When women outnumbered men more than three to one, the most
gracious solution in society was that a man could take as many as four wives.
Now that men outnumber women in India, it will be unhealthy in society if polyandry
is not allowed. But what is it that has brought us to this pass…?
Some thought leads us to the conclusion that the practice of
Dowry, as seen in the context of patriarchy in contemporary India, is the cause
of this adverse female to male ratio. But the question of Dowry cannot be seen
in isolation; there are several global issues involved.
At the outset, when considering issues of Dowry, patriarchy,
women’s lib and Human Rights, two important points have to be reckoned…
First, Ideals are indispensable:
No human togetherness worth its name exists in the absence of the pursuit of an
ideal. People must be encouraged to either
offer a better ideal or keep their
criticisms to themselves (and stop wasting public space and time).
Second, fairness and
justice is the bedrock of team strength: Any successful human team endeavor
gains strength when individuals who participate in that endeavor become willing
spokes; and no one becomes a willing spoke if he is subjected to atrocities. It
is impossible to achieve civilization status, and that too sustained for
thousands of years, at any place where the members of a group commit atrocities
against one another… Hitler, Polpot, etc are high profile examples of such
failures… lower profile examples can be had in our immediate neighborhoods in
the form of bosses and heads of families who don’t quite make the cut…
****
The medieval period in European History, that lies somewhere
between the age of the Greeks and the Modern era, is more or less considered as
an era of wilderness. Comparatively, the modern era is heralded as a time when Europe
made great progress; the women too are supposed to have taken great strides
forward in this period. It took a long time coming though, for instance the
women in the USA got a right to vote as late as in the 20th century.
Under this typical world-view, no one opposes the rant of
certain individuals who talk down the ‘Victorian’ age and express how much they
have progressed ever since… Such persons also have the tendency to measure the
whole world with the same yardstick and in the process accuse the traditional
systems in India as being Victorian-like. In their well meaning efforts they
would want to take India forward to equality and greatness. This is absurd
.
India has been a
civilization for more than 3000 years—may be 5000 years—unbroken. No
civilization ever survives unbroken that long if it were to be based on
committing atrocities on more than 50% of its population—in fact much more… the
idea is impractical… all who propose that it has been atrocities all along are
either misguided or do not sufficiently understand human nature.
Columbus’s attempt to find India can be marked as the
beginning of the attempt of the western world to understand India—and the west
are yet to discover it fully… instead, in the meanwhile, thanks to the
education initiatives of William Bentinck and the East India Company, the
western world has extended into the minds of the intellectuals of India. So
these ‘educated’ Indians too still need to discover the brilliance of the
ancient Civilization alongside their thought-compatriots in the west….
In truth, when Europe sans Greece had not even progressed
out of tribal existence the principles of equality were already deeply etched
in the life and traditions of ancient India; that too in a form that is even
more advanced than is practiced in modern day Europe.
At the core of the Indian civilization is the Vedantic thought
process and the associated Varna system. (Never mind the ranting that will
immediately commence condemning the ‘caste’ nature of its arrangement… this shouting
can be parked in one corner of our minds, for it does not help in the progress
of knowledge and understanding.) So at the pinnacle of this system were supposed
to be the Brahmins and it is instructive to understand an essential component
of their marriage rites. This is instructive because though it one understands
the essential principles of living together that were idealized in this land… The
brahminical way of life was a beacon which other groups drew inspiration from…
At one stage in the marriage rite of the Brahmins the girl
shifts her position from the right side of the groom over to the left. What
does this act in the ritual signify?
When the ceremony commences, her standing to the right
signifies that she is equal to the man. During the process of the wedding she
accepts subservience to him and there upon shifts to the lift… Now this may
sound repulsive to women’s lib, but we need to enquire further to understand
this better… She says to him in the rituals, “in order that I shift from your
right to your left I lay down seven conditions which you must accept…” and the
man on the other hand says that he has only one condition that she must accept in
order that she may the place to his left… these conditions form the basis of
the composition of marriage in an ideal Hindu society.
