The ‘WOMAN’ Problem

                                                                               

When a mother delivers a girl child in India, many a times she cannot confidently and openly rejoice on becoming a mother. She is scared that she might offend her husband, her in-laws or even her cousins and neighbours! And thus, her joy of motherhood is stifled by the patriarchal mindset of her family and the society at large. To a mother, her baby is the most precious boon, whether it’s a daughter or a son. But the society tries to restrict her natural emotions if she has borne a daughter, to show off only one of its very cruel sides.  

However, what is saddening is that most women actually expect this to happen. Most women know that the society has laid several restrictions on them, and while you may say that they have ‘learnt to live with them’, it can also be rightly said that they have resigned themselves to their fate without the desire to put up a fight. Sadly, they also ingrain the same ideas in the daughters they give birth to; some going to the extent of even taking pride in their situation as it only proves they are resilient. So in all earnestness, doesn’t that mean that the actual problem here is the Women themselves? 

Biggest Problem of India: Women reconciled to their fate

In the past, women were kept in purdahs and the reason behind this was that any man other than their husband should not see them. Society had strictly forbidden women from showing their beauty in public, but had never restricted the men from spending countless nights with courtesans leaving their wives at home. Also, polygamy was allowed in our society, which again was an event of tremendous emotional trauma for each of the women who were married to one single man. 

Though these customs have been declared unlawful in modern India, in many pockets of rural India they are still very much alive. And many other such ill practices against women exist till date too. The reason? The root of this widespread malice is Women themselves. Indian women have reconciled to their fate, with many actually believing that they are destined to suffer. Thus they can never even sum up the courage to protest against the wrong doings of men within the domestic periphery, forget the injustices done within the larger societal circle. 

No matter how much feminists clamour for women rights, women empowerment or women emancipation can never be successful if women themselves think suffering at the hands of men is their fate and don’t come forward to avail those rights.

Why are women encouraging the next generation to believe the same?

An alarming aspect of this so called ‘Woman Problem’ is that those women who have been bred to believe that they were born to serve men and suffer the tortures inflicted by men quietly, actually instil the same values within their daughters.  Why do that, when in this 21^st century they can gain strength from many examples amongst the society that clearly prove women can be equal to men, but only if they try to assert their rights?

In all earnestness, the episodes of misfortune and drudgery of Indian women in this world of men passes over from one generation to another to become a vicious cycle. The only ones to blame here is Women themselves. If you have suffered in silence because your mother taught you so, why not make a difference and teach your daughter to stand up for her rights? Why not give her the right education and guidance, so that she has the confidence to make her own place in this man’s world?

Are we worsening the situation by taking pride in the current situation?

You have perhaps heard your grandmothers and mothers say that a woman once married off can leave her husband’s house only when her bier leaves the courtyard of the house. In other words, they believed that no matter how much torture your husband or your in-laws inflict on you, you have to suffer with cowed silence and live with it until you die. Parents do not support a young daughter who wants to separate from her husband because he tortures her, often because they believe that once married a woman must stay in her marital home, no matter what. And that is what gives sadistic men the courage to continue these tortures, knowing that their wives are helpless and have nowhere else to go. 

Also, most mothers till date tell their daughter she must learn to cook, sew and handle household chores if she is to please her husband and in-laws. In fact, most start teaching their daughters the same once she hits puberty, in order to prepare her for married life, irrespective of the fact that the girl might actually be an all A grade student with a bright career possibility. Why should the woman be resigned to do all household chores, when she could be as successful as her husband? 

These are but a few examples. There are countless such examples where mothers encourage their daughters to put up with these obsolete rules our society has created for women, and actually take pride in them. 

As a popular Hindi saying goes – ‘Those who do not stand up against a crime are just as much to blame as those who commit a crime’. Therefore, before we try and change the societal mindset, what really needs to undergo a change is the mindset of women themselves. Only when a need for a better tomorrow for themselves and their daughters stems from within them, will it impart them with the real courage to fight for it.

Dowries and Death

                                                                              

As an enlightened and aware Indian citizen you probably read the newspapers, magazines or listen to daily news, all of which tell tales of the magnanimous scale of violence that Indian women in our so called modern society go through every day. India’s classical past and its rich cultural heritage accorded women a designation of honour and a treatment equal as men. But gone are those days of classicism and culture; today as you read about the increasing rate of atrocities and violence inflicted on women, you are perhaps compelled to wonder if we have actually changed for the worst with all the education and modernization the Indians have acquired for themselves. Has modernization given birth to greed given which has awakened the hidden devil within us? 

Being a woman in India is damn challenging; for some women every single day is a battle as they live through lewd remarks, harassment and sexually inappropriate behaviour at the hands of strangers. But what when the torturers are people you call your own, your very family?  One of the most common crimes against women that have existed in our country for many decades is Dowry-related crimes. Dowry crimes are so very rampant in India and they have such a long history that today these crimes are known worldwide as the typical ‘Indian’ crimes. 

Types of Dowry Crimes & Vital Statistics:

Dowry-related crimes can be of many types: wife-bashing and various other sorts of domestic violence inflicted by husband and in-laws on a bride, marital rape, acid throwing, creating emotional trauma on the bride through ceaseless threats, and last but not the least, robbing the bride of her life if their dowry demands are not met.

 When a woman is married off, she spins a web of dreams regarding her new life with her husband in a new family amid her in-laws. But when they treat her inhumanly by battering her, abusing her verbally, torturing her for money and so on, she is made to go through the most harrowing experience of her life. Not only is her world of dreams shattered to a thousand pieces, she might also become prone to depression as our society frowns upon those who lift a finger to accuse their own family and drag them to courts.

The culture of avarice is flourishing in our country, and also increasing is the goriness of the dowry-related crimes. You’ll recoil in terror if you go thorugh the statistics of deaths upon dowry in India. In the year 2012, 8233 newly-wed brides were murdered on the basis of dowry-related issues, as recorded by the country’s National Crime Records Bureau. 

