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  • Can misuse of 498A be prevented?

    Can misuse of 498A be prevented?

    On the 27th of July 2017, the Supreme Court of India issued a series of guidelines to curb the misuse of the draconian IPC 498A. This law, easily the most misused law in India, is meant to provide criminal relief against the physical and mental abuse caused to women by their husbands and in-laws. However, this law has turned into a weapon used by unscrupulous wives to falsely implicate their husbands and relatives in order to exert pressure on them to settle for a quick divorce and a fat alimony package.

    In spite of the severe public demand, and irrefutable data, the Government of India, over the past 20 years has not taken a single legislative remedial measure. Hence the burden of reducing the misuse of this law has fallen on the Courts of this country.

    In Civil appeal No. 4399 of 2005, the Supreme Court of India said the following about IPC 498A-

    “As noted above the object is to strike at the roots of dowry menace. But by misuse of the provision a new LEGAL TERRORISM can be unleashed. The provision is intended to be used a shield and not an assassin’s weapon”

    For the first time, the Courts started taking cognizance of the fact that a law drafted with the intention of protecting women from abuse was being misused for ulterior gains.

    In the year 2010, the Ministry of Home Affairs issued an advisory to all States to take measures to reduce the misuse of this law. The ministry again repeated its advisory to all the States in the year 2012.

    In the year 2014, the Supreme Court of India, in Arnesh Kumar vs State Of Bihar & Anr, ended up creating a case law and stopped the right of Police to automatically and indiscreetly arrest those accused under 498A.

    To further prevent misuse of this law, the Supreme Court once again, in July 2017, issued further guidelines on the procedure to handle any 498A case. It ordered the setup of Family Welfare Committees in every district that will look into each complaint of 498A and issue directions and advise police on next steps.

    With each one of the above measures, one should remember that the goal has ONLY been to prevent misuse of the law, especially the provision to arrest the husband and his family members right at the onset of the complaint. None of the measures have eroded the possibility of justice in case of genuine abuse. Nor has there been any change in the penalty or punishment to those genuinely guilty.

    Most of the families who undergo arrest even for a single day end up wanting to settle the cases as soon as possible. This arm twists them into accepting the demands, however unjustified, of the wife and her family, which almost always is around divorce, huge alimony and maintenance and in many cases handing over of the family property. In almost every case of misuse, the intention is to break the will of the husband and his family and force them to accept a settlement on terms placed by the (former) wife. Therefore, for those who misuse the law, it is of utmost importance that there be immediate arrest of the accused.

    If there is no arrest prior to chargesheet and/or conviction, false cases will fail during the trial. This means the husband and his family will never be arrested and therefore the chances of them accepting the demands are miniscule. In summary, the main “attraction” of 498A is its ability to get the opposite party arrested even before any semblance of a trial and/or conviction has occurred.

    With the new guidelines and consequent difficulty around arrest, interest in misusing this law should naturally decline. In the remainder of this write-up, we look at some numbers from the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) to confirm if the numbers support the theory that 498A is waning in its attraction as a tool for misuse.

    Statistical analysis of 498A

    Every year, a huge number of cases are registered under IPC 498A. In terms of total number of cases registered, it is the 6th biggest crime in India, as seen from the below table.

    Note: Table only lists those crime categories where the total number of cases registered are in multiple tens-of-thousands.

    All India – Cases – Major Crimes – 2015
    Nature of Crime Total Number of Cases
    Theft 467833
    Rash Driving/Road Rage 451069
    Death by Negligence 134384
    Cheating 115405
    Criminal Tresspass & Burglary 114123
    Cruelty by Husband & Relatives 113403
    Grievous Hurt 92996
    Kidnapping & Abduction 82999
    Assault on women 82422
    Riots 65255
    Robbery 36188
    Rape 34651
    Murder 32127

    In fact, one can notice from the above table that if one were to consider only those categories where a deliberate intent to commit crime is involved (leaving out rash driving and death by negligence), 498A crimes are the 4th largest in terms of number of cases registered.

    Over the past 15 years, the total number of cases under IPC 498A have seen a continuous upward trend and have increased by more than 100% from 2001 to 2015. The below table shows the actual number of cases registered from 2001 to 2015.

    All India – Cases – Cruelty by husband and family members for crimes against women
    Year Cases Registered
    2001 49170
    2002 49237
    2003 50703
    2004 58121
    2005 58319
    2006 63128
    2007 75930
    2008 81344
    2009 89546
    2010 94041
    2011 99135
    2012 106527
    2013 118866
    2014 122877
    2015 113403

    We can observe from the above table that, for the first time in 2015, the total number of cases registered has shown a downward trend. This can directly be attributed to the strict guidelines issued by the Supreme Court of India in the year 2014. One may argue that the decline shown is for only one year and therefore it is inappropriate to conclude that it is related to the guidelines related to “no-automatic arrests”.

