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PubMed2003

Burnt wives--a study of suicides.

Ritual self-immolation has long been practiced in India. Although in the past the practice has been related to the act of sati, it is currently more commonly associated with dowry disputes. In India, dowries are a continuing series of gifts endowed before and after the marriage. When dowry expectations are not met, the young bride may be killed or compelled to commit suicide, most frequently by burning. In a cohort of 152 burned wives, 32 (21%) were immolation suicides and these cases were analyzed from both epidemiological and medicolegal aspects. Suicide by burning amongst women is a major concern in India as it has become pervasive throughout all social strata and geographical areas. In this series, most women were from joint families (i.e. multigenerational groups of related individuals living under a single roof) and the suicides occurred 2-5 years after marriage. The majority of the affected wives were 21-25 years of age (69%) at the time of the suicide and sustained more than a 50% TBSA burn injury after dousing themselves with kerosene. Most died at the time of the incident or within the subsequent 24h, most commonly from shock.

Adolescent↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Love burns: An essay about bride burning in India.

Each year in countries like India, thousands of young women are burned to death or afflicted with fatal burns. They are victims of dowry deaths. The husband and/or in-laws have determined that the dowry, a gift given from the daughter's parents to the husband, was inadequate and therefore attempt to murder the new bride to make the husband available to remarry or to punish the bride and her family. Unfortunately, this is a domestic issue that is often ignored or minimized, and the prosecution is often inadequate. This review article illustrates various scenarios of dowry deaths, investigates different predispositions, summarizes the current legislation, and proposes solutions to this problem. One hopes that the exposure of this problem may curtail its rampant, yet well-hidden, prevalence.

Burns↗

PubMed2004

Burnt wives: a study of homicides.

The death of married females nowadays is very common in India, usually being associated with dowry disputes. In India, dowries are a continuing series of gifts endowed before and after the marriage. When dowry expectations are not met, the young bride may be killed or compelled to commit suicide, most frequently by burning. In a cohort of 152 burned wives, 47 (31%) were homicidal burns and these cases were analyzed in view of epidemiological and medicolegal aspects. Homicide by burning amongst women is a major concern in India as it has become pervasive throughout all social strata and geographical areas. In this series, most women were from extended families (i.e. multigenerational groups of related individuals living under a single roof) and the homicides occurred within the first few years of their marriages. The majority of the affected wives were 16-25 years of age (77%) at the time of the incident and sustained more than 70% total body surface area (TBSA) burn injuries. Many of them were doused with kerosene and set alight. Most died at the time of the incident or within the subsequent 24 hours, most commonly from shock.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2004

Socioeconomic factors and processes associated with domestic violence in rural Bangladesh.

CONTEXT: Although the pervasiveness of domestic violence against women in Bangladesh is well documented, specific risk factors, particularly those that can be affected by policies and programs, are not well understood. METHODS: In 2001-2002, surveys, in-depth interviews and small group discussions were conducted with married women from six Bangladeshi villages to examine the types and severity of domestic violence, and to explore the pathways through which women's social and economic circumstances may influence their vulnerability to violence in marriage. Women's odds of experiencing domestic violence in the past year were assessed by logistic regression analysis. RESULTS: Of about 1,200 women surveyed, 67% had ever experienced domestic violence, and 35% had done so in the past year. According to the qualitative findings, participants expected women with more education and income to be less vulnerable to domestic violence; they also believed (or hoped) that having a dowry or a registered marriage could strengthen a women's position in her marriage. Yet, of these potential factors, only education was associated with significantly reduced odds of violence; meanwhile, the odds were increased for women who had a dowry agreement or had personal earnings that contributed more than nominally to the marital household. Women strongly supported educating their daughters, but pressures remain to marry them early, in part to avoid high dowry costs. CONCLUSIONS: In rural Bangladesh, women's social and economic circumstances may influence their risk of domestic violence in complex and contradictory ways. Findings also suggest a disconnect between women's emerging expectations and their current realities.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1984

Burnt wife syndrome.

