Entry 18 – Small Things with Great Love:
Reflections on the Status of Women in India
A first thought in connection with the theme of women in India is probably that of the magnificently-coloured saris that are worn by a large portion of the female population of India. And this image of the colourful sari is still correct – many women still wear saris, in all colours, as well as in a variety of fabrics. Saris seem to me – never having worn one – both a very practical but also impractical item of clothing; while the loose end (the pallu) can be used as a veil, a shelter from wind, rain or sun, or for a variety of other purposes, it also seems to get in the way and effectively limit the wearer to using only one hand, the other being required to adjust and redrape the sari fabric. Younger women often opt for the alternate salwar kameez, the long shirt and leggings, with a scarf that is draped over the shoulders. However, it is what lies beyond the immediate appearance of colour in the sari that this piece is concerned with, as I reflect on what I have come to see and learn of women and their status in Indian society, and the many challenges women face here.
I meet and interact with professional women at the Institute where the students are studying; they are academics and doctors and clerks and administrators and leaders of advocacy groups and educators, and if this was my entire experience of women, the impression is of equal partners in the work force as in society. But this is not the case. I also see women in Mysore working as construction labourers – they are not the builders, but the labourers who carry cement or concrete blocks on their heads, sift sand, tote water, or dig by hand. I have seen a group of women sitting at the side of a road construction site working to make gravel, from large granite blocks. Each block is chipped by hand, the women working patiently to break them into smaller blocks and finally into pieces of gravel, one piece at a time, each one using only a hammer. They work barefoot and in saris, and sometimes are accompanied by small children. I see women who are vendors, who have simply spread a bamboo or palm thatch mat on the sidewalk, and who sit there all day selling oranges or other foods, or flowers, or jewellery. And I see women who beg in the streets; there are beggars everywhere, and my experience is that women outnumber men about three to one, and they are mostly older women. This may not be representative or accurate, but this has been my experience so far.
Women in India are still without full equal rights, without full access to property and income; they are subject to domestic abuse, sexual assault, forced into prostitution or begging if they are dismissed from their home and they have no other recourse. They are subject not only to the whims of their husbands, but often also to their mothers-in-law, who often share the same house and give direction about its management. According to one global study, India is among the top ten most dangerous nations in the world for women to live.
There is a long-standing practice of gender inequality here, and while some scholars suggest that gender equality was the norm in ancient India, particularly in the Vedic period, this has not continued through India’s history. You are probably familiar with stories from India’s past of suttee (or sati), the voluntary immolation or death by fire of a widow on her husband’s funeral pyre; one questions, of course, how voluntary this was, given the societal pressures and lack of support for one left widowed. Perhaps less familiar in the west is the historic practice of juahar, again a supposedly voluntary death, by burning, of the wives and daughters of warriors defeated in battle, to save themselves from capture, rape and enslavement by enemy soldiers. And still, in the twenty-first century, women are still dismissed from their homes by abusive husbands, murdered by husbands who simply want to claim the dowry money and remarry for more, are forced into prostitution and begging because they have no claim on property, and are subject to sexual assault by neighbours and extended family members and are not able to find support from the police or court systems. In some ways, hearing the stories from women in Mysore makes me think of the women of the New Testament period, who were little more than possessions of their fathers first, and then their husbands. The inequalities, the indignities, the lack of any kind of power over themselves, and in a sense the lack of identity were some of the things against which Jesus spoke, and which seem to exist in similar ways still for some modern Indian women.
While the conflict of a traditional culture and modern ways of living are evident in obvious ways in India – for instance, roads that are shared by cars and carts drawn by bullocks – perhaps one of the biggest conflicts that is not so apparent is that between the role traditionally given to women, and the struggle to emerge as full equal partners in society with all the rights attached to equality. As a white, western male, I will not be able to fully appreciate the issues to which women must respond in my own culture, and even less so in the “two-thirds world” which struggles to catch up to the west in material ways but not always in terms of rights and justice.
What has made a difference to my understanding is to enter, ever so briefly, into women’s reality in India not as an observer, but as a listener. Karen Armstrong, in her recent book Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life, identifies compassion as emerging from an intentionality or mindfulness of listening and being present to others. Action, she says, must be preceded by empathy, which can only come from listening, careful and attentive listening, to the stories of others. I had just recently read this work when the Mount Allison group took a “field trip” into Mysore, visiting two sites to learn more about women’s issues in India, and the response being made; I was open to listening, particularly as in both places I was the lone male, and an outsider, both by nationality and the privileges that we Canadians have been born into, and that we often take for granted.
