Jun
8
Talks of dowry are nothing new for Indians. No matters how much the percentage of literacy has been increased, or how much standards of living have been enhanced, such cursed cultural-religious ceremonial system of marriage remains in the realm of Indian marriages. The bride’s family pays a dowry to the groom to recognize that he will provide good life and security for his wife.
If someone personally asks to me, I have no problem regarding dowry. But I have sincere problems with marriage and society. Basically, dowry is no wrong if it is NOT taken as religious-cultural tradition, but taken as a legal contract. Breach of the contract will mean legal charges being filed against the breaker of that simple contract. For that marriage contract, the two partners, who surely can be lovers, will sit up with calmness to discuss their priorities, philosophical, political, social, individual preferences and patterns and will make a mutually beneficial marriage rules applicable for both of them equally. Obviously, that written document may or may not involve any monetary transactions, that is, dowry may or may not be a part of such free-willed marriage contract. Yet, the contract will be enforceable.
The breakage of simply defined rules for the couple by any of the party may and will lead to punishment (monetary or otherwise). It is freedom of both the girl and boys to keep up their desires regarding a happy married life and make their personal laws for the mutually beneficial relation between the two. The couple may/may not agree on varied subjects like allowance for polygamy or polyandry etc. let’s say a couple agrees for monoandrous and monogamous relation, i.e. for both the bride and groom, sex outside the marriage is unbearable. That is, two people married on mutual consent for monogamy/monoandry. After age 40, male felt he don’t want sex anymore.
Then there should be freedom for wife to take divorce and go for other man, but if the husband and wife agrees to remain in contract, and allow polyandry for wife, then there is no problem. But if wife cheats, than it is cheat and immorality, that is, polyandry/polygamy itself is not immoral, but if there is a contract for monoandry/monogamy and that contract is breached not by the mutual consent of the two parties engaged, but by cheating and fraud, then it is immoral and illegal, and that will be punished as breach of contract.
But in India, the marriage system is not contract based. And that is why dowry becomes a demon. There’s no legal responsibility of the husband to take good care of wife, while he can surely exploit the girl/wife for further demands of dowry by simply acting illegal. Anywhere and in any form, where there is no economic and social freedom for the individuals, the women suffers predominantly. The women will keep suffering the illegal and immoral acts of her dowry-demanding corrupt husband while he will keep breaking the generally presumed marriages law. Woman won’t oppose because of the fear of society, how the hell will she live if she leaves her coercive and exploiter husband? Living alone is such a curse for a woman you know, and what and how will she earn and eat? Will she again be an unwanted responsibility on her father’s/ brother’s shoulders? What will happen to her children etc, so many ill-reasons for a woman to keep suffering within the four walls of her imprisoning SASURAL! Obviously, woman will have to counter attack such societal moralities which forces her to accept the wrong and discourages her to use her individual rights. It is not like government or society hasn’t done anything for the women. There are various laws against dowry and domestic violence. But such laws are irrefutably redundant and on a reasonable basis, are wrong. They are redundant because irrespective of all such laws, the violence against women and the dowry-demands never stopped. They are unreasonable, because on legal formats, such laws create a difference between rights of men and women on gender basis, providing more and unbalanced legal powers to the women. Because of societal inequalities between the two genders, the genuinely needing women seldom (nearly never) get themselves in a position to use such laws and earn justice. While on other hand, some of the pretentious and cheater women irresponsibly use such laws to harass and exploit the male counterparts.
The ideal state would be equal and reasonable irrevocable rights and total freedom for citizens irrespective of their gender, class, creed, religion etc and non-interference of government, society, authority in individual freedom. < discussed here Liberty, Tolerance, Freedom of expression and Political Correctness!
In Ayn Rand’s words, “Evil requires the sanction of Victim!” it is the woman who can stop all the atrocities against womanhood. It is her individual strength and the inalienable rational rights which she acquires by virtue of her own rational faculty and not by the provision of any government or society which can and ultimately will prompt her to stand against any ill-defined tradition or cultural-religious based ill-practices.