One very noteworthy dowry death that generated ripples all across the nation was that of Pravartika Gupta who was murdered last year. She was charred to death in the bedroom where she was sleeping with her daughter who was just a year old. Her in-laws had threatened her because her parents could not hasten their dowry payment schedules. There was an agreement that her parents will pay an amount of £15,000 in hard cash and will also purchase a Honda City four wheeler for the in-laws. But suddenly they started demanding that her parents should also buy a lavish apartment which was nearly impossible for Pravartika’s parents to afford. As a result, Pravartika was sentenced to an untimely and gruesome death.

Laws against Dowries Meaningless: Why so?

There are laws in place against Dowry in our country, but in spite of that, Dowry crimes continue to play their menacing role. This is because the laws come with many loopholes.  In fact the 1961 Dowry Prohibition Act has been proved more or less ineffective due to some fundamental flaws. 

For instance Section-3 of this Act declares dowry system a punishable offence for both dowry taker and dowry giver. Now the dowry giver is always under pressure, he cannot easily lodge a complaint because he doesn’t want to ruin the chances of a prospective wedding for the daughter in the family, and is also scared of encountering legal sanctions. So this clause is a defective one. 

Section 7 of this act declares demand for dowry as a non-cognizable offence, which implies that lodging a complaint for it is mandatory. And for many people, being scared of getting involved in unnecessary legal hassles, wasting time, money and resources are the main reasons for not seeking help. Furthermore, this act declares dowry offence as a bail-able one, which implies that the convict or guilty can be released on anticipatory bail no matter how grave a crime (e.g. bride burning) they have committed.

Changes are Needed

As is obvious, death and dowry go hand in hand because laws in our country are lacking in so many aspects. Two necessary steps that have to undertaken to combat the evils of dowry are: 

1. 1. Dowry laws need to be sterner
2. 2. The judicial procedure pertaining to dowry crimes needs to speed up

Only once these changes are incorporated, will dowry become obsolete in our country, as the in-laws and husband of bride will think twice before committing these inhuman crimes.

Making Marriages Work

                                                                   

Everyday two out of four marriages in our country fall apart. These numbers are alarming, because there was a time when divorces were unheard of in India. However today, these are a lot more common, which is why there is a need for improved marriage laws that can safeguard the interests of the woman.

A divorce or separation not only shatters all dreams a woman might have fostered for her married life, but many a times also leaves her struggling to make ends meet. Especially if the man has decided to leave his wife and family to fend for themselves, a mother can be left with no option but to knock on every door possible for financial help. And why should she, especially if her husband decided he doesn’t want to be with her but another woman?

Some say working women divorcees are in a better position financially, but ‘divorce’ is a big thing indeed. Her parents might have spent lakhs on the wedding and on the dowry, which she can’t be expected to let go off just like that. So apart from all the pains & bitterness that involves a divorce, women often struggle for justice in this male-dominated Indian society. 

A look at the Marriage Laws (Amendment) Bill

To safeguard the interest of married women and to make marriages work, on the 26^th of August, 2013, The Marriage Laws (Amendment) Bill was passed by the Rajya Sabha through voice vote. Just take a look at some of the new clauses of the new bill:

This bill intends to make amendments to the 1955 Hindu Marriage Act & 1954 Special Marriages Act. According to the amendments made, irretrievable marital breakdown was regarded as a ground on the basis of which divorce would be granted, plus divorcee women were allowed to have a share in their husband’s property after separation. Also a clause in this new bill declares that the court, if convinced that no adequate provision has been arranged for maintaining the children of the couple applying for a divorce in a way consistent with the economical condition or financial capabilities of parents, might limit the grant of the legal order of divorce. 

This new bill even empowers the woman to oppose the grant on the ground that a broken marriage might dump her into grave financial crisis. The new bill declares that the court will restrict any divorce grant if it is not sure about the adequacy of the provisions made for maintenance of the off-springs born out of the marriage. 

Next, the court will not consider that an irretrievable breakup of marriage has taken place unless it’s proved in court that both the parties that have filed a petition for divorce, and have stayed apart from each other for a period of at least 3 years at a stretch. Also, if any of the parties wilfully remain absent from the hearings in order to evade harassment in the court, the bill declares that the court will safeguard the interest of the party and will not go ahead with divorce proceedings in that party’s absence; but will rather keep it inconclusive.

What are the grounds for divorce?

If you are currently contemplating a divorce, it helps to know more about the subject. The Hindu Marriage Act 1955 lists various grounds in its Section 13, on the basis of which divorce can be granted. Some of these are:

•  Adultery
•  Lunacy
•  Desertion
•  Cruelty
•  Conversion to some other religion
•  Renouncement of world
•  Missing for more than seven years
•  Contagious venereal diseases
•  Leprosy and more

Special Marriages Act 1954 too lists similar grounds for divorce in its Section 27. However, under Section 13-B and Section 28 of Hindu Marriage Act and Special Marriage Act, divorce through mutual consent of the parties is also specified as one way of getting divorce. Here, the court gives the parties a notice of 6 months, and if the parties withdraw their petition within this six months their divorce is annulled, or else after the stipulated six months the court does basic enquires and grants a divorce. 

However, cases are common where one party, who is in favour of keeping the proceedings inconclusive, doesn’t turn up in court hearings and causes an unnecessary delay for the party that wilfully wants to end the marriage. Maybe this is an area that needs to be looked in to, with new rules made to limit the time-period for which one of the partners can avoid court hearing, so that a legal divorce is not put off indefinitely.

Challenges of being a woman in India

                                                         

Women, the seat of creation is but neglected and underrated in a country like India, where the traditional spiritual beliefs hail Mata Shakti who too is emblematic of woman power. You’ll find people lighting uncountable lamps, offering pujas and donations everyday at the temple of the Goddess, but simultaneously inflicting horrendous torture on the women in their own house or in the society at large. Such contradiction or better to say ‘hypocrisy’ exists in our country where women are forever miserable under several spoken or unspoken misogynistic social rules & regulations that have been favouring the men always.

