Abstract
Cooking and women share a discursive relationship in Indian social and cultural spheres. The culinary practices of women not only reflect the gender norms prevalent in Indian society but also in Indian marriages. Marriage as a social institution in India adheres to the protocols of gender relations that regulate the culinary activities of married women in the domestic sphere. The present article attempts to unveil the politics of gender working overtly and covertly in Indian matchmaking and conjugal relationships through the analysis of women’s culinary practices in the recently-released Hindi film, Tarla (2023) directed by Piyush Gupta. In order to do so, the article takes a feminist standpoint in its investigation of the central character, Tarla’s cooking activities in her marital and professional journey. Tarla chronicles the biography of the Indian culinary icon, Tarla Dalal, and thereby represents the working of gender norms and rules that regulate women’s lives in Indian society. Through the vignette of Tarla’s journey, the film adds new dimensions to the general discourses on Indian feminisms that view cooking as only repressive and unresourceful. By analyzing the film, the article aims to broaden the horizon of feminisms by positing the agentic and mediative potential of women’s cooking.
