One woman dies every hour due to dowry related reasons on an average in the country, which has seen a steady rise in such cases between 2007 and 2011, according to official data. National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) figures state that 8,233 dowry deaths were reported in 2012 from various states. The statistics work out to one death per hour.
The number of deaths under this category of crime against women were 8,618 in 2011 but the overall conviction rate was 35.8 per cent, slightly above the 32 per cent conviction rate recorded in the latest data for 2012. The number of dowry deaths in the country has seen a steady growth during the period between 2007 and 2011. While in 2007, 8,093 such deaths were reported, the numbers rose to 8,172 and 8,383 in 2008 and 2009 respectively. In 2010, 8,391 such deaths were reported, according to the NCRB.
The agency is the central nodal department to collect and process crime statistics at the national level. Police officials who deal with these crimes blame a variety of reasons. Suman Nalwa, Additional Deputy Commissioner of Delhi Police (Special Unit for Women and Children), said the problem is not only limited to the lower or middle class. "Higher socio-economic strata is equally involved in such practices. Even the highly educated class of our society do not say no to dowry. It runs deep into our social system," she said.
The Dowry Prohibition Act of 1961, prohibits the request, payment or acceptance of a dowry, "as consideration for the marriage" and dowry here is defined as a gift demanded or given as a pre-condition for a marriage. "The existing law has certain loopholes and needs to be made stricter. Despite the amendments made to the Dowry Act in 1983, good results are still desired to be achieved," Nalwa said. However, Kamini Jaiswal, a senior Supreme Court lawyer, says improper investigations by the police at the initial stage of a case slow down the process of judicial proceedings. "We need quick conviction in such cases.
Our judicial procedure has become very slow, police does not record a case at initial stage," she said. According to Nalwa, at times it is easy to get bail in the cases which are registered under the section 498 (a) of the IPC which deals with the subject of "husband or relative of husband of a woman subjecting her to cruelty". National Commission for Women chairperson Mamata Sharma said the sole reason for such a huge number of deaths is the non-implementation of the law correctly. "Police are required to be sensitised and the public needs to be made aware of their rights and laws. Then only we can achieve effective implementation of such laws," she said.
Rising Dowry Deaths Are Concern Of Modern India
Marriage is one of the most holy and sacred ceremonies in the Indian society, but horror of the dowry system has made it look like one of the most feared institutions. The scourge of dowry is now emerging as the commonest criminal method of extortion which works with infliction of torture, violence, blackmail and many a time, murder of the bride.
The evil custom of dowry is spreading like wildfire in India with communities, which never traditionally practised dowry, now jumping on the bandwagon. The dowry system is thought to put great financial burden on the bride’s family which makes one of the reasons for families and women in India resorting to sex selection in favour of sons. Even after marriage, some brides are tortured and forced to bring more and more dowry from their parents’ house. If they fail, they are tortured and finally killed.
Some believe dowry was not a part of the Indian marriage before European influence crept into the society. The earliest example of Europeans practising the dowry in India was the case of Mumbai, which was presented as part of the dowry when Princess Catherine de Braganza of Portugal was married to King Charles II in 1661.
Historians believe the system of dowry existed in India even before the British Rule, but not in the format that is prevalent in the society today. In the pre-colonial period, dowry was an institution managed by women, for women, to enable them to establish their status and have recourse in an emergency. In this ancient system of dowry, the parents of the bride, even her kith and kin, all gave wealth to her in the form of valuable gifts etc. It was just like how parents used to give a part of wealth to their sons, so did they give it to their daughters too during the daughter’s marriage. The dowry wealth continued to be owned by the wife and not by the husband or his family.
But in spite of modernisation and the ever increasing role of women in all walks of life, the scourge of dowry in India is becoming widespread, and the value of dowries is increasing. When demands for dowry are not met, the bride is subject to torture, and often even killed. Many parents do not want to have daughters so as to escape the torture of dowry at the time their marriage. According to the National Crime Records Bureau, 8,233 women were killed across India last year because of disputes over dowry payments made by the family of bride to the family of groom at the time of marriage. The conviction rate in dowry-related crimes is a dismal 32 per cent.