Even today, though India moves towards a brighter tomorrow, being a woman can still be a challenge. And sadly, all the changes you do see are evident only in the metro cities, while it can safely be said that the women of rural India still have a long journey to cover before they can expect a life where they are treated as an equal to men.

Urban Indian women get more opportunities; the rural ones still deprived

After the Indian independence, certain positive changes were seen in the condition of women. The waves of the feminist movement that started in the west revolutionized the entire world and India too came under its impact. With the changing times, westernization & globalization took the modern India into its grasp, but all the influences were limited to the urban India only. Even today when we talk of the modern independent Indian women, we always have the educated urban woman employed in some high profile job in mind. None of us, very honestly, think of the conditions women in the rural or the most remote parts of India live in. Why is it so? 

It’s because at the bottom of our heart we too know that when we talk of gender equality, progress and upliftment in modern India for women, these changes are actually limited to a minority concentration in the urban areas or metro cities; rural India is totally beyond it. Better education facilities, schools, colleges, universities, offices all exist in the towns and not in the villages. So urban women who get a better exposure to these facilities can only get a strong foothold on society through economic independence, while the unfortunate rural women are deprived of all these life-changing factors. 

Rural India sinks into discontent when a girl child is born!

With illiteracy, comes the darkness of ignorance. Even today in many of rural Indian homes, people lament when a girl child is born. Since in villages they don’t get proper exposure to educational facilities, most never being sent to school at all as they are considered a ‘burden’ that must be married off soon, they cannot appreciate the worth of a woman; the hidden power in her. 

If a girl child is born often the in-laws show utter discontentment and blame the mother for giving birth to a girl. This is because these rural mother-in-laws themselves have no knowledge of the science behind reproduction; still believing the woman is to blame when a girl is born. At times she will be the one who will go to the extent of committing the crime of female infanticide.

Male-dominated mentality very much prevalent till date

In other words the male-dominated mentality of the people living in the Indian society is still very much prevalent. This is because it’s not possible to deconstruct the age-old male-dominated social construct of the society in a single day. 

Be it dowry-related bride burning or the sexual violence or rapes that are so rampant now, be it domestic violence or marital rapes, be it early domestication of women or the growing problem of eve teasing India reflects its societal mentality; you find a glimpse of ‘anti-woman’ male-dominated mentality each and every time a new crime is reported.

A lot more change is needed

Though modern Indian woman claims to be educated and independent and she feels that she has every right to pursue whatever career she wants, society however very tactfully rather in a very scheming manner fences her out of some of the domains which are still very much called to date as the ‘man’s domain’. 

For example you’ll hardly come across women drivers, labourers, industrial workers and bartenders. In the sports field, mechanical field, Army, Navy, Mining fields too, the entry of women is very limited which indicates that the society even in this 21^st century is not ready to open doors in these fields for women whole heartedly. 

Be it rural or urban India, the challenges of being a woman is evident everywhere. These challenges might have a different face in different places, but we are still far from having overcome them to offer true ‘upliftment’ to the Indian woman.

The Window

                                                                                 

Things that have been happening around us over the last few months have compelled us to question the humane feelings in us. We, as Indians, have in fact become dubious about our civilization, our sophistication, our education. Hundreds of times, all sensible citizens of India have questioned themselves: ‘Are we really civilized? Or have we achieved nothing in the name of civilization and still retain in us the savage traits of the primitive caveman?’ These are the questions that have perhaps haunted almost every responsible Indian mind after the ceaseless and horrendous incidents of rapes, gang rapes and sexual violence taking place in the country almost every day. 

India’s society has always been a male-dominated one. The society has constructed certain bastions of authority & power for the males. But today we see a lot of changes as men and women join hands in their journey to take our country towards a brighter tomorrow, where women and children are safe and men can strive hard to become their saviours and partners, rather than their tormentors. Yes, India is waking up!

India is not just waking up; it’s creating a storm

Acts of rapes and sexual violence are not new in our country. Yet what is new is the awakening; women are no longer so scared that they suffer as silent victims. In the past victims shied away from reports acts of brutal crime as they felt the society will overlook their tears and inevitably sling mud on them. So rape cases never got media exposure or came under public notice. 

But today, when a rape occurs, it is not only the rape victim alone but the entire country seethes and puffs with hatred and anger towards the rapist  and comes together to ensure that justice is served. This is the key indicator that our country has been startled up from its state of slumber and things are indeed changing now. 

The public outcry and the outrage as an aftermath of the incidents of rape and sexual violence are in fact a sign that India has not only undergone an awakening; it’s literally creating a storm now. The frenzied mobs are burning effigies, sometimes holding quiet candle-lit vigils or holding mute marches, along with rallies with banners bearing anti-rape slogans and demand for justice. 

The Face of a New India 

The recent news reports of rapes in India have tarnished the country’s image in the International arena, and resulted in adversely affecting the number of foreign tourists that visited every year, which was a shattering blow to the country’s tourism industry as well. Nobody wants to come to a country that’s labelled unsafe for women. However, more importantly, nobody wants to live in a country that’s labelled unsafe for women. And that is what brought about a change in the outlook of the government and the people. As the government came under pressure from either side, serious measures were taken to deal with the issue with a stern hand.

However, our country is full of fanaticism of all kinds-religious, political, feministic and so on. These fanatics create unnecessary problems and agitations and cause the government and law-making bodies to lose their focus from the immediate cause. These people can be called as a great impediment in the way of achieving something good. But thankfully, today they are simply being ignored and outlawed as India is desperate to give the innocent sufferers justice and is turning a deaf ear to the fanatics. 

Women are bolder in the face of this positive change, showing the courage to open their mouth in front of the camera even after they have suffered a rape. They feel that they have no reason to feel ashamed or hide their face; it is their perpetrators who should feel that way. That is in fact a step worthy of salute and indicates how bold today’s women have become. Today you will find a rape victim lying in a hospital bed not fearful of giving an interview, pledging to take revenge for what she has suffered by punishing the rapists. This is today’s Indian woman-bold & spirited!