What are these seven and one conditions…? The most obvious
of the seven would probably be that the man will not set his eye with desire on
any other woman—indeed it is… but that is not just it, consider these two
conditions… “You will not dispose any property that you own without my
PERMISSION”, and “You will not make donations without my PERMISSION”. See? It
is not just ‘tell me what was donated’, or even ‘tell me what you are going to
donate…’ it is ‘take my permission’… now is it not heavily loaded on the side
of the woman… but the condition on the side of the man settles it… “You will
respect my parents and you will ‘obey’ me”…
For a moment, if detached contemplation is done on this
exchange, it becomes evident that a certain dynamics is set into motion by this
commitment they make to each other in front of their near and dear ones; and it
is encapsulated in the ritual of the lady stepping from the right of the man to
his left… the question to be asked here is whether this ideal must be condemned
in the name of it being a component of the ‘unequal Patriarchal system’? Do also remember that this was designed more
than 3000 years ago…
Patriarchy needs to be seen from another perspective. It is
usual to say that it was brute force that made society settle on the equation
that woman must be subservient to man (it is the kind of thinking which claims
that all of the ancient world was ‘primitive’) but instead, if we start with
the premise that the persons who designed this ideal in ancient India were
indeed ‘equal’ minded as the generous moderns aspire to be, and were gracious
and truly concerned of all in society just as the well meaning persons of
modern society are, then we give ourselves a chance to understand what they
must have reckoned while setting up the ideal.
Indeed the biological realities of homo sapiens and the
technology of those times dictated solutions in which the men were generally
considered bread earners while home nurturing became the career of the female
of the species. Then there is the question of menopause… in the case of men it
is later; if a couple must lose interest in sexual intercourse roughly around
the same time, it was but natural to encourage older men and younger women to
pair up. Coupled with this is the fact that when equals form teams there is a
tendency for democratic stalemate as everyone would assert their rights to
decide for the team. In order to avoid this captaincy was to be awarded to one
of the pair and the older one was the natural choice. And arrangements for
other social needs were constructed in the traditions surrounding these basic
considerations.
Now, solutions generated were not uniformly like this… there
have been successful traditions in which the lineage has been based on
matriarchy… That does not matter, whatever the choice, successful groups always
were based on essential equality of all humans…
Seeing that this sense of equality is the essence of Indian
Civilization the question arises as to what the logic behind the system of Dowry
is…
A materialistic perspective which gives a degraded position
for women would consist of ‘paying’ the girl’s father for ‘purchasing’ the
woman… Positively seen, this tradition of giving bride money can mean to afford
compensation to parents for the loss of the love and company of their daughter…
but in the Indian system the thinking is something else. Where inheritance has
traditionally been through males, a parent who treats his children as equals
would therefore pass on a daughter’s share of his property to her when she went
to her in-laws. The property would add up to the property of the in-law home as
is usually held in a patriarchy. Her going to the in-laws (and not staying with
her parents) too was one of the dimensions of a well designed patriarchy, which
in turn was built to satisfy the prime goal of equal concern to all members of
society.
But the situation stands altered today. The Indian state has
changed the policy of inheritance on the basis of some new ideas of doing
justice through equality. Thanks to the parliaments of free India, there is an
attempt to redo the social structure in India on the basis of “equality”
concepts coming in from ‘modern’ thinkers… With new rules in place, based on
the constitution of India, there is a direct attempt at re-structuring the
patriarchal system that existed in most of traditional India.
Under these new conditions, the property share need not be
given out to the daughter during marriage; the question of dowry or Sthreedhana
does not therefore arise… expenses of marriage ceremonies is preferably borne
equally by both sides, even the daughter need not be encouraged to go to the
groom’s place after marriage… it also not fashionable for the girl to obey her
husband since they are ‘equals’…
Therefore, when we make measurements on the basis of the
fundamentals of equality that underlies successful civilizations, with special
reference to the question of dowry, there is no ‘well-being’ reason for
continuing the ideal tradition of dowry in today’s context. In this new
arrangement traditional thought itself points out that Sthreedhana need not be
passed on at the time of wedding; the question of dowry therefore does not
arise… though of course daughters may be expected to look forward to a share of
their parents’ property later in life, which they will hold in their own name…
The dowry problem is the result of the nation being caught
up in a confused blind between these two alternate arrangements—traditional and
the so called modern. If one is clear on which side he is he will easily be
able to take a decision but either way it is important to realize that it is
about fairness to one and all… and it is no more than a matter of dividing one’s
disposable property equally amongst the children and seeking to perpetuate a
fruitful family environment within or outside a patriarchal system…
As for practical life today, if we go beyond the ideals, it
must be pointed out that ‘dowry seekers’ are not among the ‘worthy’ people a
girl’s parents must entertain. A home that harbors greed (more so if it got rid
of its daughters in the womb or soon after birth) is hell for a daughter. Parents
are fools who purchase a life of misery for their daughter… They must take
recourse to wisdom, especially if they love their daughter and truly want to
invest for her future of peace and contentment and therefore joy…
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