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gokupg A Pocket Of Resistance | Women's Day Special

From the series, “Kissa Goi”. Artwork by Sonal Varshneya From the series, “Kissa Goi”. Artwork by Sonal Varshneya

A woman has a figure, a man a physique;

A father roars in rage, a mother shrieks in

pique;

Broad-shouldered athletes throw what

dainty damsels toss,

And female bosses supervise-male bosses

boss.

Lads gulp, maids sip:

Jacks plunge, Jills dip;

Guys bark, dames snap;

Boys punch, girls slap;

Gobs swab, WAVES mop;

Braves buy, squaws shop.

A gentleman perspires, a lady merely glows;

A husband is suspicious; a wife, however,

knows.

—Man & Woman-The Great-Man Thoughts by William Walden

When I got out of the airport at Patna this evening, I was greeted by a woman dressed in a salwar, sweat running down her face, clutching a handbag and asking the passengers if they needed an auto.

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“Do you need an auto?”

I didn’t, but I asked her if she had been driving an auto for a long time. Not very long, she said.

There were five of them there.

I wanted to tell her she should get pockets stitched to her kurta.

Like I do.

Large ones. It helps. There is a strange freedom in not holding a handbag, in defying the expectation of accessorising ourselves.

I have to keep reminding the tailor to put them in on both sides. He is very amused by these demands, like me wanting big pockets like how men have. Maybe even deeper. On both sides, too.

I tell him I don’t want to carry a handbag.

It is a political act. Two journalists, Jan Diehn and Amber Thomas, researched the modern-day differences between men and women’s pockets in their article, Someone Clever Once Said Women Weren’t Allowed Pockets, for the online publication The Pudding.

The sizes of pockets in skinny jeans for women were 48 per cent shorter and 6.5 per cent narrower than men’s skinny jeans of the same size, and in straight jeans for men and women of the same size, women’s pockets were 46 per cent shorter and 10 per cent narrower than men’s straight jeans pockets, they observed.

Our phones are of the same size. Our money, too. Our ID cards are of the same proportion.

For a long time,66br Melhores Slots no Brasil women weren’t allowed to have pockets, a signifier of traditional gender roles that have repeatedly surfaced and vanished in women’s fashion. Fashion’s insistence on form and shape and decoration also point to a real connection between oppression and fashion and capitalism. Pockets in women’s clothing might make the appearance bulgy, so they said. They had hips and breasts. Pockets would interfere with the form and shape. Enter handbags. An opportunity. Like jewellery, handbags became accessories for class and caste, too.

Women At Work: Outlook’s Women's Day Issue On Breaking Gender Stereotypes

BY Outlook Web Desk

During the French Revolution, pockets were banned in women’s clothing because the French government suspected women would conceal “revolutionary materials” in their pockets.

Therefore, pockets are not trivial. They are deeply liberating. They represent defiance against gender roles.

The hyperfeminised women’s styles kept making a comeback. With the beauty industry preying on women’s insecurities, decorating oneself became almost a necessary aspiration.

In 1954, Christian Dior famously stated, “Men have pockets to keep things in, women for decoration.”

But women have always fought back. Sunita, who works as a cook in our home in Patna, has never carried a handbag. She tucks her money and phone into her blouse. Her revolutionary material is contained on her being. She lost her husband shortly after she got married. She had two little children then and remarriage wasn’t an option. She worked hard and has finally built her own house on her own terms.

All work could be categorised as non-traditional for women. They have been forever only expected to take care of the household. And each time, a woman has ventured out into the world, she has had to fight to exist, to flourish and to be. They have been confined to their own category with a prefix “women”, like “women filmmakers, women directors, women drivers, etc”.

Consider the fight for a humble pocket. It carries the universe. For us.

As an editor, there’s always that contempt that one has to deal with. Newsrooms are unkind places for women journalists, like the world in general. You are to listen, to comply and if you don’t, you are called a slave-driver, a fool, a non-person for men and even some women who have yet not realised that even pockets were denied to our kind. There are too many expectations from us. Expectations that are oppressive. We must shake them off. Like handbags.

This issue is for us. For women who work.

Let’s raise a toast to the pocket in women’s clothing then. For women who smash expectations and gender roles.

A pocket is non-negotiable.

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Bigger, the better. To hold everything that we are.

Chinki Sinha is editor, outlook Magazine

(This article is a part of Outlook's March 11gokupg, 2025 Women's Day special issue 'Women at Work', which explores the experiences of women in roles traditionally occupied by men. It appeared in print as 'A Pocket Of Resistance’)