Most of women from Maharashtra state of
India are observed with some black tattoos on their face or on other parts of their
body. Almost all women are seen having these tattoos on their body. Even in
this 20th century, it is being followed by Maratha women as tradition of their
culture. Then a question come to our mind, what could be a reason behind this
tradition in past that Marathi peoples are still following this. In my
contacts, I asked to many Marathi peoples about it, but they couldn't answered
me properly. But i think my mom answered me properly. The answer of this
question is not found from Maharashtra a south western state of India. But I
got the answer from Odisha a South eastern State of India, means my mom is from
typical Odiya culture. She told me that during Mughal era of India, Muslim
intruders were ruling in India. Hindu Maratha women were kidnapped and rapped
by Muslims. Some time they get married to those women and using them like sex
slaves. Many stories that i have listen from my mom about Mughal emperor. She
had heard those stories from her grandmother. Recently once, I was seeing
tattoo in my mom’s hand written as "HARE KRISHNA" and i ask her about
that tattoos. She explain me as below.
Mughal emperors were trying to spread
Islam by converting Hindus to Islam in ancient India. As per the Islamic law,
making tattoos on human body is considered as anti-Islamic. In Islam, it is a
kind of taboo. From such persons, Muslims stay away and don’t keep any
relations with that person and even they don’t do sexual relation with them. It
was the biggest reason for Maratha warriors to challenge and defeat most of Mughal
emperor in south. In ancient India, Marathas were knowing the weakness of Muslim
emperors or can be said anti-Islamic activity that they were following to keep
away Muslim peoples. For Maratha emperors, it was their prime responsibility to
safe their women from being raped by Muslims. Hence, making tattoos on face and
other part of body becomes a tradition to follow in Marathi cultures. Not only
in Maharashtra but also other part of India, it is followed. But somewhere it
is followed as their culture and somewhere not being followed. In ancient India,
wherever Marathas conquered the region from Mughal, basically in south India,
influence of this Marathi tradition is observed.
Thank You
