In
social field, the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 took a step of abolishing poly gamy
amongst Hindus. The provision in Cr.P.C. u/s 125 for getting maintenance,
amendment u/s 376 I.P.C. and the promulgation of the provision of Dowry death
r/w section 113-B of the Evidence Act has provided the substantial measurements
for the eradication of prevailing maladies of oppression upon the women. The
Hindu adoptions and maintenance Act, 1956, the Hindu Succession Act, 1956 and
Hindu Minority and Guardianship Act, 1956 provided a substantial degree to
remove the disabilities of Hindu women. The Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961 was
passed with an ostensible idea of checking the evil. The practice of dowry has
emerged as a major social evil, which is reflected in large number of cases of
"Dowry Deaths". The reluctance of parents of the victim to lodge a
report is the reason for this personal nature of the crime.
Women
by and large constitute a neglected section of the society. There is now
indisputable evidence of steady decline in the value of women in society. The
following trends may be responsible in this context: - (1) excessive morality
amongst women and female child. (2) glaring disparity between men and women in
access to medical services (3) Persistent decline in sex ratio. (4) Illiteracy
and unemployment of women. Dowry is a
clear Affirmation of the fact that one’s gender determines one’s worth or
significance. Since worth is distributed unequally amongst the sexes at birth,
worth deficiency amongst females can be offset by material additives.
Dowry
is the most prominent additive. In the survey of the cases of unnatural deaths
of young women, this hypothesis suggested itself again and again. Brides who
earn more that their husbands are made to feel an obligation to supply ‘dowry
goods and services’ long after their marriage, just as those women who earn
nothing. Society perceives woman as economically less productive than man (or
unproductive) and, therefore, a female is regarded as a net economic drain on a
family. At marriage, when the female is in transit between the two households,
the family that accepts her is perceived to be saddled with a net economic
liability, while the household that is losing her is in fact losing a
liability. Dowry is, therefore, a compensatory payment to the family, which
agrees to shelter her, hypothetically for the rest of her life. And precisely
for this reason, dowry is a recurring phenomenon, which lasts a lifetime.
In
Air India Vs, Nargesh Meerau (1981) 4 SCC 335, an Air hostesses case, according
to regulation 46 and 47, the air hostesses shall retire on following
contingencies (1) on attaining age of 35 years (2) on marriage, if it took
place within four years of service (3) on first pregnancy. On other hand,
Assistant Flight persons were retiring at the age of 55 or 58 years. Both
categories continued the same cabin crew. The Apex court observed that
compelling the air hostess not to have any children and thus interfere with and
diverts the ordinary course of human action. The Apex court observed that this
provision is not only manifestly unreasonable and arbitrary, but contains the
quality of unfairness and exhibits " naked despotism" and therefore
violative of Article 14. There are vide variety of women employees i.e. (1)
small segment in workforce as executives and prestigious professionals (2) semi
professionals like nurses, school teachers who are hired not only for their
skills and intelligence, but presumably for their looks too. (3) The lowest
economic stratum, predominantly illiterate semi literate. We have to see that
(1) whether there are set of laws which meaningfully deals with the stresses
and strains faced by women in workforce (2) Do existing law discriminate in any
way against those women? (3) are the existing law comprehensive enough to
protect the interest of women ? (4) What are the special steps required to meet
the specific disabilities faced by women (5) Is there the need for special laws
to meet the disabilities faced by women. Laws, as we know, are only regulatory
and not curative and had this not been so. Nothing would have been easier for
us and to make laws against all social evils and find the next morning that our
society has become heaven. The eradication of an evil lies not so much in law
as in the society itself. No society can exists, breathe and move without a
base and this base is provided by norms and values.
No comments:
Post a Comment