WOMAN'S PLACE
"To lift the woman's fallen divinity
Upon an equal pedestal with man's."
"The woman's cause is man's; they rise or sink
Together, dwarfed or godlike, bond or free."
TENNYSON, _The Princess_.
[Sidenote: Social inferiority of women.]
Next to caste, the chief social feature of India is the position of
women in the community. Hindus and Mahomedans alike assign to the female
sex an inferior position. In Mahomedan mosques, for example, no woman is
ever seen at prayer; she would not be permitted to take part. Only by
the neglect of female children in India, and the special disadvantages
from which women suffer there, can it be explained why in India in 1901
there were only 963 females to every 1000 males. In India, as in Europe
and all the world over, more boys than girls are born, but in the course
of life the balance is soon redressed, and in the whole population in
every country in Europe, except Italy[22] and Bulgaria, the females
actually outnumber the males. Why are the Indian figures so different?
Pro-Hindu enthusiasts may glorify the Hindu social system, and wish to
deny the social inferiority of the female sex; average Anglo-Indians may
be suspected of being unsympathetic in their statements; but the Census
figures stand, and demand an explanation. Where are these 37 girls and
women out of every 1000--over five million altogether? Common humanity
demands an answer of India, for we seem to hear a bitter cry of India's
womanhood. As infants, less cared for; as girls, less educated; married
too early; ignorantly tended in their hour; as married ladies, shut out
of the world; always more victimised by ignorance and superstition--in
life's race, India's women carry a heavy handicap, and 37 out of every
1000 actually succumb.
In the matter of the social elevation of their sex, it appears to the
writer that Anglo-Indian ladies fall far short of what they might do. A
fair number do interest themselves in their Indian sisters through the
lady missionaries and lady doctors, but first-hand knowledge of the
lives of Indian women is very rare indeed. Our late revered Queen's
interest in India and in the womanhood of India is well known, but her
feeling about the duty of Anglo-Indian ladies I have never seen
recorded. Speaking at Balmoral to an Indian Christian lady, a member of
one of the royal families of India--the only lady perhaps who ever
conversed in Hindustani with Queen Victoria--she expressed her regret
that more Anglo-Indian ladies did not get up the native language,
sufficiently at least to let them visit their Indian sisters. Than
Christian sisterly sympathy thus expressed, what better link also could
there be between two communities which many things seem to be forcing
apart?
[Sidenote: Suttee and female infanticide.]
It would be unjust to depreciate the influence of mother and wife among
Hindus, and we freely acknowledge that, after custom, the mainstay of
the zenana system is concern for the purity of the female members of the
household. Saying that, we must now also note that modern ideas of the
just rights of the female sex have made little progress in India. Some
progress there has been, judging by the standard already applied; for
although in 1901 there were only 963 females to every 1000 males, in the
year 1891 there were only 958, and in the year 1881 still fewer, namely,
954. But it seems as if in India we had justification of the law of
social progress that woman's rights will not be recognised until man's
have been. The brotherhood of man must be established before men
recognise that sister women too have rights. Translating into Indian
terms, and without professing to have given positive proof--caste
feeling must still further decay before the position of women becomes
much improved. At all events, judging by the past, it almost seems to
have been necessary for the Legislature to intervene to secure any
progress for the sex and give a foothold to the new ideas, glaringly
unfair to the sex as the old ideas were. Thus in 1870 female
infanticide, earlier prohibited in single provinces, was put down by law
throughout India; although there are localities still in which the small
proportion of female children justifies the belief that female
infanticide is not extinct.[23] Nevertheless, let the progress of the
new ideas regarding women be noted; we compare the hesitating
_inference_ of the practice of female infanticide in the _Indian Census
Report_ of 1901 with the voluminous evidence in the two volumes of
Parliamentary Papers on Infanticide in India published in 1824 and 1828.
Kathiawar and Cutch, Baroda and Rajputana, round Benares and parts of
Oude and Madras were the localities particularly infected with the
barbarous custom in the first quarter of the century. But to return to
the recognition of the rights of women in legislative enactments. In
1829 an Act of the Supreme Government in Bengal made Suttee or the
burning of a widow upon the dead husband's pyre an offence for all
concerned. In 1830 similar Acts were passed by the Governments of Madras
and Bombay, and the abolition of Suttee is now universally approved.[24]
Such is the educative influence of a good law. Perhaps a would-be
patriot may yet occasionally be heard so belauding the devotion of the
widows who burned themselves that his praise is tantamount to a lament
over the abolition of Suttee. But the general sentiment has been
completely changed since the first quarter of the nineteenth century,
when the Missionaries and some outstanding Indians like the Bengali
reformer Rammohan Roy agitated for the abolition of Suttee, and the
Government, convinced, still hesitated to put down a custom so generally
approved. In these changed times it will hardly be believed that
Rammohan Roy only ventured to argue against any form of compulsion being
put upon the widow, and that the orthodox champions of the practice
appealed against the abolition not only to the Governor-General, but
also to the King in Council,--the petition having been heard in the
House of Lords in 1832. But once more to return to the emancipation of
women by Acts of the Legislature. By another Act, in 1856, the Indian
Government abolished the legal restrictions to widow marriage. Still
another Act, in 1891, forbade cohabitation before the age of twelve; and
although fiercely opposed in the native press and in mass meetings, the
Act, which expressed the views of many educated Hindus, is now
apparently acquiesced in by all, and must be educating the community
into a new idea of marriage.
