Sunday, January 21, 2007

Stop female infanticide and foeticide...

Punjabis, Gujratis and Haryanvis constitute the finest men and women India have to offer. However, they have maintained vestiges of cruelty worser than the practice of Sati in the matter of female foeticide.

It is quite possible that the practice of female dowry arose as a result of reduction in the number of men in India due to constant warring and the genetic robustness of the female fetus. Historically, in the absence of genetic testing, infanticide was the only available option for discarding the female child. This heinous practice continues today in the southern parts of India where families cannot afford an illegal ultrasound test. People in Punjab, Haryana and other Western states can afford the illegal test to determine the sex of the baby and discard it if it happens to be a female. Thus the act of having a family gets reduced to an economic activity instead of a union of two souls.

As India becomes a stable country and males do not get consumed to hateful acts by fellow humans, the number of males have gone up. However, the practice of dowry remains stronger than ever. The families that commit female foeticide love their living daughters, however that passion is not extended to the fetus. The progressive feminine movements tend to have mixed feeling towards this cruelty as they are in favor of overall freedom of abortion. Their voices get blunted as they have to support both sides of the coin. The religious conservatives are too steeped in social prejudices to be paying attention to the words of Guru Nanak in this regard. True adherence to the Gurus words and bravery are the only way out of this inhuman condition of the human spirit.

"From the woman is our birth, in the woman's womb are we shaped;
To the woman we are engaged, to the woman we are wedded;
The woman is our friend and from the woman is the family;
If one woman dies, we seek another, through the woman are the bonds of the world;
Why call woman evil who gives birth to kings?
From the woman comes the woman, without woman there is none;
O Nanak, God alone is the one Who is independent of the woman (because He is unborn)."
(Var Asa Mohalla 1, 2-19, p-473) (Reproduced from Sikhism Philosophy Network)

Please encourage your loved ones and encourage the people in the western and southern parts of India not to indulge in this heinous practice. We might be depriving the world of a future Olympian athlete, doctor, artist or prime minister!

Saturday, January 13, 2007

Empowerment

Reflecting at the years since India achieved its independence, there has been steady improvement in the status of women and children.