    When we analyze the numbers for total cases registered over the years for various states, we see that two States – Karnataka and Kerala – have shown a downward trend in number of cases registered from 2012 onwards itself.

    The data for Karnataka is captured in the below table.

    Karnataka – Cases – Cruelty by husband and family members for crimes against women
    Year Cases Registered
    2001 1735
    2002 1826
    2003 1704
    2004 1588
    2005 1883
    2006 2129
    2007 2507
    2008 2638
    2009 3185
    2010 3441
    2011 3712
    2012 3684
    2013 3276
    2014 3025
    2015 2732

    Similarly, the number of cases in Kerala have also declined since 2012, as shown below.

    Kerala – Cases – Cruelty by husband and family members for crimes against women
    Year Cases Registered
    2001 2561
    2002 2836
    2003 2930
    2004 3222
    2005 3283
    2006 3708
    2007 3999
    2008 4138
    2009 4007
    2010 4797
    2011 5377
    2012 5216
    2013 4820
    2014 4919
    2015 3668

    Some very interesting details emerge when we try to analyze the reasons behind the decline starting in 2012 for these two states.

    As mentioned in the beginning of the article, the Ministry of Home Affairs issued a circular in 2010 and in 2012 to all the States to take steps to prevent misuse of 498A. As a response to this many states issued directions to their police to take precautions while handling these cases. For example, guidelines were issued by the DGPs (and other relevant authorities) of Delhi, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Chattisgarh and others. However, almost all the directions were precautionary in nature and centered around thorough investigation, need for counseling, etc.

    However, the DGPs of Karnataka and Kerala, in 2010-11 and 2012 respectively, issued detailed directions that involved one crucial, and additional step, before arresting anyone under 498A. In both these states, the investigating officer had to obtain the consent of the DCP prior to arresting anyone. This introduced a crucial senior review process in deciding arrest. Clearly, with an additional, superior, authority reviewing the case, the scope for misuse reduced. The reduction in the registration of cases under 498A in these two states can be directly attributed to this tightening measure.

    Therefore, it is quite clear that the drop in 498A cases registration is clearly linked with its utility in immediate arrest coming down, due to the guidelines by the SC and the Police departments.

    Misuse and Conviction Rates

    If misuse of 498A comes down, it naturally means that the total number of cases that needs to be investigated by the Police comes down. This also means that the percentage of genuine cases go up and also that the bandwidth available to the Police for investigating the genuine cases increases. This highlights the important issue associated with misuse of current law which denies justice to actual victims.

    The NCRB website provides detailed statistics on the total number of persons arrested and the number of persons convicted under any crime. For the years 2010-2015, at the all-India level, the following is the conviction rate for crimes under 498A.

    All India – Persons Arrested – Cruelty by husband and family members for crimes against women
    Year Persons Arrested Persons Convicted Conviction Rate (%)
    2010 180413 23837 13.21
    2011 180701 21662 11.98
    2012 197762 16402 8.29
    2013 222091 17542 7.89
    2014 225648 16360 7.25
    2015 187067 16857 9.01

    The conviction rate, for the past several years, has been in single digits, which is yet another pointer to the high percentage of false cases registered under this category.

    For comparison purposes, let us look at the conviction rates under the 13 crime categories that we looked at in the beginning of this article (which showed the total number of cases registered)

    All India – Crimes – 2015 – Persons Arrested and Convicted (Arranged in decreasing order of conviction rate)
    Nature of Crime Persons Arrested Persons Convicted Conviction Rate (%)
    Rash Driving/Road Rage 426435 245935 57.67
    Cheating 146236 39378 26.92
    Murder 62159 16081 25.87
    Tresspass & Burglary 79379 15461 19.47
    Theft 222556 40916 18.38
    Rape 42036 7185 17.09
    Death by Negligence 116759 19048 16.31
    Robbery 46899 7317 15.60
    Riots 294289 34300 11.65
    Assault on women 101571 11342 11.16
    Kidnapping & Abduction 73557 7285 9.90
    Grievous Hurt 112916 10975 9.71
    Cruelty by Husband & Rels 187067 16857 9.01

    We can see that crimes under 498A have the lowest conviction rate of any (significant) IPC crime!!! Not to forget that the criminal is known in this case and put behind bars at the onset of the case.

    In the year 2015, after the total number of cases declined for the first time, we notice that the conviction rate under this crime went up from 7.25% to 9.01%. This could be an indicator that reduction in the number of false cases provides an opportunity for Police to perform better investigations in genuine cases. To confirm this, we can look at the conviction rates between 2010-2015 for Karnataka and Kerala since these 2 states have shown a decline in false cases for a longer period.

    Below table shows the conviction rate for Karnataka.

