GAY CALCUTTA

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIII, Issue 121, 25 May 1942, Page 4

GAY CALCUTTA

FACES BOMB THREAT

WHAT OF PURDAH WOMEN?

(By DOROTHY C. JOHNSON) NEW YORK. Colourful saris and tin hats, khaki shirts and slacks, the all white uriform of the St. John Ambulance volunteer nurses, these are the fashionable feminine clothes of Calcutta today. For when I recently left India, Calcutta, one of the largest cities of the British Empire, had certainly aroused itself from any complacency it may have had at the beginning of the European War. To-day European and Indians, whether Hindu. Moslem or Christians, are to make a firm stand against any Japanese bombardment from air or sea.

Two years ago India seemed remote from the war. Of course a huge army was being trained, every suitable factory was used to produce war materials, European men were conscripted up to fifty years of age and men were gradually being sent overseas. But petrol was not. rationed, money was plentiful, and the gay social life of Calcutta, renowned all over the East, still held sway.

Calcutta is a city of extremes. Merchant princes live in their palaces in the smart residential sections of the town. A few blocks away is the other extreme. Hamlets of mud huts, set in squalid streets, house the majority of Calcutta's one million and a half inhabitants. Here in these huts thousands of women pass behind purdah curtains. Poor, ignorant and illiterate, they live completely unenlightened lives.

Bombings Will Brine Chaos I know what purdah life means, and 1 can visualise what chaos will come to these backward homes, shut in by their out-of-date, antiquated customs when the most deadly missiles produced by modern science are hurled on their roofs. Innumerable cattle, held sacred by the natives, stroll unconcernedly about the streets of both rich and poor sections. Motorists always must be careful not to injure a wandering cow placidly chewing her cud in the middle of a busy street and many a time have I stepped into the gutter to pass a large bull that has chosen to take a siesta on the sidewalk. Now with blacked-out streets these cattle are an even greater nuisance and will probably become a menace if many Indian owners follow the example of the wholehearted blackout fan who painted his two white cows black! Many European women scarcely know how native Calcutta lives. A few years ago, travelling out to India, I met a charming young American matron. During the month-long voyage she appeared at dinner in a new frock every night. I asked her one day if she really thought she could use so many dresses when she reached Calcutta. "I shall need all these clothes," she said, "and I shall have to have them all copied by local tailors if they are to last me out till I go home again in a year or two. My life in India is just a whirl."

Changes Since the War And for most of us life certainly was a whirl. For the first year of the war this changed very little. Morning bridge and mah jong parties gave place to knitting and sewing parties. The innumerable social events in private houses, the clubs and Calcutta's two best hotels, the Great Eastern and the Grand, were held in aid of war charities. But thev were the same gay parties. The winter months have a pleasant climate, and the Christmas race meeting is famous all over India and visitors flock to the city. Rich maharajas, devoted to racing, fill the hotels. The Governor and his wife entertain in the huge white palace that was the Viceroy's house until 1912. Official parties and balls are the peak of social life. But the war clouds drew closer. More and more Indian troops sailed from Calcutta's docks for Malaya. A partial blackout was decreed, and the evening "chota peg" or highball coincided with drawing the blinds. This jerked us into a realisation, of what might yet come. We women plunged into the heart of things, our gay life cast aside. Stenographers found plenty to do, mechanically minded women drove trucks and ambulances. The sick returning from overseas were met by a smart women's ambulance corps. Most of us had taken a first aid course, but the vice-reine urged all who had no home ties (and many a husband had gone overseas) to take a three-month nursing course in the hospitals. As inducement a salary was offered which, shorn of all compulsory payments for food and lodging, left the prospective nurse with about 20 rupees (30/) a month pocket money! But the question of air raid precautions was the most urgent, and the crowded native sections offered stupendous" problems. Few fireproof buildings exist outside the business section. Digging shelters for all the population was out of the question. The native quarters would be just so much tinder for

incendiary bombs,and the mass of ignorant occupiers and timid purdah women would need considerable care and control.

Trained Indian Girls Ready

It is to the Indian men and women that Calcutta's A.R.P. organisers turned for help and they have responded wholeheartedly. In empty shops, houses and in the schools the educated and emancipated young Indian women sat side by side with men training to cope with air attacks that might be as fierce as any England endured.

Fortunately, there are many Indian women doctors. All passengers arriving or leaving India must pass a medical examination and present their vaccination certificates. I have passed many such examinations and always there has been a pleasant, efficient Indian woman doctor in charge of the female passengers. These doctors are not highly paid by Western standards. For a fully qualified experienced doctor a resident position at a hospital might offer anything from 30 to 100 rupees a month (50/ to £7 10/). But it is to these doctors and to the Indian girls trained in A.R.P. that the purdah women will turn desperately for help.

Most of the A.R.P. workers are college girls, and their thirst for knowledge has made them throw off their religious inhibitions sufficiently to take their place in a modern world. They hitch up their gay saris tighter round their waists, perch tin hats on their sleek black hair, and, stirrup pumps and sandbags in hand, they go out to practise on fires and incendiary bombs in the back yard.

Of course European women are training too, to protect their homes. They are probably dealing now with pitiful evacuees 'who have escaped from Malaya. Hospital facilities have to be increased.

India is. facing a stern test, but whatever the Japanese may choose to do by sea or air they will not find the city of Calcutta unprepared.— Auckland Star and N.A.N.A.