Volume 1, Issue 2 (Oct. 1999)

Women Second-Class Citizens in Hindutva

For thousands of years, women have suffered inhuman treatment under the monstrous laws of Brahmanism. The debilitating effects of Vedic sati, dowry, Vedic female infanticide and inhuman punishments have crushed Indian women to the status of sub-humans. Indeed, in no other civilization is the status of women worse than in Brahmanism, and never was it worse than during the Brahmanic Dark Ages (1500 BC - 1250 AD)

And the Hindutva Parivar is Reviving Brahmanic Anti-Woman Laws !

This we learn from :

Asian Age, Monday 30 August 1999 , p.1

Women 2nd class citizens in Hindutva Parivar By Ravi Shankar New Delhi: How does the Indian woman, seen through the eyes of the Sangh Parivar, appear? After rushing the "quintessential Bharatiya Nari" Sushma Swaraj to Bellary, two Cabinet ministers have made statements against Congress president Sonia Gandhi which have been attacked as demeaning to Indian womanhood. A look at how the has BJP has viewed the role of women in Indian society before and since the watershed BJP rath yatra: -- On wife-beating: Ms Mridula Sinha, president of the BJP’s Mahila Aghadi, in magazine interviews in April 1993: "Yes, it is often the woman’s fault. She can provoke the man to such an extent that he beats her. And, sometimes, the woman can be so ziddi. We tell the woman to try and adjust. After all, it is her family." -- On polygamy: In January 1993, Swami Muktananda, while making recommendations on revising the Indian Constitution, was of the opinion that all restrictions in laws on the number of times a man could marry should be removed completely. -- The practice of Sati: Swami Mukatananand also gave a clean chit to the practices of Sati and dowry, which he called "traditional Hindu practices " In October 1987, former BJP vice-president Rajmata Vijayaraje Scindia, leading a pro-Sati march after the infamous Deorala incident, when Roop Kanwar was burnt alive in Deorala village in Rajasthan, said: "Sati is very much part of our tradition." On Religious restrictions: In January 1994, Swami Nishchalananda, the Shankaracharya of Puri, was presiding over a function that Arundhati Roychoudhury walked out of after the Swami protested at women being allowed to recite sacred texts. "I respect women too much to allow them to go and beg for alms in one garment, which is a prerequisite for the donning of the sacred thread," he is reported to have said. The sacred thread, in turn, is a prerequisite for the chanting of the Vedas. Note: Two thousand years ago, in early Vedic times, women like Jayabala and Gargi held discussions at length on Vedic philosophy, which form part of philosophical texts. -- Women’s dignity: Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray has, in election rallies, made salacious references to women in public life. Among those he made remarks about were veteran Gandhian Ushabehn Mehata, socialist Mrinal Gore and the fiery CPI(M) leader Ahilyatai Rangnekar. -- Cultural policing: In Dehli, the Sangh Parivar demanded that girls should not be allowed to wear skirts ostensibly because of mosquitoes bites. In Calcutta, a similar decree was issued because wearing salwaz-kameez threatened centuries-old Indian culture. -- Landholding rights: In 1956, during intense debates in Parliament on the passage of the Hindu Code Bill, members of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, the earlier incarnation of the BJP, had strongly opposed any changes that would grant rights to women to own agricultural property. -- Rajasthan fact-sheet: Before the Congress came back to power in 1998, the BJP ruled Rajasthan for eight years. A record of how women fared under saffron rule: * Gangrape and torture of Dhapu Bal of Utharna in Tonk district of the state by nine men. In June 1996, a gang raped her again. Her husband and son were beaten up with iron rods. * In September 1997, Naina Jogani, a devout Jain, was raped by a Jain monk in Bhinmal, Jalore. * Later in the same month, a young girl was gangraped by eight men in the J.C. Bose hostel of the University of Rajasthan in Jaipur. * Then chief minister Bhairon Singh Shekawat’s reaction to protests: "Why this unnecessary hue and cry over two rape incidents?" * Deputy chief minister Hari Shankar Babu’s reply on the floor of the Assembly: "The character of a woman and the destiny of a man are such that even Gods cannot say anything about them. Why talk of human beings?" * In April 1997, the son of the state transport minister threw acid on the face of a school-going girl. Despite large-scale protests, no arrests were made.

Author : Deepti Hodlya
Dalitstan Journal, Volume 1, Issue 1 (August 1999)

 

The lobbyists also try to portray India as the `world's largest secular democracy', implying that all democracies are friendly towards the West. Well, Russia was a democracy when it opposed Western humanitarian intervention n Kosovo. Nazi Germany was a democracy when it was at war with the US. Pakistan is also a democracy, yet these same India-supporters seem to overlook this fact. The US having close ties with Pakistan means that it is supporting a democratic regime. The Indian government has also consistently debarred American companies access to its market, whilst sending in thousands of software engineeres and doctors who take up American jobs. Jobs our Government says Americans cannot perform while immigrants from a Third World country can. India also allows the deaths of more than 1 million female infants each year on account of Hindu dowry laws which turn girl children into economic liabilites. Over 50 years, that is 50 million girls who have been killed by the present Indian government. By comparison, Hitler murdered `only' an alleged 5 million Jews. By contrast, the much-maligned Pakistan and other Islamic nations have a much better track record when it comes to killing baby girls. In short, the arguments presented by pro-Hindu lobbyists in favour of India are far from convincing. The West should stop its pro-Hindu tilt before it is too late.

-- William Corrigan,
Dalitstan Journal,
Volume 1, Issue 2 (Oct. 1999)