New Delhi, March 8 -- There are poems that live in books, and there are poems that live in the bloodstream. For me, one such poem has always been the searing nazm by Sahir Ludhianvi -- a poem that arrives like a mirror held up to civilisation.

Aurat ne janam diya mardon ko, Mardon ne use bazaar diya, Jab jee chaha masla-kuchla, Jab jee chaha dhutkaar diya.

A woman gave birth to men, and men returned the favour by turning her into a marketplace. When they wished, they crushed her; when they wished, they cast her aside.

Sahir wrote those lines in anger. In ache. In accusation.

But whenever they surface in my mind, they stir something softer and stronger: gratitude. Because the women who shaped my life did not merely give birth to men. T...