues to reaffirm gender-based discriminatory practices that cause an impediment to equality of opportunity?

With the rise in digitalisation, cyber harassment across the country has multiplied. What do you think can be done to curb this?

Violence is all pervasive in the world we live in; it erodes the already porous wall between online and offline, real and reel. This is why violence against women and girls has percolated into the digital realm. It is this anonymous non-confrontational form of violence against women and girls, devoid of physical contact, that must be viewed as an impeding factor to gender justice in the 21st century. Essentially, if women are at the receiving end of systemic gender-based violence in real life then the same will translate into an inequitable cyberspace.

What factors have impacted your growth most as someone working across spaces for issues that matter most today?

Ever since I was a little girl, I was labelled as one of those ‘feminist’ types. As a girl of twelve, I was half convinced being a feminist was a pretty bad thing given the tone the word was used in. I quickly came to realise that looking at things from the lens of a woman was frowned upon. It was only in law school that I finally began attributing the right words to my so-called feminist feelings. It dawned on me that asking for safety, inclusion and parity is no sin as long as you ascribe the socially acceptable words for it. If a woman’s choice to terminate her pregnancy is because she is unmarried and her partner refuses to accept her after sleeping with her, her choice is shaped by the fear of social stigma. In making such a choice, she is operating from a place of distress over possible ostracism. At the root of her choice is gender inequality. Translating this question of gender inequality into a language that is not only accessible but easy to understand was the goal I aspired to live up to.

On a more personal note, and to answer your question regarding what factors impacted my growth - for as long as I can remember, a much younger version of myself would tag along with my father to functions I wasn’t invited to. Abba being rather proud of the fact that I look exactly like him would introduce me to almost everyone. When people questioned him about having "only two daughters", he firm, "Yes" with utmost resoluteness in his eyes was enough. Each time such an incident has occurred, I have wondered if we have progressed as a society contrary to how Bollywood movies sometimes depict us to be.

Marital rape, dowry deaths, and honour killings are some of the many issues that are far from over. In a country where half a billion population of women are still struggling to find an equal place, where do we need to go back and make changes so violence against women is uprooted altogether?

I could list the gains and losses in the decade that has passed since Nirbhaya but it won't be enough. We need more than that. The women and girls of this country deserve more than that. We need to introspect and reflect, both on a personal and institutional level, on where have we gone wrong, and how we stray from the path that was laid down before us in the aftermath of Nirbhaya. Could we have done more? If the answer is yes, then there is still time. We can make up for time lost. We can do more to strengthen our laws and have a robust system in place that does not allow for procedural lapses. We can have a judicial gender sensitisation training system that ensures victims are not subjected to re-traumatisation.

We can allocate more resources and personnel to Fast Track Courts and precipitate our specialised redressal mechanism. We can expand the definition of consent to make it more gender-responsive by affirming what consent is. The list of possibilities is endless.

To conclude, the word “Nirbhaya” means she who is without fear. But every woman and girl in this country lives in fear. Fear for her safety, for her well-being. Fear of being raped, groped, molested, assaulted — to name a few forms of assault. The question here is: Are we, as citizens, informed enough? Will we cater to this change or simply wait for another girl to be named Nirbhaya?

Drawing from your experience, what would you advise aspiring women advocates?

Honestly, I may not be the best person to answer this question as I have a mere three years at the Bar but I can tell you what I have imbibed from my mentors and the women members of the legal fraternity whom I look up to and that is to be fearless in your pursuit of excellence.

Feature Image Credit: Mayank Austen Soofi

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