India exports dowry menace to the world

For 26-year-old Diksha Sharma it was a dream come true when her marriage was fixed with Australian resident Kanav Rampal, son of Krishen and Shashikanta Rampal. Krishen was the son of a retired judge, Shashikanta was a professor. Kanav’s sister, Kanika, was an engineer in Australia. Diksha’s parents spent lakhs of rupees on the wedding, delighted at the prospect of their daughter (who holds a Master’s degree in Economics) entering such an educated family. She did not mind that she would have to live with her in-laws in Jalandhar while the paperwork for her move to Australia was under process.

Little did she know how agonising it would be. The demand for jewellery and money mounted; her sister-in-law slapped her because “she did not know how to exercise properly”; she had to massage her father-in-law despite feeling uncomfortable and bear countless taunts and mental trauma silently. “When they came to ask for my hand, they said, ‘We don’t want a daughter-in-law but a daughter’. After one and a half years of harassment, they demanded Rs.4 lakh, without which they would not complete the visa formalities. Feeling utterly helpless, my father gave them the money but in vain,” said Diksha.

One day, they left for Meerut and never returned. Police complaints and investigation revealed that they had fled the country, along with all the material possessions in the house. A devastated Diksha found out that this was not the first time the family had ruined a girl’s life. “While I knew he [Kanav Rampal] was a divorcee, I did not know the actual circumstances of the divorce. It seems the girl left him in 20 days. Unlike her, I was not smart enough to see through their game plan,” she told Frontline .

The social evil of dowry might be outlawed in India but its practise continues to grow in the NRI (non-resident Indian) population. Instances of bride abandonment and harassment have not only increased but transformed into modern forms in contemporary society. What is shocking is that educated and rich families are involved in elaborate plans to rob the bride and her family of its material possessions. When unsuccessful in doing so or having done enough, they vanish like fly-by-night operators, leaving the bride stupefied and penniless, sometimes with a child.

Shubhi Sachan was thrilled when Munish Sikka, son of Manju and the late Colonel Mahendra Pal Sikka, married her in what was a love-turned-arranged marriage after two years of a romantic, across-the-globe courtship. The Sikkas did not demand any dowry. But the wedding had to take place in nothing less than five-star hotels. While they had agreed to split the costs evenly, the Sikkas gradually withdrew and left the bride’s family to shoulder the burden. As Munish, a gaming technology expert, was older to Shubhi by more than a decade, they planned an early pregnancy, and that was when trouble started for her, Shubhi said.

Her in-laws treated her like a burden and a liability who did not bring home an income. She was forced to take up a job soon after her son was born. “My mother-in-law was after my life even before my stitches had healed,” she told Frontline . On August 26, when she returned to Mumbai after delivering a lecture in Symbiosis Institute, Pune, she found that her husband had disappeared, taking with him everything in the house. After waiting for five days her family approached the police. Munish then came to the police station and told the police that his life was under threat from Shubhi. “The police did not do anything and in two days he left the country via China. Since he is a U.S. passport holder, it will be many years before I can see any justice being done. In not registering an FIR ASAP, the police has denied me justice,” said Shubhi, who ran from pillar to post before social media tweets forced the police to register an FIR. She is now economically burdened with taking care of her child and her aging parents.

More often than not, the lack of legal provisions in the husband’s country of residence hinders the delivery of justice for these women. Dr Manjula O’Connor, a psychiatrist by profession and founder of the NGO the Australasian Centre for Human Rights and Health, is of the view that the definition of dowry should be clarified in the Australian legislation to address domestic violence and dowry abuse, a practice in south Asian, African, Chinese and West Asian communities. “Since Dowry is not a concept that the courts are attuned to considering in the normal course in Australia, it is important that dowry be introduced as a separate concept by way of example in the legislation so that the asking or taking of it can be included as a form of economic abuse and also that it may be returned to the victim [protected person] under directions of the court,” she said.