The Hindu Business Line : Marriages that `work'

In the debt-ridden State of Orissa, soaring unemployment rates have brought a twist to the dowry demands of prospective bridegrooms, and jobs are the new currency. An increasing number of educated, unemployed youth are either demanding a source of employment as dowry or seeking an employed bride in lieu of dowry.

`A survey by the All India Democratic Women's Association (AIDWA) on dowry practice titled `Expanding Dimensions of Dowry' (June 2003) was the first documentation citing several jobs-as-dowry cases. A closer study of media reports on dowry harassment also illustrates this trend.

Take the case of Nilima Sahoo from Puri district. As soon as she got a job as a health worker in a village, an unemployed youth from the same village proposed to her. His family did not want dowry, they were happy that she had a job.

But seven months after marriage, the health project shut down and Nilima was jobless. Her in-laws threw her out of their home, as she could not fund the household. Today, the pregnant woman stays with her parents and hopes to find a job soon to save her marriage.

A dismal employment scenario

The employment scenario in Orissa is dismal. According to data available from employment exchanges in the State, there are 6.16 lakh applications from individuals categorised as `educated'. Only 2,239 were placed in jobs in 2002-03. This is only the tip of the iceberg because not all job-seekers register with these exchanges.

The Orissa Government attempted to address this problem in its Tenth Plan (2002-07) through self-employment schemes for around 1 crore people living below the poverty line. However, in 2002-03, only 1.33 lakh were employed on daily wages. In 2003-04, this number rose slightly to 1.68 lakh.

The State ranks poorly on all socio-economic indicators, with nearly half its population living below the poverty line. Education, healthcare, infrastructure development, agriculture and industrial growth are all in poor shape, while infant and maternal mortality rates are high.

The low socio-economic indicators are also reflected in the skyrocketing dowry harassment figures. According to the Human Rights Protection Committee in the State and the Orissa Crime Branch statistics, compared to the previous decade, 1990-2000 registered a 460 per cent increase in dowry deaths and 405.11 per cent increase in dowry torture.

Livelihood through dowry

The new mutation that dowry harassment has gone through — livelihood through dowry — throws up several heartbreaking cases. When Mahanadi Coal Fields Ltd took over mining areas in Talcher, it promised one job for each displaced family. Five women were in line for these jobs and five unemployed youth came forward to marry them. The marriages took place in 1992. But when the women failed to get the promised jobs, their husbands abandoned them.

The AIDWA study has revealed that this trend is not limited to economically marginalised classes. The study says: "Several middle- and upper-income group families interviewed said that they were trying to organise an NGO (registered) for the prospective bridegroom — because that is what he had demanded!" They specifically demand NGOs that have been registered for three years — the eligibility criteria for overseas funding.

Tapashi Praharaj, head of AIDWA's Orissa chapter, says that the trend is particularly noticeable in small towns and coastal districts. Banaja Raol's case (2000) is a grim reminder of the serious damage that dowry is capable of causing. Banaja's wedding was fixed, with the groom's side agreeing to forego `normal' dowry for the stability that her government job offered.

But before the wedding, she lost her job when the Orissa government retrenched staff to deal with a financial crunch. The groom's family immediately called off the wedding. Humiliated and desperate, Banaja immolated herself in front of the Orissa State Assembly. Her suicide note read, "I have neither a job, nor can I get married; my future stretches before me as an area of darkness. What will I gain by living?"

There are many such stories. The fisherfolk were the worst affected by the super-cyclone of 1999. With fishing dinghies destroyed, the men sat at home, unable to earn a living. Soon, grooms were demanding fishing boats as dowry. Those who could scrape together enough to buy a dinghy, or had a dinghy to give away, did so. At a time when getting their daughters married seemed like a remote possibility, that was the price they had to pay.

Adding to this problem is the fact that in the face of spiralling unemployment more and more educated women are now seeing marriage as the only viable future. This helps entrench dowry even more deeply. The AIDWA survey found that of the 150 parents interviewed in Puri, Cuttack, Kendrapada, Bhadrak and Sundargarh, a massive 78 per cent believed that dowry should be given.

Namita Panda, Chairperson, Orissa State Mahila Commission, believes that "even if dowry appears to offer a temporary reprieve from insecurity in the pervasive unemployment scenario, the practice itself has reached such dimensions that we are moving backwards and becoming an uncivilised society".

Tapashi says that they are planning to create associations that will fight "dowry bribery" in Orissa. In addition to awareness generation in rural areas through plays, songs and dances, they will also organise mass oath-taking, where parents of boys will pledge to oppose dowry.

In urban areas, they plan to hold public protests against marriages that exceed the expenditure ceiling guidelines in the State. According to the guidelines, the combined cost of feasts and gifts to daughters during weddings should not exceed Rs 25,000. These are, by and large, ignored and have been criticised as being impractical.

Unless the government, NGOs and citizens take immediate and concerted action, the menace of dowry will continue to claim the lives of many more women.

Women's Feature Service

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