Chitra Ganesh by Rahel Aima, 4 Columns, 2018
It’s the late nineteenth century in the British Raj. In my colonial tropical fantasy it’s a swampy, starry night. A fancy begum, an aristocratic lady, is reclining in a cane-and-Burma-teak easy chair. Her name is Sultana, she wears filmy whites and her mogra-scented hair is unbound. She is, in her own words, “thinking lazily of the condition of Indian womanhood” when suddenly it’s morning, and her friend Sister Sara materializes to take her on a whirlwind walking tour of Ladyland, a place that sounds like it should be sponsored by Kotex but isn’t.