But it isn’t just the women who are changing; you see a shift in the mentality of Indian men too with this awakening. They are participating shoulder-to-shoulder with women in the anti-rape campaigns, protesting when they see any kind of misbehaviour towards women by other men on the streets, becoming conscious about the safety of female members in their own house, transcending the feelings of gender bias and so on. So much so, it is no longer fair to generalize all men as ‘inhuman’ anymore.

This is the face of the new India, where Government is strict, fanatics outlawed, women bolder and men more responsible.

Justice does exist; Authorities do wield their power:

After the Delhi Gang rape incident, certain necessary amendments were made in the anti-rape laws of India. The police forces in different parts of the country too have started playing a very active role, putting many rapists behind bars. Very recently, the death sentence of the rapists involved in ‘Nirvaya’ rape case was announced and this shows that the concerned authorities have started to become more aware of their duties.

To sum up, things seem to be falling slowly into place one piece at a time. It may take some more time for our country to walk the right path, but we can expect that a ‘safe for women’ India is not far away. Today’s public agitation in fact is symbolic of a ‘Window’ through which you can catch a glimpse of a brighter tomorrow for Indian women.

The Broken Mirror

                                                                        

In an Indian social set up families rejoice when a son is born while lament when a daughter is born. But every woman, at the bottom of her heart craves for a daughter no matter how many sons she has mothered. There goes a saying that daughters can be a mother’s best friend and vice versa. So is that the reason why women crave to have a daughter they can call their own? There are many layers to this psychographic. 

Actually, most women in India have at some point of time in their life been subject to oppression, suppression, physical, mental or emotional tortures; be it in their father’s house or in their in-law’s house. Women are often asked to stand aside no matter how talented they are and yield place to the men of the house. When they become mothers, they wish for a daughter who would grow up to be like them but will not compromise with her dreams as they did.

Daughter: Reflection of or Reaction to the mother

A daughter, by virtue of her sex, tries to imitate the mother more than the father. She tries to be more like her mother, trying to emulate the way her mother dresses up, the way she talks, the way she walks and more. When the daughter starts growing up, her mother’s beauty and femininity and the way she behaves seem quite interesting to her, and she tries to be like the mother by learning the same and following in her mother’s footsteps. In that way, from the very childhood the daughter becomes a reflection of the mother. 

Every mother tries her best to bring up a daughter who is responsible and confident, so that her own unfulfilled hopes and aspirations can be fulfilled through her daughter. However, if the mother goes through bad times; i.e. she is tortured, beaten up by her in-laws and husband or is struggling for money, that too has an impact on the daughter. She becomes aggressive towards the men of the society in general and acquires a cynical or non-conformist attitude towards life. In that way she again becomes a reaction to what’s going on in her mother’s life.

Mother should be an example to her daughter

Most mothers don’t even realize that their daughters have turned into their reflection. ‘Reflection’ means a mirror-image, which implies that their daughters lack an individuality of their own. It is important for mothers to instil their values and character believes in their daughters, but it is equally important to give enough scope for the individuality of the daughter to amplify as well. 

It is in fact the mother’s responsibility to not just teach the daughter a way of life but inculcate and lead by example the life she wishes for her daughter. Only then will the daughter be motivated enough to follow her instructions, implement, and judge by herself what’s good and what’s bad by seeing a practical example. This will help hone her individuality and will also ensure that she takes the best of her mother’s traits, while tries to develop a unique character of her own with confidence. 

Few Blunders that mother commit to make their daughters a ‘broken mirror’:

If mothers have been going through hardships and tortures, the first impact of all these come on the daughter. This is because most women psychologically feel that their daughters could be their confidante; she too will grow up to be a woman one day. Some women start sharing all the experiences of their trauma with their daughter even when she is too young to understand it all. In other words, mothers tend to burden their daughters with the trauma of their experiences from a very young age, something that can scar the tender mind of a child for a lifetime.

Many a times when the daughter starts growing up, instead of befriending her, the mother starts seeking a consoler in her. This is because most Indian women have an emotional vacuum in their life, a loneliness which they are desperate to brush aside. Most of the time they cross the thin line between a ‘friend’ and a ‘consoler’ and look for to their daughters to become their crying shoulder.

All the bad experiences that the mother shares with her daughter have a negative impact on her psychology and on her innocence. Therefore, it is very important that a mother understands that while she has a friend in her daughter, she still is her child’s first teacher and first guide. It is very important to choose carefully what you share with your daughter, and the way you put forth a certain situation in front of her. After all, do you really want your daughter, who is trying to be your mirror image, to starts reflecting your traumas in the form of a ‘Broken Mirror’?

The Bleeding Woman

The society of India is predominantly a patriarchal society where manhood is extolled and womanhood is given a secondary status, often a life of servitude under the shadow or sympathy of a man. At least this was the picture before women could acquire economic independence and educate themselves. 

While things have improved to quite some extent in the urban areas, in rural India however, the patriarchal domination and exploitation of women in the hands of males have not changed much. Here, women still suffer at the hands of a testosterone driven society, where men make all the rules and women comply. 

Indian society: Are we a testosterone driven construct?

Indian society has always given undue importance to men. Society discriminates between man and woman and has ingrained an ugly gender bias that has cast its roots deep into the society. Gender bias no doubt is a construct of our society where men are born as well as bred to think of themselves as a superior gender; a superior sex, while woman the inferior one. 

It is true that our society has a ‘testosterone driven construct’ where men by virtue of their male hormone, testosterone, think of themselves to be all powerful and assume that they can do anything with the other sex; i.e. ‘the woman’ who is biologically weaker. 

A society full of superstitions:

Our society in fact has lots of taboos, dated concepts and superstitions. Sometimes these superstitions surround Birds, sometimes animals, sometimes inanimate objects and sometimes women. For instance the cry of a raven or mewing of a cat is considered an ill omen. Also if a cat crosses the road people stop and wait for someone else to cross before they can resume their journey again because that too is considered as something portending ill-luck. Often you have heard of people worshipping stones, boulders, Banyan trees and may have even seen it. 