While the system of offering dowry to the groom by the parents of the bride at the time of the marriage is an age old one amongst the Hindus of India; during the recent past this evil custom has resulted in a large number of newly wed young housewives being either killed or tortured to end their own lives by their husbands and in-laws, for the unfulfilled demands or desire for dowry from the parents or guardians of the bride. Indeed in India today, torture of the young housewives by their husbands and in-laws for failure to bring insufficient dowry has become the order of the day all over the country. Some of them are burnt to death and others choose to die by fire; while still others are put to death by some means other than fire and disposed of by burning in order to hide the heinous offence. Hardly a day passes in the life of a forensic pathologist working in one of the states of Northern India, when he is not called upon to do an autopsy on the dead body of a burnt housewife who almost invariably is a married Hindu woman in the prime of her youth, between 15-30 years of age.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1997

[Lessons in transferring resources: the system of fees per patient].

Dowries can be defined as lump sum payments or continuing grants which health authorities make between themselves and to local authorities or voluntary organisations in respect of people with severe mental disorders to be cared for in the community instead of in hospital. This paper has three aims. First to describe how dowries and other processes were set up to encourage the closure of two psychiatric hospitals in England. The broader financing context for mental health care (prior to the reforms in England engendered by the NHS and Community Care Act, 1990) is also described and shows some similarities to the current arrangements in Québec. Second, we abstract some information from a long-running evaluation of the reprovision programme to look at the type of services used in the community by former long-stay patients of these two hospitals and the comparative costs of hospital and community-based care. After leaving hospital, former patients require considerable inputs from other health and social care services; any development of community care for these patients should at the least mirror the facilities provided on the hospital campus. The final aim of this paper is to examine the extent to which this English system of budget reallocation ("dowries") can be employed in Québec to further reduce long-stay hospital provision. There are many similarities between the health and social care systems of the two countries but there are also organisational and political differences. It is not sensible, therefore, to transfer the English budget reallocation to Québec wholesale, but we suggest that there are important process and implementation issues which can guide the development of financing mechanisms in Québec.

Fee-for-Service Plans↗

PubMed1995

Effects of inbreeding on marriage payment in north India.

This study examines the relationships between consanguineous marriages and marriage payment, using data from two Muslim qaums living in urban and rural areas in Aligarh District, Uttar Pradesh, North India. Qaum and locality were found to have no significant association with the dowry system. Marriage payment is less common in consanguineous than in non-consanguineous marriages. However, the association between marriage payment and the type of marriage is significant at p < 0.001. The dowry system is more prevalent among the higher socioeconomic groups, while the bride-wealth system is more common among the lower socioeconomic groups.

Consanguinity↗

PubMed1988

Firoza Begum v. Hormuz Ali, 29 July 1987.

The defendant was accused of violating the Cruelty to Woman (Deterrent Punishment) Ordinance of 1983. His wife had testified that he beat her while demanding dowry and ousted her from the house. The Bangladesh Supreme Court, High Court Division, upheld a lower court ruling that dismissed the suit. It ruled that the wife had not alleged that the defendant had "cause[d] or attempt[ed] to cause death or grievous hurt . . . for dowry," as required by the Ordinance. It also concluded that the wife had no right to appeal the decision of the lower court and that the decision could only be appealed by the Government, which had declined to do so.

Asia↗

PubMed1997

Wife-beating in rural south India: a qualitative and econometric analysis.

This paper uses ethnographic and econometric methods to study the determinants of wife abuse in a community of potters in Southern India. The qualitative work demonstrates that wife abuse is more likely when dowries are perceived as inadequate, when husbands are alcoholic, and when the cause of the abuse is perceived as "legitimate" by the community. Hypotheses generated from the qualitative work are tested with survey data, which confirm that the risk of wife abuse significantly increases with smaller dowry payments and alcohol consumption. Furthermore, the statistical analysis reveals that women who are sterilized or have fewer male children are more likely to be abused.

Alcohol Drinking↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Consanguineous marriages and marriage payment: a study among three south Indian caste groups.

