Dowry : A Curious Case of Indian Marriages. By Sherin Sunny

In our previous article "What Does it Take to be Murdered in India?" we've discussed the incidence, motives and possible socio-economic factors that contribute to the murders in the country. While looking into the commonly occurring crimes, murders relating to dowry issues made it to the list. Crime against women, especially with respect to dowry, isn’t a new revelation. However, it is rather disappointing to know that there have been so many crimes against a particular gender that the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) has a section dedicated to enlist them. As per NCRB report, the some of the crimes against women are as follows : 

• Murder with Rape or Gang Rape

• Dowry Deaths

• Abetment to Suicide of Women 

• Miscarriage

• Acid Attack / Attempts to Acid Attack

• Cruelty by Husband or his Relatives

• Kidnapping and Abduction 

• Human Trafficking

• Buying and Selling of Minor Girls

• Rape / Attempt to Rape

• Cyber Crimes

As an extension of the previous article, in this article we shall discuss only murders arising from dowry related issues. Around 4% of the murders reported by NCRB in 2020 are dowry related, which translates to 1172 murders. West Bengal stood as the state with the highest number of cases.

 

 

The Dowry Prohibition Act 1961 prohibits the giving or receiving of dowry. Although it is illegal, dowry is given and received in Indian marriages, including by those in my family. “It is not like we are selling off our daughter. It is like giving a gift in the form of money, gold or something she’d want. We’d like to think it is like giving a part of the girl’s share in the family wealth.”, said a relative of mine. Several Indian households share a similar outlook and don’t see the problematic side of dowry. This statement might be true and might not lead to harassment in most urban spaces or educated circles. The vices of dowry is felt mostly in orthodox and economically weak households in the country. For such households, the groom considers receiving dowry as a  right rather than a gift provided by the bride’s family. Even amongst the “urban” and “educated” circles, it is smirked if dowry is not offered to give or not given as per the economic ability of the family. 

A shift from the heavily patriarchal ways of the society is probably the way forward to put an end to dowry deaths. Taking insights from my previous story, I’d like to factor in education and standard of living to do away with dowry. For an economically weak household, dowry is a means to improve their standard of living, although it puts yet another family in debt. If standard of living is improved, then marriages will happen for non-economic reasons as well. As for education, it is expected an educated individual is exposed to different perspectives and will see the flaw in such a tradition. However this may not be true. For example, two gruesome dowry related deaths that Kerela witnessed in 2020 - Uthra’s murder and 2021  - Vismaya’s death, involved educated and financially stable households. In the former case, the victim was harrassed despite the couple having a one year old. 

Harassment, domestic violence and mental torture and other crimes against woman by her spouse is usually in the name of dowry. The incidence of dowry related crimes in India is 1.1 per one lakh population and the incidence of crime against women by husband and his relatives is 17 per one lakh population in 2020 as per NCRB data.The low conviction rate for such instances exacerbates the issue of dowry-related violence. The NCRB reports that in 2019, the conviction rate for dowry deaths was only 32.5%, indicating that the bulk of those responsible for committing this horrible crime are able to elude capture.