Indians believe that some spiritual power seats on these sources. Women too are sometimes held unlucky, especially widows, those who are childless or infertile, those who have not been married off or the ones whose husbands have deserted them. Society tries to defame them by spreading rumours, especially in rural India, are almost ostracized. 

However, have you ever noticed that strangely enough, our society has never associated men with any sort of ‘ill-luck’? Isn’t that enough of a sign that we are in fact a Testosterone Driven society where men can do no wrong, while a woman can easily be blamed for things that don’t always go right?

Women associated with all bad things

Since Indian society is a patriarchal construct, it implies that men wield all the power. So they always see themselves in a favourable light while give woman a sub-human abominable status. They never hesitate to associate women with all things bad. 

It’s a shame that even in this 21^st century when a girl child is born to couples in rural India, the family is not happy because they wanted a son. The in-laws blame the woman for giving birth to a girl child and call her names and treat her badly. And even though science tells us that it’s not the woman but the man who is responsible for the sex of the child, these people will still find no fault with the man but blame only the woman. 

Why does our society forget that it is a woman who showed them the light of the world; it is she who forms the origin of life?

Some men have changed but not all

With changing times, some men have changed their attitude towards women. They have been able to transcend the gender bias and are honestly trying to participate in the attempts made to minimize gender gaps. But this is the picture in some parts of urban India only. The older generation, plus the population in rural India, still cling onto the absurd traditions and beliefs. 

Isn’t it time that our testosterone driven society made a few changes, and gives women the respect they deserve?

The Journey of a Widow

                                                                      

Widowhood in India is a life of heartbreaking plight for a woman, or so it was a few years ago, though some things have changed for the better, thanks to the efforts put in by social activists and NGOs coming forward to fight for their cause. But even today, the age-old stigma associated with widowhood cannot be wiped away. Why is that? Why should a woman suffer further at the hands of the society, when she is already struggling with the shock of having lost her husband? 

Widows: Outcast in ancient India

The plight of an Indian widow can well be understood if we go back in time and take a look at the grim picture of widowhood back then. Our society looked upon widows as ominous and unlucky. They were kept out of all social festivities and celebrations and made to live the life of an outcast in a dingy den. The moment a man passed away, a life of ongoing tragedies began in the life of the ‘Indian widow’. 

Widows received various forms of maltreatment. The life of the young widows became highly unsecured because there was no end to lechers even during that time. With the death of their husbands, the Indian widows in fact were given a life which was no better than ‘death’ itself. At the root of all the tortures - mental & physical, lay a good number of superstitions surrounding a widow and plaguing her life. 

It was believed that as the husband has passed away, so had all colours from her life. Widows were restricted from wearing colourful saris or any other garb. They were forced to smash her bangles, remove their mangalsutra and wipe their sindoor or any other thing that would denote her marital status. Also widows were considered a ‘de-sexed’ race. So it was believed they had no need to look attractive. They were restricted from wearing jewellery, made to shave their head completely, wear plain white sari, forbidden from eating anything flavourful such as garlic, onions and non-vegetarian food items like eggs, fish and meat. They were made to hold fasts many times in the course of a month and eat only fruits at the day’s end. If a widow ever looked up at any man, it was considered sin on her part and society punished her for that.

The inhuman practice of widows being burnt alive on the husband’s funeral pyre or the practice of Sati is not unknown to anyone of us. Yes, it was rampant in our country before Raja Ram Mohan Roy raised his voice against it. This custom took birth from the superstition that since the woman was her husband’s partner when he was living, she should also accompany him to the other world.

Also often young widows were held responsible for their husband’s death. They were snubbed as an ‘ill omen’ for the family by the in-laws; a ‘witch’ who had devoured their fond son. And then the in-laws started all types of inhuman tortures on her. This was again a very common superstition that plagued widows of the earlier times.

Picture Today: Changes with time 

Today many things have changed for the better. The garb & dietary restrictions for widows have vitiated and it’s a matter of a widow’s personal discretion. Today widows don’t wear absolutely plain white sarees and neither do they don’t hold fasts so frequently. Also widows shaving their head and customs of Sati have become totally obsolete in our country. Today widows can live a normal life, wear what they want and eat what they please, so one can say their living conditions have improved remarkably as compared to things a few decades back.

However, in spite of the changes that have occurred for the best, many things are yet to change. A widow seen talking freely with any other man is criticized; questions are raised about her character. Even today, widows do not participate in some holy rituals where married women celebrate, becoming mute nothing more than mere onlookers.

In other words the society’s outlook towards widowhood is yet to change a lot.

Widow Remarriages: A path to a bright future for Indian widows

However, one big stride towards the bright future of widows had been ‘widow remarriages’-a concept put forth by Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. Today we have many widow remarriage portals on the internet. This is one way of relieving the Indian widows from the curse of widowhood and making them realize that they still have a ‘life’; that their life doesn’t have to come to an end only because their husband passed away.

The Partial Truth

Every day as you sift through the headlines, you expect to get a quick glimpse of the general political, social and economic state of affairs in the country. But the most common headlines you end up seeing these days are reports of incidents that tell stories of horrendous rape cases & sexual assaults on women taking place all over the country. Even foreign tourists who have always been eager to visit our country and learn more about its culture and heritage are literally discouraged by the news reports on Indian rapes. But even then, do the real stories really come to light? Is there more to these stories that we never find out about?

16^th December Rape case: A shame for the entire nation!

The incidence of rapes in India showed a marked rise since the inhuman 16^th December (2012) Rape Case. It was an inhuman gang rape & murder of a Paramedical student aged just 23 yrs in Delhi, who was gang-raped in a bus when she was on her way back to home after watching a movie with a friend. When the four gang-rapists approached to harass her and begun their lewd behaviour, her friend who worked in a private firm protested and was thrashed badly with iron rod. After the girl was raped, her vaginal passage torn off with the iron rod and her intestines spilling out, she along with her friend were stripped and flung out of the bus to bleed on the streets. This horrific incident of the December 16^th Delhi Gang rape shook the entire nation and received a lot of media hype.

