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The Great Indian Family And The Distortion Of Values

BY SAUMITRA MOHAN

WE Indians have always taken pride in our family values, asserting their superiority over similar values of any other culture. In fact, asked to define the word ‘Heaven’, someone called it a way of life that would include a British house, an American salary, Chinese food and Indian family. Accordingly, the word, “hell” was defined as a state of affairs that subsumes the worst from the same four cultures ~ an Indian salary, a Chinese house, British food and an American family. The fact remains that the Indian family system and the cognate family values are deemed to be the best, at least when we compare them with other cultural values.

However, certain negative features have crept into the system over time. These have never been acknowledged to be part of our value system; they represent the underbelly of our culture.
Consider, for example, the strong preference for a son. The trend has also surfaced in China because of the single-child norm. If your first child is a girl, your so called well-wishers, including those within your family, keep irritatingly reminding you that you should definitely have a son. Couples, whose first-born is a girl, generally have a son born to them as the second child. The birth is made to appear as normal delivery, but is often the result of resorting to the illegal sex selection techniques. They surreptitiously get the pre-natal tests done to ensure that they do have a boy.

There is seldom a reverse sex selection ~ those with a boy as their first child do not generally go in for a sex selection to have a baby girl as their second child. The parents or parents-in-law often target the womenfolk ~ the daughters or daughters-in-law, to push for a boy. The result is a skewed sex ratio. This has served to increase crime against women.

Another value relates to describing a good soul as a ‘cow’. This often means a dumb person and the appellation is on occasion used in relation to the daughters-in-law. Those daughters-in-law, who serve their in-laws without a murmur, are supposed to be the best of their ilk. But there is considerable prejudice against educated, smart or quick-tongued daughters-in-law. When Indian parents scout for a prospective bride, they are generally on the lookout for such a dumb ‘cow’. A stereotypical and submissive bahu is preferable because she can serve the self-centred interests of the parents-in-law. Naturally, such arranged marriages don’t last as they are embedded in a defective foundation.

More often than not, the groom’s parents demand dowry as an insurance cover that will take care of their own old age. This applies more to the people with low self-esteem, a sense of inferiority complex or unplanned lifestyle. No wonder some people insist on caste marriages; in inter-caste and inter-religion marriages, the scope for dowry is virtually nil.

Caste marriages and caste values are, therefore, promoted to put a premium on the monetary value of the marriage, indeed to jack up the amount of dowry.

Parochial societal notions of religion and limited education are responsible for a blinkered mindset that engenders wrong notions about family and culture. Indeed, universal and liberal education is required to reinforce and supplement our family values. This will strengthen our culture. Family values form a sub-culture.

The resultant cultural fusion shall also promote better tolerance and understanding among various cultures thereby denting Samuel Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations thesis. It shall also help realise Marshall McLuhan’s concept of ‘Global Village’.

Ours is a patriarchal society. The patriarchal values get so imbibed by hoi-polloi that they become their second nature. The people, irrespective of gender, become the defenders of those values. Those schooled in patriarchal values will resent more rights for women or equitable gender relations as they might threaten the dominance of conventional and archaic values.
Liberal values are perceived as a threat to traditional values, challenging the established notions of social discourse. The redoubtable mothers-in-law would not like their daughters-in-law to have more freedom or a better status vis-a-vis their husbands or the family. Therefore, the control and restraints exercised over the daughters-in-law are actually a psychological ventilation of delayed retribution against society, leading to atrocities and churlish behaviour against younger women in the same roles.
Mothers-in-law generally seek the attention of their children. This often verges on histrionics to sideline their daughters-in-law or to keep them suitably in check. Women in classical Indian families, who are supposed to play a subdued role, come into their own as they become older with a more pronounced role than they played in their young age. Some of these parents are very demanding, to the extent that they malign their daughters-in-law or play the game of divide-and-rule within the family.

Such attempts at oneupmanship can also result in psychological torture or physical assaults, often reported as dowry harassment cases under 498 A of the Indian Penal Code. In many instances, such shenanigans lead to marital break-ups or dowry deaths as well. Often parents conspire against their own children to prove themselves right. The khap panchayats may have gone to an extreme in northern India by ordering “honour killings”. But persecution of daughters-in-law is a fairly common feature of Indian society. lt is a distortion of family values under the pretext of protecting the sons. The attitude reflects the selfish interests of the parents-in-law.

An idle brain is also responsible for such travesties of the family system. As they retire from work or from active family life, most parents are not engaged in any cerebral activity. This leads to an inferiority complex; with age they become more and more demanding. Parents feel neglected and the anxiety to seek attention and importance can lead to discord within the family and the eventual break-up of the joint family system.

Many parents obstruct the marriage of their children to the person of their choice. The case involving Rizwanur Rahman and Priyanka Todi comes readily to mind.

It will take some time to correct the faultlines of the Indian family system. Hopefully, these are transitional problems which shall be resolved as Gen X passes on the baton to the next generation that can be expected to be better educated and better equipped to counter the damaging values. We will have to ensure better universal education imbued with liberal values. There is need for a concerted attempt to promote humane attitudes as ought to be germane to a modern, liberal society.
The writer is District Magistrate, Darjeeling. The views expressed are personal and don’t reflect those of the Government

The writer is District Magistrate, Darjeeling. The views expressed are personal and don’t reflect those of the Government

(source: The Statesman)