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. 

Obsolete Traditions in a New World

                                                            

Obsolete Traditions in a New World

In this 21^st century, Indian women claim to be modern, educated, aware of their rights and think of themselves to be at par with men in every respect. But when the independent women of India openly try to decry the orthodoxies still prevalent in the society, they are faced with conflict and condemnation at every step. Does this indicate that the Indian society, at its very core, still retains the anti-woman outlook it has since centuries no matter how advanced the women of today are both educationally and economically?

 It can be safely said that in many ways, even today whatever gender equality or independence of women we get to perceive in India is just on the surface level; while at the deeper levels of our society nothing has radically changed for women. This probably is the only reason that can explain why even today, some of the most abominable and heartless ‘Anti-woman traditions’ that should have been long obsolete are still observed in many parts of India, predominantly rural India.

Here is a look at the 5 most shocking Anti-woman traditions prevalent till date in our so-called modern society that neither the worldwide feminist revolution could brush aside, nor the light of woman literacy could bring an end to.

1. Balika Vadhu: 

It is common knowledge that long back; it was a custom in India for young girls to be married off prior to reaching puberty. What is shocking is that this atrocious practice is still prevalent in many parts of Northern India, especially in regions like - Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujrat and Haryana. Though ‘Child Marriage’ is now illegal, when villages in rural areas still practice such traditions, who is to report it? The structure of the society allows parents and family members to marry girls off at a very young age, killing her innocence and all chances of a normal, happy childhood. She is often expected to start having babies right after she matures, generally before her body is physically ready for the purpose of child bearing, and sadly this often leads to fatal consequences putting at risk the lives of both the mother and child.

2. Widow Maltreatment: 

Widows in the past were awfully mistreated in our country. If when a husband passed away, the wife was often expected to stay away from other family members in isolation and it was believed that she is was the one who brought ‘bad luck’ to the family and was somehow to be blamed for her miserable fate for life. The society made her life utterly difficult by putting countless restrictions on her as if she too had ceased to live. 

Many young widows were forcibly made to shave their head or cut their hair short. They were restricted from eating any delicacy food items, dressing up in bright colours or wearing jewellery and their only attire was a plain white sari. Surprisingly, the same practice still prevails in many parts of modern India. If a widow chooses to live her life on her own set rules, she becomes an object of society’s derision.

However certain positive steps are being taken to battle the present situation. We saw the example of the same when this year on Raksha Bandhan, the widows of Varanasi were brought to the limelight because they got the opportunity of tying ‘rakhi’ on social reformer, Bindeshwari Pathak’s wrist. One of the widows who made news in this event is Namuna Gautam, because in her long life of 80 years she tied rakhi to someone for the first time. This indicates how much widows were maltreated and kept out of all auspicious and holy occasions, even in this day and age!

3. Female foeticide: 

This abdominal tradition has become a matter of national crisis in our country and due to this shameful social evil; the male-female ratio in India has dropped alarmingly. In many Indian homes when it is known that the woman who has conceived has a girl child in her womb, she is often forced to get an abortion. This matter came to limelight many a times, and many radiologists in small towns and villages who advertised it as their business to tell the gender of the baby as soon as possible so that families could decide if they wanted to keep a girl child or not were shut down; their medical licenses cancelled. Yet, in many parts of India, this practice continues and countless girl foetuses are killed inhumanely every year. 

4. Dowry system: 

In spite of so many anti-dowry laws, the evils of dowry system still prevail in our country. It appears, as if a father is not marrying off his daughter; he is rather fixing a deal in the marriage market where the in-laws have the upper hand to demands whatever they want. And in many caste systems of India and also in many states, this practice of ‘buying a husband’ continues.

5. Dev Dasi: 

In many of the temples of Southern India, Dev Dasis often dedicated their lives to the almighty and were supposed to lead a pious life in service of the Lord. But the lecherous priests often fulfilled their physical desires by exploiting the Dev Dasis sexually. The same thing is happening till today, and even more rampantly due to increasing corruptions.

Don’t you think it is time these obsolete traditions came to an end? Do they really have a meaning in this New World we are trying to create? We invite all members of our blog to contribute any other ridiculous traditions they know are rampant in India even today, so that together we can make a difference.