It began as a regular statement against gender bias. But development organisation STEPS, now made up of some 8,000 determined Muslim women spread across Tamil Nadu’s southern districts, is rewriting history.

While a national debate raged about a common nikahnama and triple talaq, Pudukottai’s Muslim women quietly established the first all-women Jamaat in the world. Now, in the town’s orthodox backyard, a mosque will rise where these women can pray.

Of course there was bound to be opposition. When the all-women Jamaat first raised their voice in unison for a mosque for themselves last year, the local Jamaat offered a piece of land at Parambu village in Pudukottai district.

The mosque was to be a ‘‘real one’’ with minarets and even a woman moulvi well-versed in the Koran and the Islamic tenets. But after fierce protests from Pudukottai’s conservative Muslims, the local Jamaat hastily withdrew its offer.

Now the members of STEPS are secretive about their plans for the mosque. ‘‘We are determined that a mosque will come up soon. But, we don’t want to say anything more about it,’’ said founder Daud Sharifa Khanam.

The movement demanding rights for Muslim women began rather diffidently about 15 years ago. In Manapparai, in the neighbouring Tiruchirapalli district, Sharifa was the tenth child in a Muslim family. As a young girl, with a rebellious streak and wild imagination—‘‘I would even dream about wearing a necklace of burning coals around my neck’’—Sharifa opposed tradition and refused to wear the burkha. She questioned the inequities of the Shariat laws and dreamt of a world where women and men lived ‘‘the way they should’’.

  How they got justice for themselves  

• All-women Jamaat gives Muslim women a forum for resolving disputes without bias • More than 15 petitions relating to nikah disputes are received by the Jamaat • The women now want their own mosque though conservatives are opposing it

Initially, it was just a trickle. ‘‘The men would abuse me and intimidate the women from approaching me for help,’’ said Sharifa, a post-graduate in history and office management from Aligarh University. But now, more than 15 petitions relating to mostly to nikah disputes flow in every day, amazingly many directed to STEPS by the other Jamaats. The cases are tossed over to the 35-member Tamil Nadu Muslim Women’s Jamaat Committee for solutions. In the last one year, the committee has solved 55 cases.

Every time a petitioner knocks on the STEPS doors, the case is perused by the committee members and taken up for discussion at the monthly sittings. At these sittings, which take place in a different district, both the men and women involved take part in the debate, mediations or negotiations.

‘‘This is so unlike what happens in the other chauvinistic all-male, one-sided Jamaats. The women can never present their side. Decisions are taken based on the man’s version alone and talaq is pronounced without hearing what the woman has to say in her defence,’’ pointed out Sharifa.

For instance, Sajjida Banu (23) of Pudukottai was not only tortured by her in-laws for more dowry but also abandoned by her husband. The local Jamaat refused to sympathise. ‘‘Sajjida finally came to us. We got her husband jailed and we are also trying for a decent settlement for her,’’ said Sharifa. Sajjida is now an active Jamaat member.

Initially, before the all-woman Jamaat put on its battlegear, it went around pleading with the all-male Jamaats to be reasonable and fair while settling disputes. Soon, it decided to take matters in to its own hands. The Jamaat Committee aimed to ensure human rights, social empowerment and improved standards of living for Muslim women. If the men or their relatives refused to heed to its decisions, it threatened to take the cases before the police.In the case of one Fowsia Banu (21), the Jamaat got her out of a marriage to a deaf, dumb and allegedly impotent man.