The New Kashmiri Woman: State-led Feminism in 'Naya Kashmir'

Influenced by the leftist ideals of the Naya Kashmir manifesto, the post-partition state governments in Kashmir sought to empower its women. Scholarly work on this period covers how it was a particularly liberating moment for Kashmir's women. Using an autobiography and oral history, the existing scholarship on the meanings of the "Naya Kashmir" moment for Kashmir's women is critiqued. Even while Kashmiri women were able to benefit from a number of economic and educational opportunities, we must be cognizant of the ways in which the state became the purveyor of patriarchy. One of the shortcomings of this period of state-sponsored feminism was that no indigenous, grass-roots women's movement emerged in Kashmir, given that those working on women's issues in Kashmir were exclusively dependent on the state, which was becoming deeply contested and politicised.