The naked truth revealed:

Not only this one incident, but numerous such brutal incidents that followed in a train after the Delhi rape case reflects one naked truth but a very significant one; i.e. the highest number of rapes in India occur in the Metro cities. The main reason for this is the huge influx of small town population especially women from small towns moving to the big cities to make more money and ending up in a horrible, poverty-stricken life. 

Has anyone ever wondered what the male psychographic behind these rapes is? Psychographic outlines of the men who assault the women in the metros reveal that they are seething with aggression and are often slaves to some kind of addiction, most commonly alcohol or narcotics. However, sometimes this aggression comes from the general attitude of Indian men to dominate females. When these small town girls come to the metro cities and start earning, some are successful – they work long hours and rise on the ladder of success; something most men cannot tolerate or accept. On the other hand, some aren’t so successful and work extra hard to prove themselves, often outshining their male counterparts, which again is unacceptable to a chauvinistic man.  

They feel these girls are intruders in their city, are posing threat to their manhood. They want to teach them a lesson; something that comes from the very core of their conservative nature that tells them a woman can never be better than a man, and they must show a woman that her true place is always beneath a man. Sadly, this aggressive attitude is heightened much when these men are under the effect of some addictive.

Lines blurred between what’s criminal & what’s not:

Recently the four men who raped the Delhi girl have been given a death sentence, though from some sections of the country debate is being raised on the punishment’s quantum as there are some who favour life imprisonment for the convicts. Actually, the horrendous manner in which this poor girl was raped & murdered makes one think that any punishment would fall less for the convicts. 

Today the line between what is ‘criminal’ and what is not has become blurred. Laws in India have a number of loopholes and due to legal deficiencies, non-criminals receive criminal punishments and the real ones are dealt with leniently. Also another way of putting this issue is that today it’s really unpredictable to read a man’s mind. Men with no prior criminal or sexual assault records are often the ones responsible for brutal sexual assault crimes. And as per law, a first time offender is usually given more leeway. 

Significant confessions made by the north Indian perverts: Look into the statistics

After the Delhi Gang rape incident, statistics were collected to see how much this evil of rape has ruined our country. It’s shocking that one out of every four men in Northern India confessed of committing or wanting to commit acts of sexual violence sometime or the other. According to 2011 Rape Statistics, out of 24206 cases of rapes that took place in the country, the maximum cases occurred in Northern India; i.e. about 6227 cases. In rural India too rapes occur, but the only difference is that the cases do not get such great media exposure as in the metros. The victims there are forced to marry their assailants to hush up the matter. In many cases, the illiterate rural women do not even realize that they are being raped!

It can be said that while media is trying its best to bring all rape and sexual assault cases to light so that justice can be served, in all earnestness we still only get a partial picture of the reality. We need to spend less time talking about it, and more time trying to find out WHY rape is becoming so common in India, so that we can find a real solution to the problem. 

Minor Marriages

Every day as you sift through the headlines, you expect to get a quick glimpse of the general political, social and economic state of affairs in the country. But the most common headlines you end up seeing these days are reports of incidents that tell stories of horrendous rape cases & sexual assaults on women taking place all over the country. Even foreign tourists who have always been eager to visit our country and learn more about its culture and heritage are literally discouraged by the news reports on Indian rapes. But even then, do the real stories really come to light? Is there more to these stories that we never find out about?

16^th December Rape case: A shame for the entire nation!

The incidence of rapes in India showed a marked rise since the inhuman 16^th December (2012) Rape Case. It was an inhuman gang rape & murder of a Paramedical student aged just 23 yrs in Delhi, who was gang-raped in a bus when she was on her way back to home after watching a movie with a friend. When the four gang-rapists approached to harass her and begun their lewd behaviour, her friend who worked in a private firm protested and was thrashed badly with iron rod. After the girl was raped, her vaginal passage torn off with the iron rod and her intestines spilling out, she along with her friend were stripped and flung out of the bus to bleed on the streets. This horrific incident of the December 16^th Delhi Gang rape shook the entire nation and received a lot of media hype.

The naked truth revealed:

Not only this one incident, but numerous such brutal incidents that followed in a train after the Delhi rape case reflects one naked truth but a very significant one; i.e. the highest number of rapes in India occur in the Metro cities. The main reason for this is the huge influx of small town population especially women from small towns moving to the big cities to make more money and ending up in a horrible, poverty-stricken life. 

Has anyone ever wondered what the male psychographic behind these rapes is? Psychographic outlines of the men who assault the women in the metros reveal that they are seething with aggression and are often slaves to some kind of addiction, most commonly alcohol or narcotics. However, sometimes this aggression comes from the general attitude of Indian men to dominate females. When these small town girls come to the metro cities and start earning, some are successful – they work long hours and rise on the ladder of success; something most men cannot tolerate or accept. On the other hand, some aren’t so successful and work extra hard to prove themselves, often outshining their male counterparts, which again is unacceptable to a chauvinistic man.  

They feel these girls are intruders in their city, are posing threat to their manhood. They want to teach them a lesson; something that comes from the very core of their conservative nature that tells them a woman can never be better than a man, and they must show a woman that her true place is always beneath a man. Sadly, this aggressive attitude is heightened much when these men are under the effect of some addictive.

Lines blurred between what’s criminal & what’s not:

Recently the four men who raped the Delhi girl have been given a death sentence, though from some sections of the country debate is being raised on the punishment’s quantum as there are some who favour life imprisonment for the convicts. Actually, the horrendous manner in which this poor girl was raped & murdered makes one think that any punishment would fall less for the convicts. 

Today the line between what is ‘criminal’ and what is not has become blurred. Laws in India have a number of loopholes and due to legal deficiencies, non-criminals receive criminal punishments and the real ones are dealt with leniently. Also another way of putting this issue is that today it’s really unpredictable to read a man’s mind. Men with no prior criminal or sexual assault records are often the ones responsible for brutal sexual assault crimes. And as per law, a first time offender is usually given more leeway. 