In five aspects the social inferiority of the female sex is still
apparent--namely, in the illiteracy of females, in marriage before
womanhood, in polygamy, in the seclusion of women, and in the
prohibition of the marriage of widows. Excepting the last, no one of
these customs is imposed by caste, nor is the last even in every caste.
[Sidenote: Their lack of education.]
The inferior position still assigned to women in Indian society can best
be shown in figures. The indifference to their education is manifest
when for all India, rich and poor, European and native, in 1901, there
were fourteen times as many men as women who could read and write. Only
one female in 144 was educated to that extent, and the movement for
female education has practically been at a stand-still for some years,
in spite of the increase of native Christians, Brahmas, and [=A]ryas, who
all advocate the education of girls, and in spite of fostering by
Governments and missionaries. Taking _British_ India by itself, there
was a higher proportion of educated females, as we should of course
expect, although that only makes the proportion less elsewhere. In
British India, about 1 in 100 [9 per 1000] could read and write; but
even there, less than 1 per cent. The quickening of ideas in cities is
apparent. In the cities there are proportionally more than twice as many
educated females as in the whole country.
[Sidenote: Premature marriage.]
The injustice done to the sex by marriage before womanhood is apparent
from another paragraph of the same Report, showing that out of every
1000 girls of the age of 10 or under, 58 are already married, as against
22 boys. Taking Hindus alone, the number of married girls of 10 years of
age or under is 70 per 1000 as against 28 married boys. Even allowing
for those provinces where cohabitation is delayed, these figures mean in
other provinces a cruel wrong to the children of the weaker sex, a
doubly cruel wrong when to premature marriage may be added girl
widowhood. The _Census Report_ declares that in the lower strata of
Hindu society there has been a rapid extension of child marriage and
prohibition of the marriage of widows within the last two or three
generations, although at the low age of 10, fewer girls are reported
married than in 1881.[25] That is to say, the bad example of the higher
castes is lowering the marriage age in the humble castes, while modern
influences are diminishing the number of marriages of mere children,--we
can see both forces in operation. Here again Indian Christians,
Br[=a]hmas, and [=A]ryas are at one in setting a better example and
advocating reform. The educative Act of 1891 for British India has also
been noted above. Native States too are following up. In Rajputana,
through the influence of the Agent of the Governor-General, Colonel
Walter, an association was formed in 1888 which fixed the marriage age
for two of the chief castes at eighteen for the bridegroom and fourteen
for the bride. In the Native State of Baroda, in the extreme West of
India, a new Marriage Act has just been passed by the enlightened ruler
[1904]. In Baroda, except in special cases, the minimum marriage age of
girls is henceforward to be twelve, and of the bridegrooms sixteen.
Exceptional cases had to be provided for, because of the custom in
certain communities within the state of Baroda to celebrate marriages
only once every twelve years, female infants and girls of ten and twelve
being then "happily despatched" together. With that custom and with the
new Act together, it would necessarily happen that girls of eleven at
the general marrying time would have to wait twelve years more, or until
their twenty-third year. Since in some parts of India there is a saying
about women "Old at twenty," that delay would not do. All educated young
men may be said to hold the new ideas in these marriage matters.
Students now regard it with regret and some sense of a grievance when
their guardians have married them in their school or college years. The
only alleviation to their minds is when the dowry which they bring into
the family at their marriage helps to endow a sister who has reached the
marriage age, or to educate a brother or pay off the family debts. Among
educated people too, the idea that the other world is closed to
bachelors and childless men has died, although a daughter unmarried
after the age of puberty is still a stigma on the family. Do British
readers realise that in an Indian novel of the middle and upper classes
there can hardly be a bride older than twelve; there can be no love
story of the long wooing and waiting of the lovers?
[Sidenote: Polygamy.]
As regards polygamy, the Census shows 1011 married women for every 1000
married men, so that apparently not more than 11 married men in every
1000 are polygamists. But polygamy is still an Indian institution, in
the sense that it is at the option of any man to have more than one
wife; in the matter of marriage, the rights of man alone are regarded.
