‘Asan Bibir Panchali’: A Bengali Islamic devotional folklore that opposes female infanticide

We live in an age of clear definitions. Confusion is disavowed. Entanglements seen with suspicion. One is thus either religious or secular, Hindu or Muslim, progressive or conservative, either feminist or patriarchic, Brahminic or Dalit, and so on. Yet, beneath the glare of these high-definition categories, there continues to flow a subterranean current of everyday existence that continually confounds definitional clarities. Asan Bibi’s tale is a yarn floating in that current.

Recently, I picked up the little book of less than twenty printed pages at a bookstall at my local bazaar in Chittaranjan Park, New Delhi. Both its title, Mushkil Asan Bratakatha ba Asan Bibir Panchali, and the striking cover image of a pot-bellied fakir that had caught my eye. Booklets with bratakathas – stories performed alongside minor rituals – of various popular Hindu deities are common at the store, but I had not seen any conspicuously Islamic material before. Moreover, while there are indeed numerous bratas in Bengal, and indeed there are several published compendia of these, I had never met Asan Bibi amongst them.

The curious case of Asan Bibi

Bibis are a curious and liminal feature of the Bengali religion. They are Muslim goddesses and are often worshipped in anthropomorphic forms like Hindu goddesses. Their very existence grates…

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