Indigenous Feminism and Women Resistance: Customary Law, Codification Issue and Legal Pluralism in North East India

In this article the author intends to situate the concerns of women in feminist movement discourse and discuss the gender implication of customary law in the ethnographic milieu of North East India. Indigenous feminism, which developed out of a need to define the complexities arising through the interface between race, ethnicity, and gender, is a political and cultural movement that seeks equality. In recent years there is growing demand for gender parity and resistance to outmoded customary laws, which are replete with patriarchal tenets that deny indigenous /tribal women the basic jural-political and economic privileges and human civil liberties. Using the legal anthropological approach, it is argued that appraisal of gender perspective of customary law in northeast India can be best accomplished by reinterpretation of kinship rules and customs vis-à-vis rights issue of women in broader context of legal pluralism. In order to highlight the complex status syndrome of women in Northeast region and their struggle in the face of ‘law-codification’ and intruding hazards of state-legal domains, some case studies are cited to show enduring resistances of women organizations in the region.

Keywords: Indigenous Feminism, Customary Law, Legal Pluralism, Law-Codification and Women of Northeast India.