    Karnataka – Persons Arrested – Cruelty by husband and family members for crimes against women
    Year Persons Arrested Persons Convicted Conviction Rate (%)
    2010 6515 183 2.80
    2011 6801 157 2.30
    2012 6317 174 2.75
    2013 5771 179 3.10
    2014 5523 276 4.99
    2015 4770 91 1.90

    Similarly, the table below shows the conviction rate for Kerala.

    Kerala – Persons Arrested – Cruelty by husband and family members for crimes against women
    Year Persons Arrested Persons Convicted Conviction Rate (%)
    2010 7522 222 2.95
    2011 7305 313 4.28
    2012 6923 254 3.66
    2013 6330 268 4.23
    2014 6818 165 2.42
    2015 4998 185 3.70

    We can notice from the above 2 tables that, apart from a blip in Karnataka in 2015, the numbers always show that a dip in false cases, and consequent reduction in arrests, leads to an increase in conviction rate! Therefore, any step, such as the guidelines issued by the Supreme Court, to reduce false cases can only benefit those who are genuine victims of domestic violence and need protection and relief from this law.

    Disparity in State wise numbers

    When it comes to total number of cases registered on a state wise basis, we find that there is a huge disparity in terms of the percentage of cases registered as measured against the percentage of population of the state. The below table shows a list of the states that contribute the maximum number of cases related to 498A.

    All India – States with maximum cases registered – 2015 (Total cases – 113403)
    State Cases Registered Percentage of Total Cases Population %age – 2011 Census
    West Bengal 20163 17.77 7.55
    Rajasthan 14383 12.68 5.67
    Assam 11225 9.89 2.58
    Uttar Pradesh 8660 7.63 16.49
    Maharashtra 7640 6.73 9.28
    Telengana 7329 6.46 2.97
    Andhra Pradesh 6121 5.39 4.08
    Madhya Pradesh 5281 4.65 6.00
    Gujarat 4133 3.64 5.00
    Bihar 3792 3.34 8.58
    Kerala 3668 3.23 2.76
    Odisha 3605 3.17 3.47
    Haryana 3525 3.10 2.09
    Delhi 3521 3.10 1.38
    Karnataka 2732 2.40 5.05
    Tamil Nadu 1900 1.67 5.96

    It is startling to see that just 3 states – West Bengal, Rajasthan and Assam – contribute more than 40% of the total cases registered in the country in 2015 even though their share in India’s population is just 15% as per Census 2011. The trend is similar in the immediate preceding few years.

    Although, one can argue that these states are different in how police functions and it is easier to report cases. But using NCRB data we do not find that other crimes are also reported more in these states. So, it cannot be efficiency of police force leading to higher reporting of cases. Another possible reason could be that women are treated differently in the public sphere in these states and they can easily report the crimes to police without any stigma. So, high per capita cases case of West Bengal and Assam actually highlights some kind of women empowerment. But this myth is busted when we look at the next table, which presents conviction rate.

    The table below shows the total number of persons arrested in the year 2015 and the total number of persons convicted. Of course, the persons convicted most often corresponds to cases registered in previous years but a review of the NCRB data shows a uniform proportion of these numbers in the preceding years. Hence this is a valid comparison.

    All India – States – Ratio of persons arrested to persons convicted – 2015
    State Persons Arrested Persons Convicted %age of PC/PA
    West Bengal 22508 244 1.08
    Rajasthan 9590 2341 24.41
    Assam 10404 263 2.53
    Uttar Pradesh 41802 6708 16.04
    Maharashtra 20129 762 3.78
    Telengana 10082 426 4.22
    Andhra Pradesh 8984 756 8.41
    Madhya Pradesh 13317 2270 17.04
    Gujarat 12982 120 0.9
    Bihar 5396 143 2.65
    Kerala 4998 185 3.70
    Odisha 5051 171 3.38
    Haryana 3628 239 6.58
    Delhi 1266 144 11.37
    Karnataka 4770 91 1.9
    Tamil Nadu 3634 368 10.12

    It is once again surprising to see that the 2 of the 3 states that contribute most of the cases (West Bengal and Assam) have the most dismal conviction rate amongst all states. If social stigma was the driving force, we would not see such big disparity in conviction rates across states. This clearly shows a high level of misuse of the law associated with failure at proving conviction. Above table also highlights in red a few other states where conviction rate is far below national average of 9% indicating the law being misused more often than not.

    Conclusion

    The Government of India, considering these factors, should take further steps to dissuade misuse of this law. Introduction of criminal action against those found misusing this law can be the next big reform to totally weed out misuse. This will further reduce the workload of our investigating and judicial authorities and will also lead to faster conclusion of the genuine cases. Shorter trial periods will feed back into the loop leading to more and more genuinely affected women approaching the justice system, thereby serving the purpose which the original makers of the law intended.