In Mysore, we visited first a women’s shelter, a refuge for women either dismissed from their homes or who have fled their homes, victims of violence, or mental, physical, sexual or financial abuse or threat. We meet the “warden” who runs the shelter, as well as some of the “inmates”, the women currently living at this home for “destitute women”. Given the language being used, and the conditions of the shelter, and the way that support was offered and the days planned, I felt a bit like I had stepped into an Indian version of a poorhouse in a Charles Dickens novel; there was definitely a Victorian feel about rescuing these women. And I mean this in no disrespectful way, knowing the challenges of responding to very real needs with very limited resources, but the challenges and injustices faced by women, and the very rudimentary structures set up to provide assistance and support felt very antiquated compared to the contemporary western world. We have not made just all the injustices yet either, but the stories I heard both from the women and their helpers had me feeling that I had indeed stepped back in time.
This feeling of going back in time was confirmed in our second visit. Again, I heard interesting and painful stories, but at the same time I heard a voice of hope, a prophetic voice demanding justice, and I heard stories of success and change not only in individual lives, but at systemic and structural levels.
Our second visit was to a private home which hosts Samata Vedike, a weekly Progressive Women’s Forum established in 1978 and still going strong. A group of women from diverse occupational and educational backgrounds, of different ages and social status, they have been meeting for over thirty years to address women’s issues locally; they provide advocacy, support, and counsel for individuals who come to them with stories of injustice, and they work at (or against!) all levels of government and authority to achieve justice. Theologian Walter Wink is known for his works on justice theology that demand change in the “powers that be”, and this women’s forum, of engaging, loving, wise and wonderful women has been working to give support to individual women even as they take on “the powers that be”. As they state in their mandate: “Samata members will strive to identify the social root of oppressive and exploitative relationships and fight against it” And what they are dealing with, and their determination and wonderful community, made me think of women’s movements in the western world of a hundred years ago.
India has entered the twenty-first century in some areas, but in the areas of gender rights and justice, it struggles to catch up to the western world. But there are pockets of determined resistance to a patriarchal past, and there are kind and loving people who work at shelters and who run forums and who demand change, in small and large ways. It was Mother Theresa who famously said, “we cannot all do great things, but we can do small things with great love.” And I have met and listened to women who are striving to do great things, and who may or may not succeed; but along the way, they are doing small but significant things with great passion, great prophetic voice, sometimes with great anger, with great determination, and most of all with great love.
A first thought in connection with the theme of women in India is probably that of the magnificently-coloured saris that are worn by a large portion of the female population of India. And this image of the colourful sari is still correct – many women still wear saris, in all colours, as well as in a variety of fabrics. Saris seem to me – never having worn one – both a very practical but also impractical item of clothing; while the loose end (the pallu) can be used as a veil, a shelter from wind, rain or sun, or for a variety of other purposes, it also seems to get in the way and effectively limit the wearer to using only one hand, the other being required to adjust and redrape the sari fabric. Younger women often opt for the alternate salwar kameez, the long shirt and leggings, with a scarf that is draped over the shoulders. However, it is what lies beyond the immediate appearance of colour in the sari that this piece is concerned with, as I reflect on what I have come to see and learn of women and their status in Indian society, and the many challenges women face here.
I meet and interact with professional women at the Institute where the students are studying; they are academics and doctors and clerks and administrators and leaders of advocacy groups and educators, and if this was my entire experience of women, the impression is of equal partners in the work force as in society. But this is not the case. I also see women in Mysore working as construction labourers – they are not the builders, but the labourers who carry cement or concrete blocks on their heads, sift sand, tote water, or dig by hand. I have seen a group of women sitting at the side of a road construction site working to make gravel, from large granite blocks. Each block is chipped by hand, the women working patiently to break them into smaller blocks and finally into pieces of gravel, one piece at a time, each one using only a hammer. They work barefoot and in saris, and sometimes are accompanied by small children. I see women who are vendors, who have simply spread a bamboo or palm thatch mat on the sidewalk, and who sit there all day selling oranges or other foods, or flowers, or jewellery. And I see women who beg in the streets; there are beggars everywhere, and my experience is that women outnumber men about three to one, and they are mostly older women. This may not be representative or accurate, but this has been my experience so far.
Women in India are still without full equal rights, without full access to property and income; they are subject to domestic abuse, sexual assault, forced into prostitution or begging if they are dismissed from their home and they have no other recourse. They are subject not only to the whims of their husbands, but often also to their mothers-in-law, who often share the same house and give direction about its management. According to one global study, India is among the top ten most dangerous nations in the world for women to live.
