#surnamechange

[ablanariwho]

Who Am I

Part II

Surname swapping - a cause of social identity crisis for women

Have you read the first part of ‘Who Am I’? Now you would imagine the identity crisis a woman goes through after her second marriage.  This surname issue has perpetually put me in a “Who am I” state.

After I got divorced, I discarded the marital surname as waste and took back my maiden surname. I also changed the spelling of my first name as per numerology. I did it in the hope of adding some good luck, if not a windfall, in my life. It also gave me a sense of a fresh identity, a new beginning. Then the second marriage happened. But I did not take the trouble of changing my surname this time as by now I had realized “what’s in a surname”. I checked with my second husband if his patriarchal ego remained intact by this decision of mine. He dared not say the truth and affirmed his support for carrying on with my maiden surname.

But it’s not about me and my husband. The world around us is not yet used to this kind of defiance of tradition by women. So, the confusion surrounding my identity began. It caused a severe culture shock to several people in society. Salt to the injury was the surname of my children. They stayed with me and not their father, yet carried their father’s surname. We ended up as a family, with almost every person having different surnames. In that sense, we were not related to each other by a single thread, as the custom is - the surname of a man. A complete breakdown of tradition and concept of a family indeed!

It started with the courier guy.  He refused to acknowledge me as my husband’s wife and handover to me, in his absence, his bank documents. The moment he saw my government ID card with a different surname, his whole world turned upside down. He ran away for his life, which in this case was his job. He also refused to hand over to me my daughter’s credit card in her absence. She was not married, yet carried a different surname. It neither matched with mine nor with my (second) husband’s. He would freak out at such inconsistencies. I found it so difficult to explain to him how this had happened. It was beyond his comprehension. He refused to believe my identity as her mother!

Illustration by Vidya Bhamre

The second person who got the shock of his life and in his entire career for the first time was the census man. He had come to take the demographic data of our family as part of the census. He was also equally puzzled when he heard we all had different surnames, yet claiming to be a family. Once he could fathom the issue of the surname in our family, he asked me about our family caste with a lot of annoyance. I was also confused and did not know what to say. I knew this was going to break the census man’s patience if I said I was not sure of our 'family' caste.

  The scenario was like this.

 My second husband belongs to the Kshatriyas - the warrior caste. I am a Brahmin by birth, supposedly a superior caste! My children are also Brahmin going by their father's caste. As per tradition, women get married in the same caste. In inter-caste and inter-community marriages, the woman converts into the caste or religion of her husband. “Going by that norm, do I now belong to the warrior clan?" The question was hanging on my mind like a pendulum while the census man was fidgeting.  I ran through my thoughts and did an inky pinky ponky to decide what was my caste at that moment. "Did I like the stories of Shivaji, Rana Pratap or Jhansi ki Rani as a child? Yes, I did," pat came the answer.  "Do I have awe for men in the Indian army from the warrior caste?"  "Yes, I have. I sleep in peace knowing well they are there to take care of our security at the borders. I admire their efficiency in rescue operations during floods or other disasters," the voice in my head prompted.  Yet, at the same time, I knew guns and wars scared me. I was not courageous like the Kshatriya women. I was comfortable at preaching though - like a  pro-Brahmin!  "How can I  now imagine myself belonging to the warrior caste while I am by birth a Brahmin?"  I reminded myself shifting of caste, community and Gotra of a girl happened in marriages. No wonder mine must also have gone through that magical transformation.

Then I did some quick calculations of profit and loss in the process.  Nowadays, Brahmins jostle for the meagre 20% general quota in government education and jobs with other higher castes. It is a penance for the sins committed by their ancestors. Kshatriyas are the other sinners and hence contenders for the same quota. So same status. No pain, no gain. "Next", my calculation continued, "Brahmins still enjoy a position of superficial respect in society. Even today they own the exclusive liaison service business between deities and mankind."  "But only Brahmin men have the entitlement to that position and respect, not women,"  my mind quipped.  "Okay, what about Brahmin's power of cursing? Brahmins do not need any weapon like Kshatriyas to fight a war. They have the power of cursing to destroy an enemy. I guess there is no gender discrimination in that. Both men and women have this power,"  I told myself.  I was trying hard to find out some feasibility for not letting go of my superior caste by birth. "But people are no more scared of them. Your cursing doesn't work anymore," said the modernist in my mind. 

After considering all the pros and cons, I felt it would be safe to go with my weaponless Kshatriya husband. Let patriarchy win and the census man be happy. It was quite a big jump in shifting my caste though, I was not sure whether upward or downward.

There was another conundrum. My children from my first marriage are also Brahmins by birth. Being their mother I should have been in the same caste. But because I married again, mine had changed. How could they be part of 'my' family then? "Because you are their biological mother. You have their sole custody," the feminist in my head retorted.

Looking at the census man’s offensive mood, I dropped the idea of expressing my dilemma. I felt it was safe to say we all belonged to the warrior caste of my second husband. A complicated lengthy explanation of the situation would have been riskier.

Illustration: Vidya Bhamre

The officials at the Directorate General of Foreign Trade and the Election Commission of India also had a tough time figuring out who I am. I had applied for an IEC and a Voter ID, respectively. They got flabbergasted by this surname phenomenon in my case. They corrected the information given by me in my applications. They put my husband’s name in place of my father’s name and vice versa. That made sense to them going by the surname system in patriarchy. They found it annoying that I did not even bother to wear any sign of marriage. There was neither a pinch of vermilion on my hair-parting nor a mangalsutra around my neck. It would have made their lives easier in perceiving me as a married woman and not put them in this type of confusion. 

I had faced the ugly, intrusive questioning by men in some other cases too. The Director of a management college and the Director of a radio station scoffed at me for not wearing signs of marriage. Not being able to identify a sexually viable woman’s marital status inconveniences men a lot. They become unsure about when, where, how much and which way to vest their sexual interest in them. I failed to convince them that the concept of one marriage and repeat of it in the next seven lives is redundant. I told them, “Nowadays there is no certainty of a marriage lasting till ‘death do us part' in one life. Forget about repeating the same mistake in the next seven lives with the same person. So, it would be better if society stops this tradition of changing women’s surnames to their husbands. Let it be only their father's or parents' surname. Parents are the only constant factor in their biological identity. Let that be women's social identity too. It would save the trouble of changing it in official IDs and KYC of banks, insurance companies. Earlier, there were no hassles of government IDs such as PAN card, Adhaar card, Ration Card, Voter ID, Passport, Driving License. Changing the surnames of women after marriage was a smooth, one-time, verbal procedure.

The conversion of surname, caste, the community is an intangible process. Yet presumed and accepted to be true. It is a faith, projected as a fact. 

Society is also in flux. Women are becoming educated, empowered and self-reliant. They are opting for choices such as divorce, re-marriage and single parenting. Society is in a dilemma whether to remain patriarchal or shift to a matriarchal system. The latter would also be frightening and equally problematic. It may become ‘ambiarchal',  if that could be a new word to define a new societal system of gender equality! 

Hence, how does it matter if a woman does not change her surname after marriage? Women can still be no less a wife and a daughter-in-law. Patriarchy should get over this insecurity and need to re-brand women after marriage. Finally, in my case, tradition overruled my defiance of it. I got my voter ID card with the ‘corrected’ version of my information inputs. The competent staff of the Election Commission of India did the honour.  As per my Voter ID, my husband, despite being younger than me, is my father! The possible reason could be his surname didn't match with mine, a married woman. My plea to change it remained unheeded to date!