    The Government should also perform a thorough analysis of the data collected to determine state-wise (local) reasons that could show a more prevalent case of domestic abuse of women. Since law and order is a state subject, making necessary laws specific to those states, while removing a common special law for the entire country could be a welcome move to curb misuse and at the same time increase effectiveness.

    Note: The author tweets at @Hariprasad.

    Image Source: http://www.section498.com/article/a-look-at-how-the-dowry-law-is-being-highly-abused/

  • Equal rights is fine but what about unequal fights?

    Equal rights is fine but what about unequal fights?

    What happens when you rob a man of his dignity and his life? Someone someday will take a drastic step, lose his mind and go on a killing spree. After all, if you ruin a man’s life to the point where there is nothing left to live for, well, he can surely take a few lives with him as revenge. One must not take so much advantage of someone just because one isn’t saying anything. We are talking about men in current India to make you realize that it is not far from truth. What has brought about this sad state of affairs? Short sightedness of legislature and judiciary. To give an example-

    Rohit is a psychiatrist and runs a suicide prevention help line. He got a call from one guy in jail and went to meet him. He told that his wife registered a case on him for divorce and maintenance. So the judge fixed an amount but the total income of the guy is less than the amount payable in maintenance. Since he could not afford to pay it now he is jailed for not paying the maintenance. Not surprisingly, he is now contemplating suicide.

    Such cases as reported by Rohit are widespread but do not get enough coverage and get drowned in the feminist hysteria, except generating some coverage on inside pages of local newspapers, where no one bothers to pay heed.

    Man leaves suicide video blaming wife n in-laws, says ws threatened n harassed with a false #498A , parents torturedhttps://t.co/TFNKloH8Nu

    — Deepika Bhardwaj (@DeepikaBhardwaj) August 31, 2016

    What is the solution out of this mess? With changing times, men must update their attitude about relationships and marriages and see it the way women see it- a contract made for self interest. Currently, once someone’s marriage gets fixed he starts building air castles about what will happen on honeymoon, while the girl’s family starts doing financial calculation about how their daughter gets upward social/economic mobility just by marrying (female hypergamy).

    The popular narrative tells men that dowry is evil but is silent on how women (and their families) hunt grooms? They roam with calculators in their hand! The primary motivating factors for them are “Mumbai/Delhi mein khudka ghar hai? (Does the man own an apartment)”, “1BHK/2BHK?”, “does the groom have any other claimants on the property, like brother?”, “ladka kitna kamata hai?(How much does the boy earn?)” etc. The institution of arranged marriage is nothing but legalized prostitution these days where parents sell their daughter to the highest bidder and have the guts to lecture ‘society’ that dowry is evil. What is this mythical ‘society’ they keep ranting about? Aren’t women a part of the same society?

    Compare their cold and calculating attitude to the callous attitude of men while hunting for wives, all they see is “ladki dikhne mein theek hai? Ok, kardo shadi (Is the girl decent looking? Ok, lets marry)”. Anyway it’s inappropriate for the guy to lay claim on the girl’s property, neither socially nor legally. It is impossible to get her property even after her parents die, or if you divorce and become jobless and she has job, she never has to pay maintenance. The feminazis failed to get it legislated but the next bill will give claim to wife on husband’s inherited property post divorce. So basically the onus of a failed relationship and its economic implications are put squarely on the man, while the woman has ZERO liability in such an alliance. Go big or go home but no loss. When a girl’s family says that they got a good groom, what they mean is they found a wealthy groom, so if X is better than Y then it can be proved with objective data that X has more money than Y. Can a guy do similar calculations? What does he mean when X bride is better than Y bride? Do men even have objective parameters to judge on a scale of ‘better’? They consider themselves lucky just because someone is marrying them.

    Men must start exploring proper options like pre-nuptials, hiring detective to see if there are any other Feminazis in the girl’s family who have given divorce to their husband and stolen 50% of his property. ANY red flag, ANY, just say no. It’s time men start thinking with their heads. No one goes to buy a new car and think “what are my insurance options if this new car gets into an accident” because we are all wishful thinkers and assume the best possible scenario, but when the accident happens, they realize that in their happiness to buy a new car they didn’t read the fine print and cannot claim any respite once an accident takes place. It is the same callous attitude men in India have towards marriage. No one realistically thinks about bad scenarios at the time of marriage- what if this doesn’t work out? What are my legal/economic liabilities? What is my plan B?

    Men need to start becoming more cunning. The world is a scary place filled with vultures who want to take everything that you have (the very reason they made any association with you is because of what you HAVE, not because of who you are) so once you stop having what you have (by losing a job/business/accident/disease) then the same girl who thought it made sense to be with you earlier makes the calculation that it doesn’t make sense to be with you now. It is these ‘sensible’ people who are the most poisonous and we keep hunting for demons under our beds.

