This article was first published in the print edition of Manushi Journal. (Issue-42-43, Sep-Dec 1987)
On 4 September 1987, eighteen-year- old Roop Kanwar was burnt to death on her husband’s pyre in village Deorala, Sikar district, Rajasthan. In one sense, there is not much difference between the death of Roop Kanwar and the deaths of thousands of women burnt alive in their own home in many parts of the country. disapproval. Therefore, it is perpetrated secretively, behind locked doors. The woman’s husband and in-laws invariably claim that her death was a regrettable suicide or accident, and that they made every attempt to save her.
Modern day sati, on the other hand, though rare, is a public spectacle, the low value set on women’s lives, the public burning to death of a woman is an open endorsement of that devaluation.
When parents advise their daughters to endure maltreatment by a husband and in-laws, and to ‘adjust’ at all costs in the marital home, they too are endorsing the norm that a woman’s life is worthless except as an object of use or abuse by her husband. In this context, the reaction of Roop Kanwar’s natal family to her death is not very surprising. When we met her brother in Jaipur, he said that though their family was mourning her death, they had no complaints regarding the manner of her death. Although Roop Kanwar was burnt in the presence of thousands of people from around Deorala, her family, who live in Jaipur, a mere two hours drive away, were not informed that she was about to become a sati. Yet, they condoned her being burnt alive and say she has brought honour to them.