A woman’s freedom is not dependent on the irrational reservation or governmental announced laws based on flawed basis. The freedom and enlightenment of womanhood is dependent only on the individual woman standing on her own against any ill any injustice of religion, society, community or state government. It is the woman alone, who can safeguard and void the evil victimizing her, and none else. And for that, obviously women will have to demand for her individual rights, she will have to stand alone. She will have to be the light!
Let us consider a just opposite situation. Let’s say it is not bride or her family who have to pay dowry, but it is the groom who has to pay dowry in order to get married to prove to the bride’s family that he will be a good provider. Will that change the situations of womanhood to any better state?
Obviously, the answer is a big NO. It won’t effect in the situation of women in the society. The example is the Thailand’s cultural/traditional system of “Sin Sod”, according to which, the male has to give dowry to prove that he can be a good provider for the bride. But, in absence of social and economical freedom, even that causes a curse to women. (Read more about Sin Sod here Thai Dowries Change with Time.
Obviously, I am not against this system too if individual rights and mutually consensual premises are enforced under free-will contract system.
Many westerners marries farm girls from NE of Thailand by paying good amount in Sin Sod, some of them even marries girls who have already worked in bars or prostitution rackets for the cause of poverty.
Mostly, girls are being sold there by their families irrespective of their consent or non-consent just for the cause of greed of money by the poor farmers. The girls may be minors too. Hence, it causes unwanted breakage of individual rights and exploitation of individuals who obviously are women, girls. Many Thai men just cannot marry because of lack of good amount for Sin Sod, again similar situations as in India. There also, the dowry system proves to be working ok at rich family cordons. But at middle class and poor class, same dowry system proves to be havoc. It simply shows that, until the woman herself won’t stand for her individual rights as an individual and not as a mere part of a family or community or sect or religion/tradition or country, she won’t get any justice, no matters what ever changes the cultural traditions may take place. There is only one way for freedom, and that way is the Individual’s will and strength to be free on the basis of reason!
Author:~Unpretentious Diva/Freesoul~
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10 Responses to “Dowry- The Other Facet”
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siddharth ranjan Says:
June 9th, 2008 at 12:05 amOnce again a good theme reduced to black and white by Gargi, in her inimitable style.
Summary:
we ought to give more credence to the existing legal system of the country and should solemnize marriages in court of law rather than at religious altars and the Marriage should be well defined by an exhaustive contract.
women have to stand united to prevent atrocities against their lot and all unjust demands and exploitations should be appropriately opposed.
samay Says:
June 9th, 2008 at 2:42 amDowry system
Dowry system is undoubtedly becoming one of the biggest curse of the modern Indian society. A custom that we carry forth when the rationales behind them have diluted and degraded.
The rational reason that I see for the origin of dowry system in Vedic society (which was indeed a very rational society) was the right of inheritance. In ancient times, the daughter once married off, never used to return to her parent’s home. She used to travel to distant land to dwell with the family of her husband. Since she was not expected to return, the legitimate share of the family wealth was given to the daughter at the time of marriage. Marriage was believed to be beginning of a new grahasti (family) by two individual and the girls share of wealth was given to the man for the simple reason that in ancient time man was the creator and maintainer of wealth or simply put the bread winner.
Misnomer that this wealth is being given as a guarantee for the daughter being kept well has crept into the social consciousness later, which of course has resulted in vice versa phenomenon of daughter not being kept well if the dowry is less. Such a social sanction has made dowry a ransom that brides father pays to the groom.
Concept of making wealth from a marital relationship never existed in Vedic scheme of things. In Vedic precepts of marriage, the bride and the groom must be of equal stature intellectually, in accomplishments and in stature. It in fact advises men not to marry from a family that is too rich as compared to his and not vice versa thereby undermining dowry as a criterion for marriage.
Greed has however taken toll on the system and people are looking to get rich in the shortest possible way. Money matters no matter how it comes. Existence and acceptance of such concept of wealth in the mind of the individual itself is a moral corruption according to me.
