Oh These Rehnumas

Oh! These Rehnumas! - The focal leitmotif of the novel Oh, These Rehnumas! is to bring out the representative voices of women crushed into helpless yet simmering silence by the all-powerful patriarchs who claim to be their benefactors. Taha Akhtar, a modern young journalist is caught in the quagmire of constrictive mind set of the people of her own community which obstructs her from carving her own destiny. There is young Nazma too, who is oblivious of the fact that she is trapped in an abusive relationship and in all her naivety believes the marital rape to be her husband's love. Their resultant angst lends a greater credibility to the struggles they face day in and day out. The characters are wonderfully nuanced and relatable inducing the readers to shed the veneer of detachment and identify with their dilemmas and predicaments. The crisp and compelling dialogues present rather candidly their concerns of self-esteem and identity. The effortless ease of the nimble narrative and the deft writing style keeps the reader glued to the novel. Oh, these Rehnumas! raises several pertinent questions about the status of all those Muslim women who belong to an even more marginalized section of this minority community and simultaneously evaluates the age-old patriarchal construct embedded in its social fabric in an equable manner.