Bibi Baria

By Nafeesa Syeed, *Kashmiri women find a spiritual space of their own* - The Guardian - London, UK; Tuesday, September 6

Although women can pray on the grounds of other holy spots in Srinagar, at this shrine they aren't sidelined

At the shrine of Bibi Baria in Kralpora, a few miles outside of Indian Kashmir's capital of Srinagar, men are barred from entering the tomb of the 14th-century saint. It's a rare chance for Muslim women here to engage in a spiritual space that is all their own. It also feels far removed from unrelenting political tensions in the region that have included occasional strikes and protests this summer.

In downtown Srinagar stands a shrine dedicated to Baria's father-in-law Mir Sayyid Ali Hamadani, a Persian saint who locals credit with spreading the Sufi-oriented Islam that took hold in the valley of Kashmir. (He's buried in Tajikistan.) Women are allowed to pray outside the sanctuary, but if they try to step inside they are immediately reprimanded.

Here, however, the opposite holds true. Men are permitted in the tiled courtyard of Baria's shrine, but Zoona Malik, an elderly voluntary caretaker, shoos them away if they want to enter. In the past, Malik says, men who went inside became blind.

Atop the brown-brick shrine sits the pagoda-like layered roof and pointed pillar characteristic of Kashmiri architecture. Devotees lower their heads to the steps at the entrance, and some then kiss the ground.

The wrinkly and bespectacled Malik, who doesn't know her exact age but is a long-time visitor to the shrine, says women often come to ask from God – through the saint – with help conceiving a child or curing an illness.

"I come here to serve her," Malik says of the saint.

In addition to the well-maintained tomb, there are two large structures the religious organisations responsible for the complex have built exclusively as women's prayer halls.

At midday in early August, in the first week of Ramadan, about 10 women line up in a row for the congregational prayer service. They follow the imam, or prayer leader, whose voice is carried through a loudspeaker from an adjacent mosque, which is separated from the Baria compound by a brick wall. The setup runs counter to most mosques in south Asia that usually do not have accommodations for women or even allow them to enter the worship site.

Although women can pray on the grounds of some other holy spots and mosques in Srinagar, here women aren't sidelined to the periphery, but rather act like they own the place.

There are at least a few other shrines scattered in the valley where ladies are buried. The tradition of having a female religious guide also is not foreign to Kashmir, where some living women pirs, who act as spiritual advisers to individual disciples, still exist.

Inside Bibi Baria's resting place, women sit barefoot on green carpets, raising their hands and crying their woes and wishes, with the refrain, "Ay maeni khudaya!" (Oh, my Lord!) to punctuate their orations. Dozens of multi-coloured threads and ribbons are tied to the door handle, representing the prayers they hope are answered.

If they attain what they seek, then they will have to return, unknot the amulet and offer thanks.

Picture: A Kashmiri Muslim woman prays outside the shrine of Sufi saint Mir Sayyid Ali Hamadani during Ramadan in Srinagar. Photo: Fayaz Kabli/Reuters.