Significant confessions made by the north Indian perverts: Look into the statistics

After the Delhi Gang rape incident, statistics were collected to see how much this evil of rape has ruined our country. It’s shocking that one out of every four men in Northern India confessed of committing or wanting to commit acts of sexual violence sometime or the other. According to 2011 Rape Statistics, out of 24206 cases of rapes that took place in the country, the maximum cases occurred in Northern India; i.e. about 6227 cases. In rural India too rapes occur, but the only difference is that the cases do not get such great media exposure as in the metros. The victims there are forced to marry their assailants to hush up the matter. In many cases, the illiterate rural women do not even realize that they are being raped!

It can be said that while media is trying its best to bring all rape and sexual assault cases to light so that justice can be served, in all earnestness we still only get a partial picture of the reality. We need to spend less time talking about it, and more time trying to find out WHY rape is becoming so common in India, so that we can find a real solution to the problem. 

Delhi Dissected: The Gender Play

Women in our country are often associated with their gendered roles wherever they move and the society finds it hard to perceive them as an individual overlooking their gender. Thus, it’s a million dollar question whether the women whom we see around in our city are really recognized as a part of the city wholeheartedly by the male residents or not. 

Often when a woman is alone on the streets or wishes to come out of her home’s confines to take a whiff of fresh air or enjoy the scenic blue sky; quite unfortunately she is eyed as an intruder in her own city’s space by the men around her. This in other words reminds her that after all, she is a woman in this world that favours men, and nothing beyond that.  Her life outside home is simply expected to be a transit between the two destination points. Whether she’s moving on roads, alleys, is going to stations or parks, everywhere her freedom to be herself is greatly thwarted because somebody is always watching over her; i.e. the men of our city.

Delhi: Can a woman feel safe here?

The same theme is highlighted in film maker Sameera Jain’s 64 minute Documentary Mera Apna Shehar where she captures women’s experiences in the city of Delhi through gendered lenses. If you see the documentary, you really will be astonished to find how Delhi, a city buzzing with so much life and vibrancy, fences out women of its cityscape. Here women are ceaselessly struggling to sense in them a feeling of legitimacy when they are out in some public space. The mentality of the male population always makes them feel that they are an aberration to the city and thus gives them a feeling of lowness. Therefore you’ll find women looking into books or magazines even when they are not reading those or fidgeting with their cell phones when they are in some public space, like local trains or waiting for a bus. These sorts of activities allow them to battle with their insecurities as well as with the embarrassment at being ogled at by lecherous males.

‘Mera Apna Shehar’ captures the gendered outlook of the Capital city of India

‘Mera Apna Shehar’ is truly worth a watch. The documentary presents Delhi’s outlook on women through many inter-related narrative strands upholding the different intertwined layers that this strange city has. The everyday lives of many women characters are pictured in the movie. One such is Komita Dhanda, (Associate professor, Lady Irwin College). In the documentary she is captured as ‘The Woman in the City’ hanging out in public spots like bus stop, park, road side, paan shop. In most of the captured shots she is found eyed by men lecherously even when she isn’t trying to look attractive to capture unwanted attention. It’s a matter of ‘daily indignity’ in Delhi’s cityscape for women according to Jain, and indeed speaks volumes about Delhi’s paranoia for women.

The camera recorded real life pictures of the position of women in the city of Delhi, and in this context it’s worthwhile to mention of the shots where Dhanda is shown in park. When these pictures were recorded, she wasn’t aware that the camera was on so she was completely herself-Winkling her toes, scratching, lying on the grass, and doing everything that one enjoys doing in a park. The camera not only recorded Dhanda in the park but also countless disturbing shots of men who ogle her, steal glances at her, hover around her and are literally bemused due to the presence of a lone woman in the park in the evening hours. 

One very notable yet disturbing sequence of the documentary is the one in which a car pulling up just next to Dhanda expects her, sort of presses her to get in one evening when she was standing on the roadside.

A ray of hope

In another part of the documentary, it is shown how a non-profit organization called Azad Foundation is training women to become expert cab drivers. These women initially meet with many challenges because the roads of Delhi are hostile towards women, and they find it a little difficult to get used to all the glaring, staring and getting shouted at but they never give up. With their stoic confidence, they bend all hostilities in their favour. "At red lights people really stare when they see a girl driving and a madam sitting at the back. Some guys try to race with me, two on both sides, my car in the middle. So I just apply the brakes and stop. 'Go race,' I tell them in my mind. 'I'll just stay here. I don't want a race'," says Savita, one of the Azad Foundation girls and her comment really ignites a flame of hope and breathes in some positivity in to the bleak shots portrayed in the movie.

To sum up, the film maker’s sole goal behind framing this documentary is reinforcing the oddity of the foul gender play that has ‘dissected’ Delhi. Instead of exposing the abnormalities prevailing in the city, she used her camera with the intention to reveal it, and she wanted to abide by the experiential mode of approach for doing so. This documentary is indeed an eye-opener for all Indians. Though it brings Delhi under the spotlight, yet there are many other cities where the same thing is happening.

The Best and Worst Places for Women Entrepreneurs in India

With the changing times, the modern professionally qualified Indian women have stepped into a new genre of career and that’s entrepreneurship. Giving a damn to the social backlash that differentiate between genders and thwart the free will of women, these women are asserting their rights and proving excellently their skills in managing their professional sphere. Today we get to read the success stories of many businesses in our country that are led by women entrepreneurs and these very successful women have proved the common Indian society-bred fallacy that women don’t have the brains to run businesses completely wrong. 

Businesses led by women are scaling new heights in our country and over the last few years our country has really witnessed some flourishing women-driven businesses that have made landmark achievements. 

But if you keep an eye on business news or trends, you’ll notice that not all the cities of our country have successful women entrepreneurs. To put it the other way round, women entrepreneurs have not been able to ground the base of their business successfully in all the cities of India. Why is it so?