All over India, however, among the educated classes, Mahomedans
excepted, public opinion is now requiring a justification for a second
marriage, as, for example, the barrenness, insanity, infirmity, or
misconduct of the first spouse. The temptation of a second dowry is
still, however, operative with men of certain high castes in which
bridegrooms require to be paid for. The writer well remembers the
pitiful comic tale of a struggling brahman student of Bengal, whose home
had been made unhappy by the advent of two stepmothers in succession
alongside of his own mother. The young man did not blame his father, for
his father disapproved of polygamy, and was a polygamist only because he
could not help himself. It had come about in an evil hour when he was
desperate for a dowry for his eldest daughter, now come of marriageable
age. He had listened to the village money-lender's advice that he might
take a second wife himself and transfer to the daughter the dowry that
the second wife would bring. Then in like manner the lapse of time had
brought a second daughter to the marriage age, the necessity for another
dowry, and a third mother into the student's home. The poor fellow
himself was married too, and one could not resist the conjecture that
_his_ marriage was another sacrifice for the family, and that his
marriage had saved his father from bringing home yet another stepmother.
The redeeming feature of the story--the strength of Indian family
ties--let us not be blind to.
Polygamy in India is certainly now hiding itself. A couple of
generations ago it was practised wholesale by the kulin brahmans of
Bengal. Several middle-aged kulins are known to have had more than 100
wives, and to have spent their lives in a round of visits to their
numerous fathers-in-law. For each wife they had received a handsome
bridegroom-price. So declares the last _Census Report_. Except among
Indian Mahomedans, who have the sanction of the Koran and the example of
the Prophet himself, there are now few upholders of polygamy in India.
In a meeting of educated gentlemen in Calcutta a Mahomedan lately
protested against some passing condemnatory reference to polygamy, on
the ground that in a general meeting he expected that his religion would
be free from attack. A learned Mahomedan judge, on the other hand,
writes that among Indian Mahomedans "the feeling against polygamy is
becoming a strong social if not a moral conviction." "Ninety-five out of
every 100 are either by conviction or necessity monogamists." "It has
become customary," he tells us, "to insert in the marriage deed a clause
by which the intending husband formally renounces his supposed right to
contract a second union."[26]
[Sidenote: Seclusion of women.]
With regard to the seclusion of women, at some points the custom seems
to be slowly yielding to Western ideas, although it is still practically
true that Indian ladies are never seen in society and in the streets of
Indian cities.[27] A different evolution, however, is still more
manifest at this present time. It almost seems as if at first modern
life were to bend to the custom of the seclusion of women rather than
bend the custom to itself. The Lady Dufferin Association for Medical Aid
to Indian Women is bringing trained medical women _into_ the zenanas and
harems, and every year is also seeing a larger number of Indian
Christian and Br[=a]hma ladies set up as independent practitioners, able
to treat patients _within_ the women's quarters. In the year 1905 a lady
lawyer, Miss Cornelia Sorabjee, a Parsee Christian lady, was appointed
by the Government of Bengal to be a legal adviser to the Bengal Court of
_Wards_, or landowning minors. Zenana or harem ladies, e.g. the widowed
mothers of the minors, would thus be able to consult a trained lawyer at
first hand _within_ the zenana or harem. Missionaries are discussing the
propriety of authorising certain Christian women to baptize women
converts _within_ the zenanas.[28] Long ago missions organised zenana
schools, and now native associations have begun to follow in their
steps. In all Indian Christian churches, women of course are present at
public worship, but they always sit _apart_ from the men, a segregation
even more strictly followed by the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j or Indian Theistic
Association. For the sake of zenana women, the Indian Museum in Calcutta
is closed one day each week to the male sex, and in some native theatres
there is a ladies gallery in which ladies may see and not be seen behind
a curtain of thin lawn. Movement even towards a compromise, it is good
to observe.
[Sidenote: Prohibition of the marriage of widows.]
The prohibition of the marriage of widows has already been referred to
as bound up with caste ideas of marriage and with social standing, and
as the most deeply rooted part of the social inferiority of women. By
some at least the injustice has been acknowledged since many years. At
Calcutta, between 1840 and 1850, Babu Mati Lal Seal promised Rs10,000 to
any Hindu, poor or rich, who would marry a widow of his own faith, but
no one came forward.[29] The late Pandit Iswar Chander Vidyasagar of
Calcutta has also already been mentioned as a champion of the widow's
rights. But though legalised in 1856, the cases of re-marriage among the
higher castes of Hindus in any year can still be counted on the fingers
of one hand. The _Report of the Census of India_, 1901, takes a gloomy
view regarding the province of Bengal, the most forward in many
respects, but the most backward in respect of child-marriage and
prohibition of the marriage of widows. The latter custom, we are told,
"shows signs of extending itself far beyond its present limits, and
finally of suppressing widow marriage throughout the entire Hindu
community of Bengal."[30] The actual number of widows in all India in
1901 was 25,891,936, or about 2 out of every 11 of the female
population, more than twice the proportion [1 in 13] in Great Britain.
As in the matters of the repudiation of caste and the raising of the
marriage age, the three new religious bodies, namely, the Indian
Christians, the Brahmas, and the [=A]ryas, stand side by side for the
right of the widow.