Turning Tables

In Imphal’s Ima Keithel, Which translates to “women’s market” in English, approximately 3,000 women or “Imas” have been the face of it for five centuries. Born from necessity in 1533, when men marched off to war, these women, the Meitei community’s backbone, rose to the challenge—they took to the fields, wove textiles, and sold what they made to sustain their livelihoods. As more and more women joined the force, “Asia’s largest all-women market” came to be.

While this market has become Imphal’s one-stop shop for everything, from local ingredients to textiles to toys, it is a symbol of women’s resilience that found expression in 1891 when these women protested against the reforms introduced by the British favouring external trade. Even today, Ima Keithel continues to be an all-women-run show, as authorities have forbidden men to set up shop.