The present study aims at understanding the interrelations between consanguineous marriages and marriage payment. The data are collected from three castes inhabiting two regions of Nellore district, Andhra Pradesh, South India. It is evident from the study that the dowry system is more prevalent among higher castes, while the bride wealth system is more common among the lower castes in the hierarchy. Further, it can be seen that the dowry system is more prevalent in developed regions, while bride-wealth is more common in backward regions. Marriage payment is found to be less common in close kin marriages than in unrelated marriages. Most of the uncle-niece marriages are without any marriage payment, in all the castes. However, most of the matrilateral cross-cousin and patrilateral cross-cousin marriages are also without any marriage payment in the Devanga.

Consanguinity↗

PubMed1977

Life cycle events in 15th century Florence: records of the Monte delle doti.

Records of a dowry investment fund operated by the city of Florence, Italy from 1425-1545 contain information on life cycle events of about 32,000 girls. This information includes date of birth, date and amount of investment, and date of dowry payment or death. In the present study, the first of 19 volumes of these records were used to compute death rates and payment rates (an approximation of marriage rates) and to analyze these rates according to age, time, and socioeconomic status. Usable records were obtained for 1631 girls. There were 315 deaths; death rates per 1000 person-years were 38, 17, 11, 16, and 19 for ages less than 5, 5-9, 10-14, 15-19, and 20+, respectively. Compared to previous and succeeding years, death rates increased 5-10 times in 1437-1438 and 1449-1450, years in which epidemics have been recorded. During these periods of epidemics, death rates were relatively low in the winter months. Death rate were made for 1274 girls. About three-fourths of these payments were made by age 20. Rate of payment increased with amount of investment. Proportionally, births were least frequent during December and January, indicating a deficit of conceptions around the time of Lent.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2006

Who's afraid of the Wolfe couple: the interlocking traumatic scene.

Fulfilling intimate relationships require a constant emotional and psychological struggle to disentangle strangleholds created by the interpenetration of unresolved complexes stemming from previous disappointing relational experiences. These complexes may manifest as an encrypted pattern of engagement that each partner brings to the marriage, like a 'malignant dowry'. The dowry box, once opened, releases its nefarious contents to create an extremely complex and entangled drama I call the 'interlocking traumatic scene'. Partners unconsciously entrap each other to play a part in such a scene with double (sometimes multiple) roles for each antagonist. The imaginal space between the two characters can be seen as a projection screen, upon which are superimposed two separate shadow plays, one on each side of the screen. A third play, which is a co-created product of these two individual traumatic scenes, can also be observed. Three plays are performed simultaneously. The defensive systems that the two individuals bring to the equation dovetail together, but the actual interlocking mechanism itself deadlocks in such a way that it seems to have its own malignant presence, a 'malevolent third' (after Ogden 1994). I outline therapeutic interventions using the metaphor of the therapist as 'anti-director' and I introduce my concept of the conjoint selected fact (after Bion 1963 after Poincaré 1952).

Fantasy↗

PubMed2004

Spousal physical violence against women during pregnancy.

OBJECTIVE: To determine the prevalence of physical violence during pregnancy and the factors associated with it. DESIGN: A population-based, multicentre, cross sectional household survey. SETTING: Rural, slum and urban non-slum areas of Bhopal, Chennai, Delhi, Lucknow, Nagpur, Trivandrum and Vellore, in India. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 9938 women who were 15 to 49 years of age and living with a child younger than 18 years old. METHODS: Probability proportionate to size sampling of households was performed in three strata. Trained field workers administered a structured questionnaire. Women who reported domestic violence were asked about violence during pregnancy. Outcome variables included six violent behaviours: slap, hit, kick, beat, use of weapon and harm in any other way. Moderate to severe violence was defined as experience of any one or more of the following behaviours: hit, beat or kick. Odds ratios were calculated for risk and protective factors of violence during pregnancy using logistic regression. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Physical spousal violence. RESULTS: The lifetime experience, during pregnancy, of being slapped was 16%, hit 10%, beat 10%, kicked 9%, use of weapon 5% and harmed in any other way 6%. Eighteen percent of women experienced at least one of these behaviours and 3% experienced all six. The overall prevalence of moderate to severe violence during pregnancy was 13%. Logistic regression showed that the factors determining whether a woman experienced moderate to severe violence during pregnancy were: husband accusing wife of an affair (OR 7.1; 95% CI 5.1 to 9.8), dowry harassment (OR 4.1; 95% CI 2.8 to 6.1), husband having an affair (OR 3.7; 95% CI 2.8 to 4.8), husband being regularly drunk (OR 3.2; 95% CI 2.6 to 4.1), low education of husband (OR 2.8; 95% CI 1.4 to 5.6), substance abuse by husband (OR 2.6; 95% CI 1.3 to 5.5), no social support (OR 1.8; 95% CI 1.1 to 3.0), three or more children (OR 1.6; 95% CI 1.2 to 2.1) and household crowding (OR 1.1; 95% CI 1.0 to 1.2). CONCLUSION: In this study, 12.9% of women experienced moderate to severe physical violence during pregnancy. Suspicion of infidelity, dowry harassment, husband being regularly drunk and low education of husband were the main risk factors for violence during pregnancy.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1999

