Whisper of Steel

How much is a zillion? I think I know after a visit to the Imphal’s Ima Market – the women’s market as it is called. Zillion is the number of fish sold at the market, along the streets around the market, and at the entrances and the exits.

For a vegetarian, it is a living – or is it dead – nightmare. Very dead, beady eyes staring up at you sullenly, mouths angrily open, scales that shine in the sun in silver melancholy. Occasionally, the startling sight of a fish leaping up in the throes of its final agony as it is kept in two-cm deep water, meant to keep it barely alive.

And the smell – it is the kind of smell that has even my fish-crazy North Indian friend go green at the gills and black out and lie sprawling on the wet floor. Really! Truly! Literally! She is probably the only one in the entire market who had a fish-eye view of the palm-covered ceiling of the market yard. No one other than the prone fish has the time to look up.



But then the other things in the market are as overwhelming as the piles of fish. The colours of Manipur are vivid, varied and vibrant. Traditional clothes that hang from the wooden pegs, stacked neatly like towers of wool and cotton. Knives, spices, handicrafts, trinkets, jewellery, dolls, fruit, vegetables – everything.

The women sit in their alcoves, their square of space on the endless platforms that are rowed up along the breadth of the market enclosure. The thatch-covered tin roofs shut out the sun, who nevertheless peeks through the walkways in between, slowly seeping through the roof edges and dripping through the gaps in the ceiling. And the light takes many hues as it bounces off the million things that clutter the market.

And the rainbows reflect in the faces of the women. So that, the most colourful are the women themselves. Crinkly-eyed, rosy-cheeked, dapper in their shirts and wraparound sarongs, the women preside over the market with resplendent poise. Their greetings, their smiles, their thank yous and their pleases are all like the graceful motions of a peacock.

But these women are not just all silk, spice and swan down. They are strong and steely too. Numbers show every second household has a drug user or a positive person. And it is the mothers, daughters, sisters and wives who are standing by them, helping them to find their moorings.

The women’s market is not just a traditional hub, it is also a contemporary process for the women to earn for the family, to sustain the economy and to ensure some semblance of order in a society torn by many insecurities.

The serenity in the faces of the women belies the turmoil inside. Their indolent posture belies their sheer dynamism. And the sights, smells and movements of ordinariness in the market belie the simmering layers beneath.

Ima markets of Imphal are a study in non-militant feminism. Of women power sheathed in daily life. Of human spirit breaking through the cobwebs of obscurantism. And, of unknown shades of colours you thought you knew.