There is a long-standing practice of gender inequality here, and while some scholars suggest that gender equality was the norm in ancient India, particularly in the Vedic period, this has not continued through India’s history. You are probably familiar with stories from India’s past of suttee (or sati), the voluntary immolation or death by fire of a widow on her husband’s funeral pyre; one questions, of course, how voluntary this was, given the societal pressures and lack of support for one left widowed. Perhaps less familiar in the west is the historic practice of juahar, again a supposedly voluntary death, by burning, of the wives and daughters of warriors defeated in battle, to save themselves from capture, rape and enslavement by enemy soldiers. And still, in the twenty-first century, women are still dismissed from their homes by abusive husbands, murdered by husbands who simply want to claim the dowry money and remarry for more, are forced into prostitution and begging because they have no claim on property, and are subject to sexual assault by neighbours and extended family members and are not able to find support from the police or court systems. In some ways, hearing the stories from women in Mysore makes me think of the women of the New Testament period, who were little more than possessions of their fathers first, and then their husbands. The inequalities, the indignities, the lack of any kind of power over themselves, and in a sense the lack of identity were some of the things against which Jesus spoke, and which seem to exist in similar ways still for some modern Indian women.
While the conflict of a traditional culture and modern ways of living are evident in obvious ways in India – for instance, roads that are shared by cars and carts drawn by bullocks – perhaps one of the biggest conflicts that is not so apparent is that between the role traditionally given to women, and the struggle to emerge as full equal partners in society with all the rights attached to equality. As a white, western male, I will not be able to fully appreciate the issues to which women must respond in my own culture, and even less so in the “two-thirds world” which struggles to catch up to the west in material ways but not always in terms of rights and justice.
What has made a difference to my understanding is to enter, ever so briefly, into women’s reality in India not as an observer, but as a listener. Karen Armstrong, in her recent book Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life, identifies compassion as emerging from an intentionality or mindfulness of listening and being present to others. Action, she says, must be preceded by empathy, which can only come from listening, careful and attentive listening, to the stories of others. I had just recently read this work when the Mount Allison group took a “field trip” into Mysore, visiting two sites to learn more about women’s issues in India, and the response being made; I was open to listening, particularly as in both places I was the lone male, and an outsider, both by nationality and the privileges that we Canadians have been born into, and that we often take for granted.
In Mysore, we visited first a women’s shelter, a refuge for women either dismissed from their homes or who have fled their homes, victims of violence, or mental, physical, sexual or financial abuse or threat. We meet the “warden” who runs the shelter, as well as some of the “inmates”, the women currently living at this home for “destitute women”. Given the language being used, and the conditions of the shelter, and the way that support was offered and the days planned, I felt a bit like I had stepped into an Indian version of a poorhouse in a Charles Dickens novel; there was definitely a Victorian feel about rescuing these women. And I mean this in no disrespectful way, knowing the challenges of responding to very real needs with very limited resources, but the challenges and injustices faced by women, and the very rudimentary structures set up to provide assistance and support felt very antiquated compared to the contemporary western world. We have not made just all the injustices yet either, but the stories I heard both from the women and their helpers had me feeling that I had indeed stepped back in time.
This feeling of going back in time was confirmed in our second visit. Again, I heard interesting and painful stories, but at the same time I heard a voice of hope, a prophetic voice demanding justice, and I heard stories of success and change not only in individual lives, but at systemic and structural levels.
Our second visit was to a private home which hosts Samata Vedike, a weekly Progressive Women’s Forum established in 1978 and still going strong. A group of women from diverse occupational and educational backgrounds, of different ages and social status, they have been meeting for over thirty years to address women’s issues locally; they provide advocacy, support, and counsel for individuals who come to them with stories of injustice, and they work at (or against!) all levels of government and authority to achieve justice. Theologian Walter Wink is known for his works on justice theology that demand change in the “powers that be”, and this women’s forum, of engaging, loving, wise and wonderful women has been working to give support to individual women even as they take on “the powers that be”. As they state in their mandate: “Samata members will strive to identify the social root of oppressive and exploitative relationships and fight against it” And what they are dealing with, and their determination and wonderful community, made me think of women’s movements in the western world of a hundred years ago.
India has entered the twenty-first century in some areas, but in the areas of gender rights and justice, it struggles to catch up to the western world. But there are pockets of determined resistance to a patriarchal past, and there are kind and loving people who work at shelters and who run forums and who demand change, in small and large ways. It was Mother Theresa who famously said, “we cannot all do great things, but we can do small things with great love.” And I have met and listened to women who are striving to do great things, and who may or may not succeed; but along the way, they are doing small but significant things with great passion, great prophetic voice, sometimes with great anger, with great determination, and most of all with great love.
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