noun

• 1The practice in certain Muslim and Hindu societies of screening women from men or strangers, especially by means of a curtain.

  ‘he never required them to observe purdah’

  More example sentences

  • ‘she was supposed to be in purdah upstairs’
  • ‘The idea that if one gives up a customary religious practice such as purdah, that one is ceasing to be a Muslim altogether is an egregious misrepresentation of what it takes to be a Muslim.’
  • ‘He deprecated the practice of purdah and sati, encouraged inter-caste alliances and remarriage of widows.’
  • ‘We hold separate gatherings in our home and observe purdah as much as possible so it isn't that we're looking for any way possible to go against the commandments of Allah.’
  • ‘For example, women do not practice purdah, or seclusion.’
  • ‘Their wives wear burqas and observe strict purdah.’
  • ‘The degree and kind (the actual veiling or seclusion) of purdah observed by women has varied across time and place and from family to family and is also related to class status.’
  • ‘He tried to liberate women from the practices of purdah (wearing a veil) as well as preaching strongly against the practice of sati (Hindu wife burning on her husbands funeral pyre).’
  • ‘He proposed abandonment of purdah and more freedom to women..’
  • ‘On the contrary, teenage girls today are observing purdah.’
  • ‘Outlawing of polygamy and purdah within Islam and a call for the emancipation of Mulsim women also find place in that period.’
  • ‘Traditionally, the custom of purdah (seclusion of women) was not followed.’
  • ‘The idea of purdah was acquired from Persian and Byzantine societies, which secluded women out of deference and honor, not in order to humiliate them.’
  • ‘During purdah they deliberately avoided issues that may breach purdah.’
  • ‘Its famous Palace of the Winds is actually just a wafer-thin facade designed to enable the court's women to observe processions in style, without compromising their purdah.’
  • ‘For a woman, a death in the home - with purdah, which literally means curtain - is a death of honor.’

  Synonyms

  isolation, solitude, retreat, privacy, privateness, retirement, withdrawal, purdah, an ivory tower, concealment, hiding, secrecy, peace, peace and quiet, peacefulness, quietness, lack of disturbance, lack of interruption, freedom from interference

  1. 1.1count noun A curtain used for the purpose of purdah.
     ‘The memory of his grandmother's rousing speech to the electorate from behind the purdah when his mother contested in the elections is the event he recalls as the most moving in his life.’
     More example sentences

     • ‘Learn to read, and while you are seated behind the purdah you may make a tour of the whole world.’
     Synonyms

     window hanging, hanging, screen, blind
  2. 1.2A state of seclusion or secrecy.
     ‘the supermarket's own self-imposed purdah on the GM issue’
     More example sentences

     • ‘expect the lawyers to re-emerge from their temporary purdah when the legislation is published’
     • ‘He has barely been seen or heard in the media since he went into purdah in the wake of the donation revelations.’
     • ‘Do they want him to go around hanging his head in shame, in some sort of judicial purdah?’
     • ‘Although in the forties, women in the "family way" were no longer confined to their homes to conceal their delicate conditions, those conditions were still confined to a kind of cinematic purdah.’
     • ‘Will you be imposing a pub-opening purdah?’
     • ‘Phil struggled to get back to reality after his purdah in the UK.’
     • ‘Children's reputations stand and fall on the size of the goody bag their guests are offered—if it doesn't contain a computer console, a DVD, and a phone they will be in social purdah until their next birthday.’
     • ‘Having escaped the law her only option was self-imposed purdah on a remote Scottish island.’
     • ‘It's a magnum opus of a double album, too, which is good news, for if all she had managed to come up with after a dozen years in purdah were 10 songs and 40 minutes of music, we might well have felt short-changed.’
     • ‘It was almost like saying, "please, please go into purdah and don't appear until you've had this child and look like a normal human being again."’
     • ‘After eight years of purdah, the former presidents have finally emerged into the glare of the television cameras.’
  3. 1.3British The period leading up to an election, during which government departments generally refrain from making any new announcements.
     ‘it is very difficult at the moment with the election on and the government in purdah’
     More example sentences

     • ‘Government regulations require councils to remain strictly impartial once an election is called, commonly called the "purdah" period.’
     • ‘It seems unlikely that they will all go off on holiday for the duration of the election campaign or adopt the equivalent of the ministerial purdah.’
     • ‘With the civil service now going into purdah for the European and English county council elections, an announcement isn't expected until next month.’
     • ‘Election purdah is no longer just those few weeks of a campaign, it should be now really.’
     • ‘It was election purdah at the time so the concordat was not released.’
     • ‘The Commission knows of no reason in law why a budget should not be presented during an election campaign, although by well-established convention significant government announcements are avoided in the "purdah" period running up to general elections.’
     • ‘The data was said to be delayed because of the official "purdah" period, which prevents civil servants from releasing overtly party political information, even though this only officially begins once the election has been called.’
     • ‘The implication was that the government is bound by pre-election purdah—the convention that the civil service does not make major announcements in the six weeks before elections.’
     • ‘She had rejected that objection on the grounds that the campaign ended before the start of the local election "purdah" period.’