Medicolegal response to violence against women in India.

This article examines women's experiences in India with health and legal interventions that address domestic violence, dowry-related violence, and rape. By examining the experiences of survivors of abuse with the medicolegal system in New Delhi, it considers the extent to which women are able to access their legal rights within the special protection system constructed specifically for them. The use of primary data highlights the impact of state procedures on women, and it demonstrates how procedures designed to enhance women's access to the law actually inhibit it. Using semistructured interviews with female survivors of abuse, police officers, case workers, nongovernmental organization leaders, lawyers, physicians, and government officials in a 4-year period, this article examines women's access to state services designed to address violence against women, and raises questions about state tolerance of domestic and sexual violence.

Asia↗

PubMed1988

The Cruelty to Women (Deterrent Punishment) (Amendment) Act (No. 37 of 1988).

This act amends the Bangladesh Cruelty to Women (Deterrent Punishment) Ordinance 1983 to do the following: 1) change the maximum penalty under Sections 4 and 6-8 from transportation for life to imprisonment for life; 2) change the penalty under Section 5 from "punishable with transportation for life or with rigorous imprisonment for a term which may extend to 14 years" to "punishable with death or with imprisonment for life or with rigorous imprisonment for a term which may extend to 14 years and shall not be less than seven years;" and 3) add a new offense of attempting to commit offenses under Sections 4 and 5 of the Ordinance. Section 4 of the Ordinance deals with the kidnapping or abduction of women for unlawful or immoral purposes; Section 5 with trafficking in women; Section 6 with causing death or grievous hurt for dowry; Section 7 with causing death in committing rape; and Section 8 with attempting to cause death or causing grievous hurt in committing rape.

Asia↗

PubMed1989

Family, society, economy and fertility in Bangladesh.

"This paper examines the socio-economic and cultural conditions under which the large family represents a rational economic goal for parents [in Bangladesh]." The author notes that rural children provide valuable labor services to parents during childhood, grown sons continue to support their parents financially and in other ways, and sons are the most reliable source of security in old age. Daughters, however, remain at home and cost a significant amount for dowries at marriage. It is concluded that prevailing socioeconomic conditions in Bangladesh still provide substantial support for high fertility and son preference.

Asia↗

PubMed1987

Act No. 5 of 1987, 1 April 1987.

This Act amends the Compilation of Civil Law of Navarra to eliminate provisions that discriminate on the basis of sex, birth, or civil status. Among the changes are the following: a) the age of puberty is made the same for both sexes; b) wives are given the same rights as men to manage marital property and to exercise parental authority over children and both must agree in order to dispose of the home and household effects; c) the rights of illegitimate children are made equal to those of legitimate children; and d) obligatory dowry is eliminated.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1987

Shobha Rani v. Madhukar Reddi, 12 November 1987.

Overturning a lower court decision, the Supreme Court of India ruled that harassment of a wife where such harassment has as its goal coercing her or any person related to her to meet any unlawful demand for any property or valuable security such as for dowry would constitute cruelty sufficient to warrant divorce.

Asia↗