I always wonder, how come every time we talk about Sita (Goddess in Ramayan) we just say Sita, wife of Ram, why can’t it be other way calling Ram husband of Sita. May be Ram did greater deeds compared to Sita, in that case Satyabhama or Goddess Lakshmi should get that missing privilege, but that is not the case. They are just depicting the social status of women when these epics where written, there has been considerable improvement in social status and dignity for women, we have many women now who doesn't need to be named after some man, but is this improvement well distributed to all the communities? Can we continue to have half of the population being treated as inferior and continue to have them suffer?
We may think that poverty leads to more trouble for women, but according to statistics percentage of female-headed families among below poverty line are 4 more times more compared to average female-headed families. So it not just financial status of a family that is deciding the social status and independence of Women. We have women reservation bills pending for statutory bodies, will these bills help? If just sending few women to power is going help, then problem should have been solved already, as Indira Gandhi (the most dynamic Prime Minister India ever had) ruled India for 15 years, Bangladesh having ladies as both prime minister and opposition leader, most of the South Asian countries were ruled by Women. But all this didn't give women in these countries equal status to women. So woman empowerment needs to happen at a mass scale, by providing education and employment opportunities. If we can’t provide compulsory education to entire population of India, it can at least be provided to the 50%(women) of it.
India stands in the top list in case of Women trafficking, where lakhs of women are forced in to flesh trade, which makes their life hell forever. Forcing them to live in dangerous conditions, without any help, either from government or Women rights organizations. At least I have never seen any women Right Organizations showing apathy for their fellow women who are suffering in this Trafficking. Best solution for this may be to give legal status and identification to them which will stop exploitation from others.
Sexual discrimination has diminished, but still we see it in abundance, like purdah system being prevalent in parts of the country. When Shabana Azmi speaks about kids text books teaching that “Father earns for family, Mother cooks for family” we may not take it seriously, but these sort of small things creates preconceptions which can grow stronger.
India is always thought to be a land where women are worshipped, but when we look back into history it just stinks with practices like Sati, Devadasi, Purdah Systems and this list continues. But at the same time we have unending list of Women who achieved great strides here. Better education and opportunities for women can get us to better society and may be somebody won’t need to change their surname after marriage.
5 comments:
Hi Guna
i find your judgment quite flawed toward Ramayana. if it had been according to your suggestion (Ram being called Sita's husband), you would have lamented about condition of male at that time.
i can give you many examples to disprove your assessment.first and foremost among them is the fact that the great Lanka war was fought for Sita.
also one female (kaikeyi)drove Ram on exile and even the most powerful king Dasratha was powerless in front of her. Lanka war was initiated also because of a female (Surpanakha).
and if could recollect, when ram had to start Ashvamedha, his priests insisted that that could not be done as Sita was on exile, so ram ordered to build a gold statue of Sita and the statue was present beside him during the yagam consolidating the status of wife in society and specially in rituals.
as you have said, India is always thought to be a land where women are worshiped, and indeed it is.
on Sati, it was introduce by rajputa female to scape from muslim rulers after killing of their husbands in war. it was never present before that. same purdh system, introduce by muslims.
on prostitution(Devadasi), it had been the classic business of world and specially of India. i see flaw in the law, that do not recognizes this fact. if government had recognized this fact, the condition of women involved would have been better.
@Ravi Ranjan,
I just took Ram and Sita as example to show that women are treated lower in spite of being equal. There is no doubt that women were always powerful.
About Sati system, its not something that came because of Muslim rulers, as there are references of Sati being preformed in Mahabharata as well. I agree that purdah system was introduced in medieval era and its sad that its still seen in society
I feel that this system was driven by women that “Father earns for family, Mother cooks for family”. See how cool will it be if women does the hard part of earning and men does the coolest part of cooking. There is a women conspiracy involved. So, still you see Men earning hard and women spending cool.
My Comments on Women reservation bill: Definately these kind of bills would nothelp. First of all, there should be a healthy environment for Women to come out and participate in the Social event. [Here Im not talking about Page3-event parties.]
Here in AP we have a tradition like, If a politician die, his wife will replace him. But they are becoming as "Rubber Stamp"s.
There will be no benefit to Women society from these lady leaders.
Leader should not come from reservation or sympathy.
@Ravi,
Reservations and Sympathy can make a MLA or MP not a Leader.
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