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INDIA
March 8th is International Women’s Day. Women in the world have reached dizzy heights. In India the progress women have made is unparalleled. In the cities, it is very obvious and in the villages women have brought in phenomenal changes.
However as I write this article, it is strange that I talk about slavery. In the last two decades slavery in India has changed its face.
In the past, the state of widows was appalling. My own aunt was widowed at a very young age. She lived in her father’s house. My grandfather, grandmother and my uncle with his family lived on the third floor. In the middle was my aunt with her three children. The ground floor was reserved for business guests. There was only one staircase. If anyone from the top floor had to come down before sunrise, they would ask the kids to see that their mother (the widow, their own flesh and blood) should go into the room till they left the house. Reason? – So that they should not see the face of a widow before going to work for it would bring bad luck. A widow couldn’t attend any special functions of the family, even her own son’s marriage.
Widows from some communities would be sent to religious centres like Varanasi, Haridwar or Allahabad where they would be left to die without any support. Many of them, turning to prostitution, died of multiple sexually transmitted infections or other diseases. Remarriage was very uncommon. Any man marrying a widow was promptly ex-communicated from the society.
Now the prison walls of widowhood have largely broken down. Many widows get married and, amazingly, sometimes the husband’s family arranges the match. However, widows from some communities are still sent off to the ‘holy cities’ where they are exploited and die in terrible conditions.
This is not the only slavery prison women have to live in.
Poverty in itself is prison, but when poverty is topped with cultural and religious beliefs, the result is nothing but catastrophic. Here are a few stories to help you understand the situation.
The Dowry system still is a cultural truth in India. I met Archana in the red light area three years back. Archana is quite attractive. She was 16 years old and in school when her parents started looking for a suitable match for her. Almost everything was settled and she was engaged, but just a week before the marriage there arose the big issue of dowry and her marriage was called off. This happened twice. Archana lost her friends, had to give up her education and spent most of her time at home. After a couple of months, her elder brother came up with a suggestion. He said that he would take her to a bigger city, get her employment and then look for a good match. This pleased her parents. He brought her to a suburb of Pune, leased out a small room and kept her there. A few days later he brought two of his friends along and a big stock of alcohol. That night and the following three days were a nightmare for Archana. Her brother not just raped her himself, but raped her with his friends looking on and they did the same. When the three went to get more drink, Archana ran away and came straight to the red light area in the city of Pune. She hates what she does but more than that she hates men.
Bijli’s father was a farmer and a poor one at that. With mounting debt and many mouths to feed, he committed suicide. Bijli is the eldest child and was sent to earn a livelihood for the rest of the family, as her mother had to stay back to look after the land, the younger children and her husband’s old parents. Bijli and her uncle travelled to Pune and she was placed in a home to work as a house maid. This 12-year-old never had enough to eat and worked almost 12-13 hours a day. Moreover, she was beaten if she so much as dropped a utensil and if by chance she broke one, then not just her salary was deducted but even her sparse meal was taken away.
Religion is good and essential to live a fruitful life. But when it weaves a prison for those who follow it it is nothing short of a curse. Here is the story of a boy, a patient of mine, who lives in a religion-made prison.
“I was born in a very poor family of Tamil Nadu in South of India,” said Sudha, a 24-year-old. “It was fate that I was the fourth son. I was named Sunder [beautiful]. Poverty and a religious tradition prompted my parents to marry me to a goddess, with great pomp and show. Many other boys of the area also were married that day to the goddess. I was about 10 years old then. I was not allowed to go home after that but stayed in the temple till the age of 15. We had to work very hard there and never had enough to eat. At the age of 15, I ran away from the temple and went to Mumbai, the city of prosperity. A very kind person took care of me for three years. Now somehow the kind person was not quite like others. One day this kind person arranged a meeting with someone special. The special someone had changed lives of many people. My life changed also. A big pooja [worship ceremony] was in progress and many people were there. I was made to sit on a flower-bedecked stool. My hands were tied at the back and a bamboo placed between them. I was stripped and boiling oil was poured on my genitals.”
To cut the story short, this boy was turned into a sex worker for men having sex with men and was placed in a community of eunuchs. Now he is infected with HIV virus and lives in a prison of a different kind. My patient’s story left me numb. How can human beings become so callous and cruel? The most gruesome violence against a fellow being is to take away the gift of God, sexuality.
Many of my contacts in the red light area have been sold on the pretext of employment. They can never get out of the debt of the money they were purchased for. The interest on the money is 20% per month. If a girl was sold for 20,000 rupees, in one month it becomes 20,000 + 4000, and so on.
These are just some of the prisons people live in – the modern forms of slavery.
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