    The idea of marriage was offered to men under the premise that after evaluating the pros and cons, it had a net positive effect on everyone. Steadily, over the years the dividends which men receive from this institution has eroded and it is increasingly becoming a liability. It used to be a package deal where you got companionship, children, sex, and a friend to grow old with, but now with the new laws and corporate lifestyle, all of that has been jeopardized. There’s no companionship as the husband and wife work in different offices and hardly see each other daily, sex is non-existent (or as per the whims of the lady, and now that they are clamouring to introduce marital rape bill, more fake rape cases will ensue to blackmail husbands). Kids? Well, once there is a divorce, the court take away the kids and gives them to the wife! And old age? You will spend old age as an old man filled with regrets, no companionship, no kids, no retirement pension, paying maintenance to your wife. Where is the benefit to men to get into such a one sided arrangement where the onus of a failed relationship is completely on one gender?

    Now a days, if you are an upper middle class man, the fact that you marry only means that you have pledged your wealth to a stranger unilaterally where she has no reciprocal obligations whatsoever. The concept of household chores is non-existent as there are washing machines and house maids. So even if the wife is a house wife, her status is that of a highly pampered house cat. She adds no value to the alliance in any way compared to what she gets to legally claim in return (your entire property). Going out and marrying is like going to the mall and buying trouble with your hard earned money.

    On the other hand, the women, by marrying, immediately become legally entitled to lay claim on the husband’s property and immediately achieve social/economic mobility. The husband’s real estate is multiple times of what she would earn from her job anyway. It’s the woman who gets everything in a conventional marriage scenario and no matter how shrill the Feminists are, they aren’t ready to forfeit this benefit of caricaturing the man in the role of a provider. The more he is capable of providing, the better man he is considered. How come no Feminists are crying objectification now?One just needs to look at west to realize how a failed marriage society will look like. They have disintegrated this ‘package deal’ that marriage offers and relegated each of its constituent elements to different sources. There, when the men want companionship? They join hobby clubs and meet like minded people. When they want intellectual conversations, they talk to people in their office or on the internet. They want sex?, They arrange it yourself through ‘various means’ including pick up artistry (free casual pump and dump sex which oddly is opposed by their own feminist) and fuck a new girl each weekend. when they want to have the feeling of fulfilment of raising a child? They adopt an orphan or 10 and sponsor their education. When they want safety and security in retirement? They buy a house at a prime area from all the money saved and lead a comfortable life, which arguably is a way better choice there since their chances of good old age life is better if they are single and unmarried and hence not screwed by their legal system where they get robbed of their properties and earnings in the name of divorces and maintainance. Even the hospitals have become like 5-start hotels. If you are sick in old age and pay them enough, they will keep you like a king till you die. Men there don’t need a wife or kids for that (or they will still have 10 adopted kids who might help them in old age). The laws pushed down the throat of men in their feminazi society has ensured that the above combination is FAR better than the prospect of marrying a woman in 20s, and then have a sexless bitter life with a false marital rape case filed against them once their wife lose interest in them, while their house and money and kids are taken away while leading the life of a single uncle and waiting to die and nothing to look forward to!

    The above scenario is well exemplified by the movements like PUA and MGTOW in the west. Their society is already at a point where majority men don’t marry and leave their women (even the normal non-feminist feminine women) stranded with a cat with their shrinking ovaries with nothing to look forward to except cat piss in their future. While men are learning to cope up with anti-men society, it is actually the women who end up as sore losers and cat ladies in the end. Since men no longer want to marry feminazis, the shrill feminazis then raked up the old patriarchal quote and ask men “To Man Up”. The irony is that despite all these impediments that men face, it is the women who keep claiming perpetual victim hood.

    The above decadent situation which is prevalent in west today, has reached the current decadent state wasn’t reached overnight and was reached by decades of unopposed march by feminism and mindless women pampering by their politicians and judiciary which thought men had no issues in marital life and only women had issues and pampered their women without thinking through the consequences for their actions. While not every women might have supported feminism or “women’s rights” march and the laws screwing the men there, they inevitably let their feminist crazy sisters to shout over the rooftop and let the laws screw their men. Now it is the same women, who might not even be feminists themselves but are made to pay the price for such anti-male laws there with singledom, cat piss and dog shit. Feminists who pushed for such laws are actually happy for it since why would an already lesbian, anti-male and all sex is rape hippy care that other normal women are getting left alone without companionship?

    This is not to say that women don’t face atrocities in India. Many women in rural areas are getting physically abused and killed by their in-laws, but that sample set has no connection to the modern urban educated woman working in a corporate job. Urban Feminazis appropriating victim-hood on the behalf of their rural counterparts whom they have never even met and claiming more and more concessions is nothing but crude opportunism. It’s like Anil ambani saying “my driver didn’t have breakfast today so I must eat 2 extra burgers on his behalf to compensate for it”.

