The older I get, the more I realise that being modern isn’t about rejecting everything that came before us.
It is about having the freedom — and perhaps the wisdom — to decide what we want to carry forward.
I observe Karwa Chauth. Not because I believe a woman’s fasting determines her husband’s longevity. Not because I need a ritual to prove my love. And certainly not because I have stopped questioning things.
I do it because somewhere between the logic and the symbolism, there is something I value — the anticipation, the little rituals, the connection with women before me, the dressing up, the moon, the laughter and the feeling of being part of something that existed long before me.
I can question the literal belief and still respect the emotion behind the ritual.
I can be an independent, educated, fiercely opinionated, modern woman and still wear my bangles, celebrate my festivals and fast if I choose to.
Perhaps that is what being truly modern means to me: having enough confidence in my own intelligence to examine a tradition without automatically dismissing it.
Which is why I was rather appalled by Ratna Pathak Shah’s description of modern, educated women observing Karwa Chauth as “appalling.”
Not because she chooses not to observe it. That’s entirely her choice.
But because dismissing another woman’s choice to observe a tradition seems strangely at odds with the very freedom and agency that modern feminism is supposed to champion.
A woman doesn’t become less educated because she observes a fast. Nor does she become less rational because she finds meaning in a ritual.
And as Nityananda Misra’s response so thoughtfully points out, perhaps the first step towards rejecting a tradition should be understanding it — its history, symbolism, cultural context and evolution — rather than assuming that what we don’t personally believe must therefore be irrational.
That distinction matters.
Modernity is not the ability to sneer at tradition.
It is the ability to question it, understand it, reinterpret it and — if we choose — carry it forward on our own terms.
I don’t need to reject my roots to prove that I’ve evolved.
I can evolve… and still keep my roots.
And perhaps the most modern thing of all is this:
Allowing another woman the same freedom to choose her traditions that we demand for her freedom to reject them.