Changes in society and Role of women
The concept of dowry further dilutes with the changing role of women in the society she is no more a financial burden on the man and men are no more the sole bread winner. In such a situation if dowry is given by the brides side equal amount must be contributed by the grooms side as well into the new family.
Dwelling further is there a need for anyone to contribute, if parents have made their kids able and competent to work and earn their living in the world they have ideally done their job. They must not be asked to part with their wealth for it is for them to enjoy. They have the legitimate right to give that wealth to whomsoever they wish to after their death through a will. The concept of dowry thus has become redundant and a menace in the modern society.
suren Says:
June 9th, 2008 at 1:36 pmhey i have read somewhere that even in some indian system there used to be a practice of men giving dowry to marry women.. my personal opinion is that dowry, as a system, had evolved to prevent the outflow of capital from the family system given the fact that marriage used to be within the joint family… but as systems and institutions changed it has led to the present situation of dowry being a demon !
shradha Says:
June 9th, 2008 at 4:39 pmHey!
good issue raised!
keep writing!
renegade_division Says:
June 9th, 2008 at 8:27 pmIn simple black and white, if a money is paid with a commodity in a voluntary exchange then the supply greatly overweights demand.
So if women are being given with a bunch of money that means there is more demand for good men. Since no value can be added to women other than what they naturally have, so their looks were compensated with dowry.
Even today, I hear something like this(this actually happened), we were looking for a guy for my cousin, and this one lady who happened to be the mother of a prospective groom, said on phone without even looking at anything about the girl:
“We need 5 tola gold, a Maruti Car, 10 pair of clothes for groom, one Cabinet(Almirah), 3 Safari Suits, Rs 1 Lakh in cash and if the girl has some problems(khot) then the demand can go up too”
Well my mom told her “I have 5 young rajput guys in my family, all of them engineers, all of them of unmarried, two are working in Bangalore, one is working in Calcutta, my own son is in America, and my other son is studying in Manipal”
She replied “Lets just make it with the Car then, shall we?”
Purnendu Says:
June 12th, 2008 at 12:12 amThe article would have been better if you have checked with the legal aspects and tried to remain legally correct. Anyway, a nice one from you.
Freesoul Says:
June 12th, 2008 at 8:47 am@pururendu
the article is Morally correct and signifies that Indian law system is wrong.
Ruchi Sharma Says:
July 11th, 2008 at 8:29 pmWhen dowry becomes an obligation, it becomes a danger.
Mohammad Khairul Alam Says:
August 13th, 2008 at 2:08 pmSeminar arranged by Rainbow against Dowry
“Dowry is a social malady that degenerates the self-dependent mentality of the men. Apart from that, the custom hinders a good relationship between the provider and receiver of dowry, and as a result, creates problems between families and within the society. Each year this custom costs a large number of women their life while it causes many other women to live a degraded life”- this was the speech from chief guest Mr. R Jamir, Director of MATADOR, at the seminar arranged by Rainbow Nari O Shishu Kalyan Foundation against the dowry custom. Mr. Md. Sohel Alam, the representative from the Qatar Charity Found, Rashal Md. Iqbal Khan the Representative from the PKSF were also present at the seminar as the special guest. Director of Rainbow Md. Altaf Hossain Mahabul read the main article at the seminar. Amongst others who presented their speeches on the occasion were social workers like Mr. Mahbub Alam, Md. Mizanur Rahaman Scientific Officer of PPRC, Mohammad Khairul Alam Executive Director of Rainbow Nari O Shishu Kallyan Foundation and Kazi Nafiza Shultana Chairman of Rainbow. People from different levels of the community participated in the seminar from the areas of Lalbagh, Hajaribagh and Kamrangirchar.
Feminism versus Ifeminism | Reason For Liberty Blog Says:
December 28th, 2008 at 10:26 pm[…] against the woman as an Individual. No one can deny that extreme crimes such as Honour Killing, dowry deaths, violence against women, rapes, sexual harassment is a burning problem. Yet the question, which […]