Reasons for Women Status in India

 This time, we’re going to dig deeper to the ancient India, finding out the connection between religion and women status and how did it influence the India society now. 

The reasons contributed to the tough environment that Indian women face could be divided into about two aspects---traditional and legal. 

Traditional

 1. Caste system -- Caste system in India had profound influence that Indians still obey it until now. According to Indian ancient code, the status of women was as low as the labors and they had to follow their fathers, brothers and husband all their lives. Some even said “Serving for husband is the only divine job that women should do.” and “Women without husband just like soul without a body, lake without water.” Immersed in such thoughts for almost thousands of years, no wonder it would be a mission impossible to change Indian’s bias in a short period of time.

2. Hinduism and Islamism— These are the two religions that most Indians believe in. In their codes, men had to raise parents that they had the right to inherit all the properties. And it should be men to hold their parents’ funerals that they could save dead people’s souls. As a result, most of parents are eager to have a boy instead a girl that leads to the serious imbalance of human proportion and inequality of men/women status.

 3. It is said that dowry decides the treatment of women in their husbands’ home. Due to the old tradition of India, it is necessary for women to bring a bunch of dowry to their new family. Some women couldn’t marry because of this trite and even maltreated because of the fewer dowries she brought. Thus, women usually viewed as money-losing propositions in India that millions of female infants disappeared every year in India.

 4. Sati (Loyalty)—The most crucial sentence that Indian women would face. Indians believed that dead men could enter the heaven and their family could be saved if the widowers sacrificed themselves with fire. Women could choose to be burned with their dead husbands or dressed delicately and carried by relatives to be burned after their husbands’ funerals. Both choices would win people’s applause and get fine reputation for widowers. Although the Indian government already announced the act as illegal and protests from countless feminism groups, superstitious Indians still consider Sati the sacred duty that women should do that many of them “force” widowers to complete the ceremonies.

 Legal

 1. Old justice system—There are too few judge in India that it could take a lot of time to sentence. According to the data, it is about fifteen judges to hold a million people’s case. This situation cause the slow pace of judging countless rape cases and thus make those rapists become savage.

 2. Low literacy—Because of being oppressed, Indian women have rare access to education that they couldn’t know the rights which should belong to them.

 3. Low participation in politics—Although there had been a woman president for 8 years, women’s participation in Congress only account for 11%, which is completely weak to do anything for the ordinary women. 

From above, we all know the reasons why Indian women suffer a lot under unfair and injustice circumstance. Although we are far from India, we could still do something for them such as donating to charities or becoming a volunteer to help them. At least we already understand thier culture and we have to pay proper respect to them.