Dowry killings have been described by some women’s rights groups as a problem that is typically among the urban middle class, who aspire to greater material prosperity, and the dowry that comes with a wife is viewed as a means of obtaining money and consumer goods. Dowry deaths are typically reported either as murder or suicide. Some reports of accidental deaths have later been prosecuted as dowry deaths. While dowry deaths are not the top 10 leading causes of all female deaths in India, they are sixth largest cause of crime-related violence against females in India.
In 2011, 8,391 dowry deaths were reported in India. With a total female population of about 587 million, dowry-related violence caused 1.4 deaths per year per 100,000 women in India, compared to 1,427 natural deaths per year per 100,000 women. Statistics in India show that 90 per cent of such murdered brides were educated, 30 per cent were graduates, and 20 per cent were women who worked outside the home and contributed to the family financially.
“Dowry originated in upper caste families as the wedding gift to the bride from her family. The dowry was later given to help with marriage expenses and became a form of insurance in the case that her in-laws mistreated her. Although the dowry was legally prohibited in 1961, it continues to be highly institutionalised. The reason many parents do not want to have daughters is because of the dowry they will have to shell out at her marriage, and the stress they go through due to never ending demands from her in-laws,” says women rights activist Meenakshi Nayar.
Payment of dowry is now prohibited under ‘the 1961 Dowry Prohibition Act’ in Indian civil law and subsequently by Sections 304B and 498a of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). Despite anti-dowry laws in India, it is still a common illegal practice. Other laws attempting to address the problem include ‘the Dowry and Bridal Gifts Restrictions Rules, 1976’ and ‘the Dowry Prohibition (Maintenance of Lists of Presents to the Bride and Bridegroom) Rules, 1985,’ which are intended to document gifts and provide complainants with stronger evidence in the event that prosecution for crimes against the bride occurs later.
Dowry, an ancient Indian practice
In India, dowry is considered to be a practice whereby parental property is distributed to a daughter at her marriage, establishing some variety of conjugal fund, the nature of which may vary widely. This fund ensures her support or endowment in widowhood and eventually goes to provide for her sons and daughters.
Contrasting with the related concepts such as brideprice and dower, dowry is an ancient Indian custom, and its existence may well predate records of it. Dowry continues to be expected in some parts of India, mainly north, with disputes related to it often resulting in domestic violence, such as dowry deaths.
The practice of dowry in India continues to be a controversial subject. Some scholars believe dowry was practised in the ancient Indian subcontinent, some do not. Historical reports suggest dowry in ancient India was significant and daughters also had inheritance rights, which by custom were exercised at the time of their marriage. The Code of Manu also sanctioned dowry and bridewealth in ancient India, but dowry was the more prestigious form and associated with the Brahmanic (priestly) caste.
Dowries originally started as “love gifts” for the marriages of upper caste individuals, but during the medieval period the demands for dowries became a precursor for marriage. The demand for dowries spread to the lower caste, and became a prestige issue, with the system becoming rigid and expensive. The dowry system became a tool for enhancing family social status and economic worth.
Dowry got more pronounced after the country achieved independence in 1947. Prior to 1956, including during the British Raj, daughters had no rights to inheritance to their family’s wealth. In 1956, India gave equal legal status to daughters and sons among Hindu, Sikh and Jain families, under the Hindu Succession Act. For its Muslim population, India granted Sharia derived personal status laws. Ancient vedic scholar Manu described dowry as essentially a payment of cash or gifts from the bride’s family to the bridegroom’s family upon marriage. These days it would include cash, jewellery, electrical appliances, furniture, bedding, crockery, utensils and other household items that helped the newly-weds set up their home.
In the recent decades, the expected value of the dowry has risen in northern parts of India such as Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh. This phenomenon has led to a sharp increase in “dowry deaths” since the 1980s. A “dowry killing” occurs when a new wife is murdered by her husband or in-laws if they are unhappy with her, rather than sending her back to her parents, which would force the in-laws to return the dowry to the bride’s parents.
