This was published in the print edition of Economic and Political Weekly. (Issue March 18, 1999)
IT is puzzling that EPW should think fit to publish such a confused diatribe as C S Lakshmi’s ‘On Kidneys and Dowry* (January 28).
Nowhere in any of my writings have 1 argued that “dowry and dowry items are the girl’s share of the property” as Lakshmi fantasies I have argued. On the contrary, the thrust of my argument was that it is women’s lack of inheritance rights which forces them mistakenly to continue viewing dowry as some sort of inadequate compensation for the denial to them of an equal share in parental property.
My article in Manushi (No 48, 1988) was an inquiry into why anti-dowry campaigns, despite their stridency, have been so ineffective. Dowry continues to be practised nearuniversally and most women continue to participate in it. Is this because most women are fools, or is it possible that our approach leads us away from comprehending their limited alternatives?