    So the only advice to men and their sisters and mothers is to avoid the dynamite of failed marriage by properly filtering out any signs of feminism when they look for a bride. Unless the Indian society wakes up to this challenge, it too will end up with failed marriages and unhappy cat ladies like in the west, while men look the other side and ignore them. This will be especially true for women in India as well. The price for feminism and it’s cat ladies of the west is paid for by both feminist and non-feminists alike in the west. The percentage of women who identify as feminists is at an all time low of 27% in USA and still the percentage of women who manage to get a husband is only 30-40%. This is why women against feminism is gaining ground there. But it is a step too late and too little. Their society is already dying and their women are already miserable. Women of India should women up and stand up to the braindead white wannabe Indian feminazis, for if they don’t stand up to this judicial trampling of men by courts and society on the advice of white wannabe feminists, it is not just their brothers and sons who are going to be destroyed, but their own lives along with their sisters and daughters as well. It is about time Indians stop this blond white wannabeness and start learning from the mistakes the dying and decadent west made.

  • Feminism in India will not help the girl child- Part I

    Feminism in India will not help the girl child- Part I

    The above poster is more than enough to explain everything that is wrong with feminism. The problem can be described in one word-entitlement. The entitlement of the entitled middle class princesses.

    But for the rest of the article, lets forget about entitlement and analyse some of the problems in India and see whether feminism can be an antidote for any of them.

    The often cited reasons for the existence of this movement are gender gap or poor sex ratio, poor child education rates, practice of dowry, etc. However, if one takes a closer look at these issues, one would find that all of these issues are result of poverty and not really misogyny as claimed by the feminists.

    Poor sex ratio or female foeticide

    The article argues that the root cause of female foeticide lies partly in poverty, weak social security and the expectation that sons will support parents in old age.

    It claims that population-control campaigns encouraged families to have fewer children, which intensified sex selection when parents still felt they needed at least one son.

    The article points to Tamil Nadu as a place where attitudes have shifted because daughters increasingly support their parents and some parents live with daughters and sons-in-law.

    It concludes that solving skewed sex ratios requires either removing stigma against larger families or making daughters equally responsible for elderly parents.

    Dowry

    Dowry is described as one of the traditional ways of sharing paternal property with daughters. The article argues that abolishing dowry without changing inheritance and marriage-market realities may not improve the position of the girl child.

    Read Part 2 here.

    Image credits:
    https://mic.com/articles/93147/14-powerful-photos-that-show-why-india-needs-feminism-now-more-than-ever

  • Why dowry is not evil as painted by MSM

    Why dowry is not evil as painted by MSM

    Dowry is the favourite topic which raises immediate alarm among deracinated Indians, specially the youth who are brainwashed into believing that dowry system is evil and misogynistic and why we need feminism to fight against it. More often than not, these people tend to be young with no sense of real world and live in an urban area. They can be heard and seen writing against how evil dowry is on the internet and how they will neither give nor take it. But dowry is a lot more nuanced issue than many think it to be. It is not all black and white and is certainly not evil as displayed in media, academia and films. It is a sad commentary on how badly the narrative is rigged and dominated by the lunatic feminist academia and mainstream media. Even very simple analysis of the dowry system will poke holes into the whole propaganda, including the claims that it is a war on women. The propaganda is so massive that governments after governments refuse to even look into the issue even though the lopsided 498A law has sent millions of families to ruins since overwhelming majority of cases registered under 498A are false, to the tune of 90%. So, what is the truth behind dowry. Let’s analyse:

    Dowry is girl’s share in paternal property

    In the original Hindu culture (and indeed most religious customs), sons inherited most of the wealth of the parents. The parents of the bride used to give dowry to their son-in-law, as they would transfer their own wealth to their sons. For example, if a family has a total wealth of 10 lakh Rupees, they will give 5 lakh Rupees as dowry to find a groom of similar status while giving 5 lakh rupees as inheritance to their sons. Of course, the son being the presumed owner of 5 lakh inheritance, he usually received 5 lakh as dowry for himself when he gets married. So in total the wealth remained more or less equal, provided everything was equal- the status of bride and groom. But this dowry system could also be used in a way to give a better life to daughter by finding a better groom for 6 lakh dowry rather than just 5 lakh dowry, thus leaving the son with only 4 lakh inheritance and hence only able to get a girl of 4 lakh dowry for himself. Given that Hindu society of the old was agricultural in nature and had strict laws against marrying within ones village, dowry was a perfect system to keep ancestral property i.e. land with the sons since they did not leave the village. While girl child would get gold and other transferable property, the son usually got the land.

