Theorizing Women’s Resistance: Navigating non-state values in the shadow of state law in India

The Indian justice system consists of a multiplicity of state and non-state dispute resolution bodies, which constantly engage with each other. However, one of the strongest criticisms of legal pluralism comes from proponents of gender equality as some of the orders of these non-state, male bodies violate women’s rights and autonomy based on cultural norms of unity, solidarity and honor. This research explores one such non-state dispute resolution body, the Khap Panchayats in Haryana, India. Most scholarships have focused either on the functioning of Khap Panchayats or the critical analysis of their patriarchal orders against gender equality. However, not much has been researched about the everyday resistance of women in these societies. Therefore, this research looks at how women in these communities exercise their agency through navigation between state law and non-state values. In the first part of the paper, the author situates this complexity within the historical development of modernity in India and the consequent emergence of codified family law through colonial subjugation. The “repressed” pre-modern (non-state traditional bodies) has challenged the universality of modern law and questioned the understanding of concepts of stability and order in society. This chaotic tussle does not mean absence of order in society, rather as Masaji Chiba argues, communities have certain core values, different from modern values, which drive the contextual meaning of order. In the second part, it is argued that this chaos carries within itself the seeds of resistance by women from the community. The prevailing view often frames women’s negotiation and resistance within the Khap Panchayat as an inherently dead-end endeavour, positioning the sole viable means of liberation as seeking recourse within the formal, state-enforced legal framework. This provides a reductionist view that essentializes women as helpless while overlooking the quotidian exercise of women’s agency. Hence, the present study adopts ethnography to understand the ways in which women navigate between the disciplinary power exercised by state and non-state institutions, not as a passive recipient, but as an active agent. This is done by focusing on the complex, everyday negotiations women engage in within their communities in relation to marital decisions.