WUNRN
By Meera Khanna
* 6.9 per cent of women in
* Every fourth household in
Monica Devi was widowed when her husband, a soldier in the Indian Army, died in action in the Poonch sector of Kashmir in 2006. She now stuggles to make ends meet and supports her daughter, who was born three months after her husband's death. (Credit: Nirupama Dutt\WFS)
The principle of equality and
non-discrimination, which reflects the spirit of the Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), is really the
touchstone of the Indian Constitution. But the spirit of the Constitution is
ignored, contravened, contradicted and forgotten in the actual implementation
of laws and policies when it comes to widows.
Ownership and control of assets is the
greatest protection for widows from deprivation and consequent discrimination.
But even though the legislation on property has been made more gender friendly
with the Acts of 1937, 1956 and 2005, they are far from being equal, fair and
non-discriminative.
For instance, with the amendments of
2005, daughters in Hindu joint families will now get a share equal to that of
sons, but the position of the widow stays the same. The widow will not inherit
any share in the joint family property in her own right but is entitled to an
equal share with other Class I heirs only from the separate share of the
husband, computed at the time of the notional partition. In effect, the actual
share of the widow will go down, as the separate share of the father will be
less since the property will now have to be equally divided between father,
sons and daughters. The law will now discriminate against a woman, not as a
daughter but as a widow.
In any case, daughters very often are
persuaded by the family to will away her share so that she can continue her
association with the natal home. So when the daughter becomes a widow, her
deprivation is only enhanced. These inequalities would remain unless the entire
coparcenary system is abolished totally since it has folds within folds of
inequalities, which cannot be dealt with in a piecemeal manner.
Section 4(2) of the Hindu Succession
Act allows for special State laws to prevail over the Hindu Succession Act to
address the issue of fragmentation of agricultural holdings, fixation of
ceiling and devolution of tenancy rights in these holdings.
A man has full testamentary power over
his property including his interest in joint family property as well as his
acquired property. The law, in failing to lay down a ceiling on the amount that
can be willed away, has emphasized the discrimination against women
particularly widows.
Between 1987 and 2003, 2,556 women were
killed after being branded as witches. Most of these victims were widows, aged
women and vulnerable women closely related to their attackers. In fact, the
property right of tribal women have become their death warrant. In many cases
the widow who owns land is asked to give up her right by the husband's
relatives. When they refuse to do so, the village healer is bribed to brand her
as a witch. There is a specific law to address this crime - the Prevention of
Witch Practices Act (2001) - but it comes with a package of loopholes and the
actual punishment is nominal.
Women have equality of status under the
country's Constitution. However, many anomalies remain under different personal
laws that govern many minorities in
Meanwhile women, particularly widows,
face discrimination on property matters in the name of cultural and religious
freedom, which contravenes the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of
Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), which put the onus on Governments to
abolish existing laws, regulations, customs and practices that constitute
discrimination against women.
Even though
Again, the inability of the government
to ensure that marriages are registered in the country only goes to reinforce
the deprivation faced by widows. Inheritance of property is often denied due to
a lack of proof of marriage. An expressed inability should not absolve the
Government of its responsibility to prevent discrimination practiced against
women and widows.
Inadequate measures on the part of the
Government, non implementation of policies, and ineffective programmes
invariably affect the poor. Since poverty has a feminine face, women are the
most affected, especially the widows among them.
CEDAW emphasises the vital need to
ensure that women are provided social security. Yet only 28 per cent of the
widows in
Today, when the crushing burden of debt
is forcing many farmers in the country to end their lives - more than 20,000
farmers are estimated to have ended their lives since 1997 - it is there widows
who are left to face the consequences. The farmers' widows, already under their
husbands' debts, have no clear titled right to the land. There are, besides,
children who need to be clothed, fed and educated. These women are financially,
emotionally and educationally ill-equipped to cope with all these sudden
responsibilities. The Government has been making ex-gratia payments, but such
doles will not help. The Government's approach must shift from welfarism to
rights. Widows must be given entitlements, so that their debts are waived and
their right to the land, recognised.
The multiple forms that violence
against widows are known. Yet there is astonishingly very little data
available. This is because of the persistence of the myth that widows are being
taken care of by their families. Without adequate data, it will be impossible
to map the economic, social and political vulnerabilities of widows and ensure
that justice is delivered to them.
Widowhood is both a crisis and a
problem. In the suddenness and in the sea change it brings in the life of a
woman, it is a monumental crisis. As the woman tries to cope with the
implications, she is faced with innumerable problems without a support
structure of any kind. What's worse, in
In such a scenario, the widow is triply
discriminated against - as a woman, as a widow and as a poor widowed woman. It
has been said that poverty wears a woman's face - it probably wears a widow's
face.
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