    Some people might object to the division of ancestral property in the above example as equal while it is unequal in the real world. But in the same real world, girls were also not supposed to take care of their old parents. Since the sons were supposed to help their old parents, they naturally got higher share in ancestral property. Also if a girl got lower share in her ancestral property through dowry, her husband got higher share in his ancestral property thus nullifying the overall effect on their family wealth.

    If dowry objectifies women, it equally objectifies men

    While this system on surface seems like it is objectifying women by associating a price for their marriage, it is very far away from truth. The price tag of dowry does not come from wealth alone. If a groom is very good guy with no bad habits, a good job and a good degree, then he is much more likely to get a better dowry than simply because of his family’s wealth. This is exactly opposite for the groom, who is a known alcoholic with no stable job and is general burden for the society. He is unlikely to get any dowry at all for his marriage. Actually it would be a great achievement for such a person to get married!! So if dowry is objectification of women, then it should also be seen as objectification of men. Men are objectified for their behaviour, job, wealth, status and family wealth. The truth of the matter is, the bride’s family is willing to pay the bribe precisely because they think the groom is worth the dowry they pay him. Isn’t that objectification of groom by putting a price tag on him? So why don’t the men go around complaining that they are getting objectified?

    The truth is, the world sees someone for what he/she is worth to the world. This is reflected in the dowry system too. A groom with good looks, good job, good status, good family will be more guaranteed to provide a good life for the bride and hence the bride’s family tries to lock him up for their daughter with dowry. Similarly beautiful, more cultured girls, and these days even working girls with good education (specially in more developed states like Tamil Nadu, Maharastra, Gujarat etc) etc will have higher demand than the ugly or uneducated girls and hence would be able to match with ideal grooms with much less dowry than ugly and uneducated girls. While it is politically correct to mince words on this issue and dance around this fact to protect the presumed sensibilities of the easily offended snowflakes, who prefer emotions of how innocent all women are and how evil all men are, it is much more important to confront this issue.

    Hence, dowry is a complex system of measuring and price gauging both bride and groom’s worth and is a way for the parents to give their girl children their wealth. But since dowry always goes from brides to grooms, does this not mean that dowry is inherently misogynistic? Of course not. The groom already brings his own inheritance as wealth to the family the new couple will start while the bride doesn’t. So the dowry which the bride brings is only a fair contribution which the bride makes to start a new family. In simple words, grooms do bring dowry to family in the form of inheritance while brides bring dowry and no inheritance.

    Changing inheritance laws will change system of dowry

    But now the inheritance laws have been changed so that daughters have equal share in the properties of the parents. This largely negates the need for dowry, since bride herself brings inheritance, much like how groom’s used to bring their inheritance for starting a family. Also in some cases, the girls family might give more dowry over the inheritance if they find the groom to be worth it and it should be completely fine. They are not being forced into marrying a groom who asks for dowry but are choosing him after fully knowing that he is asking for dowry and then deciding that it is worth giving the daughter in marriage to the guy because he will take care of the girl better than some other guy who doesn’t take dowry. This is perfectly fine as long as it is voluntary.

    This is also another example where it is easier to see the baseless propaganda against dowry. Lets say that there are two families A and B and they want to get married. A has 20 lakh of wealth while B has 30 lakh. A decided to marry off their daughter to son of family B giving family B 20 lakhs as dowry. As per the present propaganda, this practice of dowry is evil. Now let’s take another example where there are two families C and D where C is worth 20 lakhs while D is worth 30 lakhs. Then family C gives their daughter in marriage to son of family D but without any dowry. But after the death of family C, the daughter and hence the son-in-law inherits all the money/wealth of family C which is again 20 lakhs. Is the latter case any good or better? Is there any difference in the reality of former case of dowry vs the latter case of inheritance? Of course not, at least for people with normal logic except brain dead and brainwashed feminist zombies. So why is dowry demonized by media while inheritance of property by bride/daughter is seen as triumph of women’s rights? Does this make any sense?

    Is the dowry system perfect?

    If dowry is not that evil as it is portrayed in the media, does it mean it is perfect? Of course not. The problem with dowry isn’t what the feminist lunatics and social justice warriors in academia and media cry about. The problems with dowry system is the break of trust after marriage or at the cusp of marriage- whether on the groom or the bride side. Some times, the bride’s side decides to dupe the groom’s side into thinking that they would give a much larger dowry while actually they don’t. This of course is morally wrong for any unbiased observer (except feminist harpies) because it is plain cheating and breach of trust.