Which Indian cities have the highest number of women entrepreneurs & why?

Let’s first see which cities that have the highest number of women entrepreneurs. Cities like Bangalore, Bombay, Coimbatore, Pune, Delhi, Chennai and Hyderabad have the highest number of women entrepreneurs as per records. These cities are mostly metro-cities that have an urban, most importantly, progressive lifestyle. 

Here women have been brought in a high-profile setting since their very childhood, where they were free to do whatever they liked. There was a milieu of gender equality in the type of culture that prevails in these cities and thus women could freely assert their right to practice whatever profession they wished and prove to the world their mettle in the field entrepreneurship, which for long was thought of purely as a man’s professional domain.

Which Indian cities have the least number of women entrepreneurs & why?

Now there are also many cities in our country that have the least number of women entrepreneurs such as Kolkata, Lucknow, Jamshedpur, Guwahati, Bilaspur, Ahmadabad, Jaipur etc. This is because in these cities, women entrepreneurs don’t get the necessary backing from the society to start off their business and also do not get a good target audience for the initial capture of the market. 

The key reason for this is that the commoners residing in these cities still have in their mind a deep rooted misogynism, which urges them to oppose women entrepreneurship. They are hard-core believers in the age-long myth that a woman can’t equal a man in entrepreneurial skills, and so they refuse to cooperate when female entrepreneurs try to set up businesses in their cities. 

What is the critical difference between these cities?

The main critical difference between these cities is the difference is the social outlook towards women entrepreneurship. In case of the former lot, a very progressive and free setting encourages business women; while in case of the latter lot, a regressive social setting that derides women who take steps to empower themselves, discourages women entrepreneurship.

Does geography play any role in this?

In case of some of these cities, geography does have a role to play. You must have noticed that most of the cities listed here as bearing the minimum number of women entrepreneurs fall to the eastern and western part of India. These regions are marked by conservative societal structure; here people have not yet broken free from their cultural restrictions that could be called obsolete in the modern world. Also, these are mostly areas where poverty dominates in many sections of the society and dated thinking towards women prevails even in affluent families because of their caste and cultural beliefs. This could be one reason why many of the cities with least number of women entrepreneurs fall in these geographic locations.

Indo-Nepal Border: The Scene of Human Trafficking

As time moves on and we incorporate as well as assimilate all the influences of modernization into our lives, we often claim with an air of pride that we are Civilized & Cultured. But this conviction of ours is shattered when we get to read the horrifying tales of human trafficking that are rampant on the Indo-Nepal border. Everyday humanity is crushed at the hands of some savage, fiendish, uncivilized criminals through the many incidents of human trafficking at the Indo-Nepal border and this indeed makes us think - Are we really civilized? Can we really call ourselves cultured? Or do we still retain in us some savage caveman traits that are hard to break?

The tragic case of Radha: Trafficked at Indo-Nepal Border

Media updates show that human trafficking has become one of the fastest flourishing industry, plus a highly lucrative trade on the Indo-Nepal border. A month back we came across the tragic story of Radha who is by birth a Nepalese but is a ‘cast away’ in her own homeland or birth place. The reason is she has no document for proving her Nepali citizenship. 10 years ago she was trafficked to a circus troupe in India; there she married a fellow male companion of the troupe who was an Indian. Her husband passed away and that too without making any arrangements for Radha to get an Indian citizenship. Furthermore there is not a single legal document or any other proof to prove that she had ever married. 

Radha who is now 22 years of age is left with two children, and is struggling to get an identity. She has returned to her homeland Nepal but is not counted as a Nepali. Without the citizenship ID, she just cannot start her life afresh; neither can she try for a job nor can she enrol herself in a school. Also she needs the ID for opening a bank account or for getting the birth certificate registration of her children. 

Radha is a victim of human trafficking on the Indo-Nepal border who now has no hope of a normal future, neither for herself, nor for her young kids. This is not Radha’s plight alone; there are many like 

her who go through the same kind of hell-fire across the borders; their stories lost in time. 

Are there other such cases too?

Take for example the pathetic case of Nayantara that occurred in the year 2012. A clever labour broker in Nepal duped her into believing that she would get a profitable job in Lebanon as a domestic worker but actually sold her to a brothel owner in India. There she was forced to ‘entertain’ a minimum of 35 customers per day and in case she refused, she was beaten up with an iron rod. After moving from one brothel to another; i.e. passing out from the hands of one owner to another, she is at last back to her homeland Nepal, shocked and traumatized. 

There are many other such stories, a new one every single day in India. These women have been abused over and over, and for them there is no future in sight even though they might be back in their home country now.

Why human trafficking finds a good market in India?

Human trafficking is rampant in India because it finds a good market here, thanks to the male-dominated social setting of India which encourages human trafficking. Specifically, it is the flesh trade or forced prostitution type of trafficking that finds the biggest market in our country.

 Another reason for the increase in human trafficking India is that our country is bordered by many other countries like - Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Bhutan, Burma, China and Afghanistan. It’s very easy to quickly transport or shift the trafficked lot to the other parts of the world especially to the Arabian countries and counties like UK, US, Russia etc and get a handsome monetary reward in return. 

Furthermore another significant reason for human trafficking to find a good market in India is that even though we have completed 60 years of our Independence, extreme poverty still prevails in the marginalized strata of our society where people are living below poverty line. Tormented by extreme hunger and poverty, the children and women of the slums of India become extreme vulnerable to trafficking because they want to buy hope that they will find work and better quality by taking up new job opportunities, even if far away.

Male psychographic behind the trafficking trade

When it comes to human trafficking, the psychology of men in India is the root of all problems. They feel that when the society is in their favour and they have nothing to fear and can thus overpower a woman or even an innocent child with all sorts of horrible crimes possible. Society will anyway sweep it under carpet, hide all evidences and safeguard them. 

How can then we hope to bring an end to this shameless act of human trafficking?