India Insight

India’s roads are among the world’s most dangerous, claiming thousands of lives each year. Cows and elephants rub shoulders with sleek foreign-made sports cars on highways across the country.

But two-wheelers remain India’s favourite mode of transport. Millions of scooters and motorbikes are sold every year, accounting for 75 percent of all vehicles sold in the country. Entire families are seen seated on these affordable and fuel-efficient vehicles, zipping in and out of packed traffic in cities and towns.

Enforcing road safety measures remains a huge problem, leading to one road accident every minute and a road accident death every four minutes in India.

But surprisingly, in New Delhi, women who drive two-wheelers or ride pillion don’t, by law, have to wear a helmet.

Women in the Indian capital are often seen sitting side-saddle on the back with their hair freely fluttering in the wind, while their male drivers wear helmets, a life-saving accessory in case of a crash.

Since I met her over a week ago, I have been unable to forget.

Every morning as I put on my lipstick and black eyeliner in front of the mirror, I am reminded of her face. Or lack of it.

Sonali Mukherjee, 27, is one of hundreds of women across the world who have lost their faces, and their will to survive, as a result of one of the most heinous crimes against women I have come across: Acid violence.

Nine years ago, three men broke into Sonali's home in the east Indian city of Dhanbad as she slept, and threw concentrated acid over her face.

Three men were arrested by Delhi police this week for “honour killings” days after the Supreme Court asked eight Indian states to stop these so-called “honour” killings, where family members, typically men, kill daughters and their husbands for apparently bringing dishonour to the family by marrying below their caste.

The killings, in a posh neighbourhood in Delhi, brought the tragic and shameful story of honour killings closer home to Delhi residents, who had so far dismissed the rising instances of these killings as a feature of rural India, equating them to a more traditional and conservative India they claim not to inhabit.

The clash between tradition and modernity is not new and is not unique to India, where more than two-thirds of its population lives in rural areas, and where more than half the population is below the age of 25 years.

India’s cabinet this week cleared a proposal to amend the Hindu Marriage Act to allow “irretrievable breakdown of marriage” as a ground for divorce.

The amendment had been resisted earlier and been pending for nearly three decades now. Other grounds for divorce, which can take anywhere from six months to 20 years, include cruelty, desertion and adultery.

The amendment, if approved by parliament, will make divorce easier for estranged couples, experts say, particularly in cases where a partner is deliberately delaying proceedings. Even family courts are notoriously ineffective and insensitive when it comes to separation, with judges often admonishing the woman to be more “adjusting” or offering advice thinly disguised as rulings.

The Women’s Reservation Bill has been introduced in the Rajya Sabha on the International Women’s Day.

It may be the most consequential act of lawmaking since independence.

It is probably too late to discuss alternative proposals for getting more women into parliament or the opinion of those women who don’t agree with the reservation route to political empowerment.

How far will women’s reservation empower women and the society?

There are questions on its provisions as they have been reported.

The bill seeks to bring more women into parliament by reserving seats.

While this widens the choice for the voter by putting women leaders into circulation it also decreases the choice of candidates for voters in reserved constituencies.

Lost in the clamour over our cricketers defying WADA over the “whereabouts” rule in drug testing, was a tiny news item in the Hindustan Times daily last week about women boxers washing dishes and serving tea to visitors at the National Institute of Sports.

Sports Minister MS Gill, when questioned about it in India’s upper house, said the practice was “a normal courtesy extended to distinguished guests”.

There was no clarity on what made a guest distinguished or whether this was a courtesy that only women were called on to extend.

A mob vandalized a police station in west Delhi this week after a woman accused five policemen of raping her in a police station.

This is not the first time enforcers of the law have been accused of rape.

In 2005, a 16-year-old girl was raped by a drunk constable in south Mumbai in the infamous Marine Drive rape case.

A year later, another police constable was accused of raping a slum dweller in Karnal.

As part of its 100-day action plan, the Congress-led UPA government is pushing for the Women’s Reservation Bill, which seeks to reserve 33 per cent seats in parliament for women.

The UPA has also promised to give women 50 percent seats in local government institutions like the village council, up from the 33 percent of seats currently reserved for them.

That measure has  been in place for over a decade and a half. But has it done any good?

Prime-time television in India is not really known for sensible content. Especially the soap operas. I have never been a fan but one tedious evening, I switched on the telly and sat through one “saas-bahu” serial after another.

What was it about family dramas that kept millions of Indian women glued to their TV sets each evening? I intended to find out.

In one such episode, a mother-in-law laments the loss of an unborn grandchild.

“We have lost our grandson and our daughter-in-law cannot bear a child after this. Now we will never have a grandson to take the family name forward.”