    To put this into perspective, imagine a groom’s family cheating the bride’s family by claiming they are billionaires before marriage but the falsehood comes out before the time of marriage or after marriage. Wouldn’t the bride’s family be pissed off at groom’s family for cheating? And if the brides family comes to know that the groom isn’t as qualified as it was advertised to them or that the his claim of being a billionaire is a lie, isn’t the bride’s family justified in cancelling the wedding to save their daughter from a bad deal? Fact is neither the society not the law would think that such a cancellation of marriage was inappropriate or wrong. But imagine if the bride’s family makes false claims, including but not limited to a dowry of certain amount, and the groom’s family comes to know about this fraud, why should it be wrong for the groom’s family to cancel the marriage? Is it any different from the previous scenario except for the gender swap? So why is the latter punished for asking dowry, when girl’s family voluntarily agrees to dupe the groom’s family?

    Post marriage demand of dowry is unethical

    This leaves the last issue related to dowry and the one where state can intervene. The real problem with dowry starts when the groom’s family asks for more dowry from girl’s family after marriage and wilfully creates problems for the girl. This of course is completely wrong from a moral point of view as it amounts to breach of contract. Any such incidents should be punished by law without fail, if proven in court. This is where the article 498A should come into play, even though it needs tweaking in the current form to prevent its abuse. This is the only part of dowry which causes deaths and hence should be strictly prohibited and punishable.

    Dowry helps less worthy girls get better grooms

    But what about the fate of poor women who can’t give dowry? This is a false question designed in a way to prey on the inherent biases humans have to favour the problems of women over men, the reason why most people in India still support article 498A in current form even though it destroys nine “innocent” men for every woman it avenges, which is completely antithetical to the idea of innocent until proven guilty.

    There are countless men who would of course marry without any dowry but one does not see girl’s parents queuing up to marry them. Why? Because the girl’s parents want their girls to get a good husband for a cheap price (yes, dowry is objectification of men for their job, wealth, family, status, power etc) and that’s why there is so much propaganda about the poor man not being able to find a groom for his daughter. The proper sentence or issue here is not that the poor man is not able to find a groom because of dowry, it is that the poor man is not able to find a high quality groom as per his wish because he cannot afford the high quality grooms. Of course there are men who are unemployed bums and drunkards who would be willing to marry for nothing. Why don’t the poor guys marry their daughters to them? Wouldn’t that automatically solve the dowry problem without any state intervention?

    They want their daughters to marry doctors, government employees, civil servants and engineers at a low cost. But the problem is, there are other girl parents who are willing to pay lot more dowry than what the poor father will pay for these professional grooms from rich families. The statement or complaint that dowry cause poor girls to not find grooms is analogous to saying poverty ridden people in India cannot afford to buy Audi and hence Audi sales is evil. It may not be politically incorrect to say so, but this is the ground reality.

    The hysteria against dowry system without actually understanding what it is is another example of how cancerous feminist ideology and women’s groups pushing for more 498A style laws in India are. They just want to increase the power of women at the expense of men. This can be demonstrated by the fact that the same anti-dowry activists who see that a doctor demanding dowry from the girl should be punished don’t ask for the punishment of the girl for insisting on marrying the doctor without bringing anything worthwhile to the table. This is not to say that money is everything and dowry has to take the form of money alone. Money is but one form of dowry, the other being good qualification, good looks of the girl etc. If the doctor demanding dowry to marry a particular bride is wrong, isn’t it equally wrong for the bride to insist on marrying a doctor i.e. a person with lots of money and respect in the society? Should men take the route of these women empowerment groups and start demanding that women marry them regardless of their qualifications and family status? If that position is ludicrous, shouldn’t the position that all dowry is evil also equally ludicrous? And if Indian parents are more than happy to put in effort and money to ensure a better future for their daughters, why should feminists complain? The west has a broken family system, but it does not mean that Indians who have good family support should also reject it.

    Also read: The Entitled Middle Class Princess Syndrome

    And this is another example of intellectual dishonesty by feminists. They claim that dowry is misogyny and affects only women. But they fail to acknowledge that dowry objectifies men as well, because women and their families see men as wage earning, high status serving machines which come with a price tag. Turning it into gender war is completely bogus. How is dowry, which is for the overwhelming majority, worked and earned by men (brother or father of the bride) and given to groom’s family (usually the mother of the groom) oppression of women?

    For all the loud noise made against dowry for the past 50 years, fact is that the propaganda did not change zilch on the ground. This itself should have forced any sane academic to re-analyse their theory but not feminists. The simple reason that dowry still exists is that it provides a good market mechanism to match brides and grooms. For the ivory tower feminists, it might seem as oppression but the parents who want better life for their daughters use dowry as a way to marry them with better groom in a better household. Since they care for reality rather than ideology, they hardly pay any heed to this intense propaganda.

    In case you want to know what dowry you should demand, check this. Also watch the below video by Madhu Kishwar to get more nuanced idea about this issue. In one part of the video she calls it groom price rather than dowry!!