Sunaina Mir
Status of a woman in our society is not hidden from anyone. Even a small male child of 6 years of age knows that he has an upper hand over his sisters. Right from his childhood, he is taught to exercise control over his younger sisters. Things are more deteriorating in case poor families where our ill-fated daughters are given less food than sons. They oftenally sleep with half filled stomachs, they often ally move in rags and grow in miserable conditions. They have not been provided with the basic necessities of life like food, clothing and education . In addition to this , a girl is taught to submit before patriarchal norms of society and to give away her every right including right to property. Parental family come with an explanation that one day a daughter has to go to another family so why to waste property on her. On the other hand, woman in- laws do not prefer to give her any entitlement because this is the only way by which they can keep her suppressed.
This possession lessness has reduced her to a subject of exploitation in a society. Research of Panda and Agarwal(2005) in Kerala showed that among the property less women (owning neither land or house) 49% experienced physical violence and 84% experienced psychological violence in contrast to those who owned both land and house reported dramatically less physical and psychological violence (7% and10%) respectively.
No doubt, according to the historical amendment in the Hindu succession Act 1956, a daughter will be considered as equal heir like son. This amendment has totally discarded the discriminatory gender where only sons were considered as successors not daughters. More over every religion of world also talks about property rights of women.
Many years have passed since this law came into force but tell me how many of you have given women right to own a property, and how many of you have given entitlement to a women in the property bought out of her income after marriage?
Irony to Indian society is, some barbaric customs are so deeply rooted in the minds of people that any civil law cannot change them. Something similar has happened to property ownership of women. This property less ness has made every women to live a life of continuous fear of becoming homeless and penny less at any time especially after divorce.
Friends, today every female is working and contributing in a family economy though from Govt. Or private sector, even those, who are house wives, they by doing all home activities are also contributing in home economy by saving the charges of a helper. So every woman should raise her voice in order to end her greatest agony of becoming homeless or moneyless, if divorce happens to her. She has to follow following steps
(1) She should demand her right in the family property as per Hindu succession amendment Act (2005) in order to live a life of dignity both in parental and in-laws home.
(2)Working women should demand their entitlement in the property purchased after marriage in which a woman has given a part of her income.
(3) The house wife, who supported her husband by saving a lot of money from daily expenses, should also claim entitlement in the property ,so purchased by her husband.
In the end, i would like to say to every female , let us own a property and end our greatest agony of becoming a burden on our parents. possession of a piece of land or house will inhibit everyone to take us as liability. Possession of property will remove all apprehension of starvation, dependency mercy, embarrassment, pain tears and homelessness from our lives.
