Women are not born, but made. What better than India to exemplify this statement by Simone de Beauvoir. With the whole world celebrating International Women’s Day with great pomp and show, it would be only apt to analyse the position and space Indian women occupy today, and comparing it to the time 60 years ago when the country had just gained independence. With women participating in nationalist movements, to being pushed into the domestic household space, to their resurgence as super-women today, women in our country have seen it all.
The obvious answer to this question lies within our minds,The word female comes from the Latin ”femella”, the diminutive form of ”femina”, meaning 'woman'. The tradition of India is that always has been very respectful from the ancient period and the status of women has always been esteemed as high.The Indian cultural tradition begins with the Vedas. It is generally believed that the Vedic period is spread over from 300 BC to 600 B.C. Some general observations and broad generalization can only be made regarding the status of women during this vast period[ www.yourarticlelibrary.com/women/status-of-women-in-ancient-india/47636 ].In ancient India the women were given all the freedoms as to choose their male partners and there was no PURDAH back then, Daughters were never ill-treated although male children were preferred to female children. They also received education like boys and went through the “Brahmaachary” discipline including the “Upanayana” ritual. Women studied the Vedic literature like men and some of them like Lopamudra, Ghosa and Sikata-Nivavari figure among the authors of the vedic hymns. Many girls in well-to-do families used to be given a fair amount of education down to about B.C 300[ www.yourarticlelibrary.com/women/status-of-women-in-ancient-india/47636]. Vedic women had economic freedom. Some women were engaged in teaching work. Home was the place of production. Spinning and weaving of clothes were done at home. Women also helped their husbands in agricultural purists. The Medieval period (Period between 500 A. D to 1500 A.D) proved to be highly disappointing for the Indian women, for their status further deteriorated during this period. Muslim invasion of India changed the direction of Indian history. The influx of foreign invaders and the Brahmanical iron laws were main causes for such degradation.
As far as a woman was concerned, her freedom was curtailed, knowledge of not only the scriptures but even letters was denied to her and her status was reduced to that of an appendage on man. Caste laws dominated the entire social life widow remarriage and levitates were disallowed. Women could not inherit property. Girls were treated more as burdens or liabilities than as assets. Moreover the status of women reduced to the status of slaves during medieval period. The women faced many problems such as child marriage purdah system, practice of Sati etc. Throughout the medieval period, the status of women went on declining.
The status of women gradually declined during the post-Vedic period. Most probably, the woman’s status deteriorated due to the introduction of non-Aryan wife. The non-Aryan wives did not have any knowledge of Vedic rituals. They could not associate themselves with their Aryan husbands in various religious performances. At a later stage, the Aryan wives, too, lost many privileges which they enjoyed in the earlier period. In course of time, the girls were denied of formal education. The marriageable age of girls came down to 8 or 10 years. Thus the incidence of pre-puberty marriages increased and child-wives without education became the order of the day.
Women in India slowly started recognizing her true potential. She has started questioning the rules laid down for her by the society. As a result, she has started breaking barriers and earned a respectable position in the world. Today Indian women have excelled in each and every field from social work to visiting space station. There is no arena, which remains unconquered by Indian women. Whether it is politics, sports, entertainment, literature, technology everywhere, its women power all along.
Today names like Arundhati Roy, Anita Desai, Kiran Desai, Shobhaa De, Jhumpa Lahiri can put any other writer to shame. In the field of cinema, women like Rekha, Smita Patil, Shabana Aazmi and Vidya Balan and Konkona Sen are such names who don’t play feminised roles, but have asserted themselves over this male-dominated realm. In the field of Politics, from Indira Gandhi to Shiela Dixit, Uma Bharti, Jayalalithaa, Vasundhra Raje and Mamata Banerjee today, women are making their presence felt.
Meaning of the term discrimination Against women
Any distinction, exclusion or restriction made on the basis of sex and gender that has the effect or purpose of impairing or nullifying the recognition, enjoyment or exercise by women, irrespective of their marital status, and on a basis of equality between women and men, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural, civil or any other field.It can occur both through acts that result in, or have the effect of, women being denied the exercise of a right because of a lack of recognition of pre-existing gender-based disadvantage and inequality that women face (non-intended or indirect discrimination), and through the omissions of acts, i.e. the failure to take necessary legislative measures to ensure the full realization of women’s rights, the failure to adopt and implement national policies aimed at achieving gender equality, and the failure to enforce relevant laws.
Discrimination can stem from both law (de jure discrimination) or from practice (de facto discrimination). The CEDAW Convention recognises and addresses both forms of discrimination, whether contained in laws, policies, procedures or practice.