From Art to Taboo: The Tawaifs of Avadh

Women have always held symbolic roles throughout history. Honour, resistance, and national symbols converge in the image of the woman. Where, then, did the courtesans, the tawaifs, lie in this social structure? Were they different from the other women in society? Tawaifs were one of the most influential women of their time. Their historical terrain is as rugged as it can get, especially against the backdrop of the Indian national movement.

The word “tawaif” is an Awadhi term for the immensely skilled women who enjoyed the zenith of their profession during the 18th and 19th centuries. Purveyors of all that is rich in art, fashion, and taste, they combined the Persian and Indian forms, which we later inherited as Kathak, dadra, and thumri. They were possessors of refined intellects, a heightened sense of humour, an expensive sense of fashion, and luxurious lifestyles, and they held agency in deciding upon their clientele. Their history, however, has been a rugged terrain featuring royal patronage, politics, social ostracization, gradual decline, and now almost obsolescence.

In the 18th century, the centre of culture and art moved from Shahjahanabad to Awadh. The historian Abdul Haleem Sharar explains, “The court of Awadh had emanated from Khurasan and adhered to the Shi’a faith. Thus Persian culture, which had been nurtured in the stately and majestic laps of the Sassanide and Abbaside dynasties, permeated the society of Lucknow.” In 1775, Nawab Shuja ud Daulah moved the court from Faizabad to Lucknow. These were also the times of the fall of the Mughal Empire, which formerly patronized the courtesans. They found patronage then in the noble courts of the nawabs.

The English synonym for “tawaif” is courtesan, which signifies a “court person”, i.e., they were active participants in the court activities. Abdul Halim Sharar, in his 20th-century work, documented the history of the Nawabs of Awadh using accounts from survivors of 1857. He discussed the influence of tawaifs in court politics, noting that Hakim Mahdi, the vizier of Awadh, credited his success to a courtesan named Piyaro. According to Sharar, Piyaro financially supported Mahdi’s initial appointment by providing funds for a nazr (offering) to the Nawab. Tawaifs also exercised effective influence on the nawabs’ decision-making, be it personal or political. Their patrons kept them well-paid and indulged them in meaningful conversations, including literature, poetry, puns, and politics. It was for this intellectual finesse that the head of the kothas, the courtesan quarters, usually called ‘khanum’ or ‘chaudhrayan’, used to employ teachers for the musical and literary instruction of the courtesans. Even during the rule of the East India Company, they played a pivotal role in mobilising the masses and providing financial aid to movements. Having gained enormous wealth, they became so affluent and politically strong that it’s said even the governor’s retinue was stopped to let the most famous courtesan pass through.

The first War of Independence of 1857 proved a nail in the coffin of the tawaif culture of India, which was already depreciating with the fall of the Nawab and the usurpation of his province. Under the rule of the Crown, they faced the brunt of heavy taxes and depleting resources. They had even participated in the Indian War for Independence. Azizanbai, a courtesan initially from Lucknow who later moved to Kanpur—then Cawnpore—instigated the Indian soldiers to lay siege. She was said to ride in men’s attire on horseback and wield weapons. The kothas became hiding places and meeting venues for the rebels. Gauhar Jaan, an influential courtesan, was approached by Gandhi for his contribution to the Swaraj Fund in the 1900s. Veena Talwar Oldenburg, in ‘Lifestyle as Resistance,’ writes: “These women, though patently noncombatants, were penalised for their instigation of and pecuniary assistance to the rebels.

On yet another list, some twenty pages long, are recorded the spoils of war seized from one set of ‘female apartments’ in the palace and garden complex called the Qaisar Bagh, where some of the deposed ex-King Wajid Ali Shah’s three hundred or more consorts resided when it was seized by the British.

It is a remarkable list, eloquently evocative of a privileged existence: gold and silver ornaments studded with precious stones, embroidered cashmere wool and brocade shawls, bejewelled caps and shoes, silver-, gold-, jade-, and amber-handled fly whisks, silver cutlery, jade goblets, plates, spittoons, huqqahs, and silver utensils for serving and storing food and drink, and valuable furnishings.”

The retaliatory measures of the British Empire after the “Sepoy Mutiny” of 1857 proved detrimental to the tawaif system in particular and the Indian subcontinent at large. Firstly, most of the private property of the courtesans was confiscated. Oldenburg describes the symbols of luxury that were found in their quarters. Oldenburg goes on to talk about their sexual fluidity and agency, wherein they even engaged in intimate and sexual relationships with their fellow courtesans. The British morality that propagandised sexuality as a taboo villainised these women as “promiscuous, characterless, debauched,” and contagiously unclean, not worthy to be in company with. Their patrons having been deposed, their profession suffered a lethal blow. Besides, for further stigmatisation, the Contagious Diseases Act of 1864, aimed at reducing the spread of venereal diseases in the British troops, curbed the courtesans’ bodily and financial agency by categorizing them as prostitutes and stereotyping them as diseased.

In the late 19th century, the anti-nautch movement gained momentum, spearheaded by Christian missionaries and Indian reformers. Public sentiment shifted significantly against courtesans and dancers during this period. As mass resistance to British rule unfolded with the Swadeshi and non-cooperation movements in the 1900s, the social status and financial standing of most courtesans had significantly declined, presenting a stark contrast to their influence in 1857. Women involved in the national movement echoed discomfort at the involvement of “debased” women, their influence alongside them, and their moral standards dictated by colonial virtue.

Modern cinema portrays an image of the courtesan as a self-sacrificing woman or as one fatefully forced into the profession out of binding circumstances. Umrao Jaan, e.g., was sold into being a courtesan by her kidnappers. However, interviews and documentaries clarify most women’s willingness to step into a profession that promised them agency, provided them a doorway to the world otherwise dominated by men, and ensured a life of luxury and female bonding. This was also an attempt to get rid of natal or conjugal exploitation and oppression— the idea of “qismat badalna.” In the late 19^th and early 20th centuries, Tawaifs evolved into mere prostitutes, termed “randi.” This shift, coinciding with colonialism, embraced a “sugrihani” ideal akin to the Victorian housewife, legitimized by medico-legal language. This moral transformation labelled all ‘itinerant and deviant’ individuals, including female entertainers, as ‘deviant’ through the lens of venereal disease.

The demise of the Tawaif marked more than the extinction of a cultural expression. It symbolized the forceful deprivation of agency and esteem from those who once possessed what intensified patriarchy loathed—sexual and economic autonomy, along with a standing in the respectable sphere. Their obliteration, aimed at furthering the colonial agenda, further decimated a culture rich and vibrant with dance, music, and art.

Ifrah Fatima is a student pursuing English Honours from Jamia Millia Islamia.

Edited by: Moneera Aiman