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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!gatech!ut-sally!raghu
From: raghu@ut-sally.UUCP (Raghu Ramakrishnan)
Newsgroups: net.nlang.india
Subject: Re: Marriages and Dowry Expires: Refere
Message-ID: <3046@ut-sally.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 29-Sep-85 18:04:19 EDT
Article-I.D.: ut-sally.3046
Posted: Sun Sep 29 18:04:19 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 4-Oct-85 03:56:27 EDT
References: <5585@fortune.UUCP> <51700004@uiucdcsp> <3039@ut-sally.UUCP> <2430@ut-ngp.UTEXAS>
Reply-To: raghu@sally.UUCP (Raghu Ramakrishnan)
Organization: U. Texas CS Dept., Austin, Texas
Lines: 29


> Is 'welfare' (for a woman) equivalent to being married?
> Especially if 'marriage' amounts to the purchase of a groom?

I've tried to summarise rama@ngp's points. They are both valid questions.

My personal views on these  questions are less important (especially
since I have no sisters or daughters!) than the views of Hindus at large.

In this context, the answer to the first question is an unequivocal YES. Let
me emphasize that this does not reflect my personal opinion, and that I am
not implying that this should be so. I am just pointing out a fact of life.
Changing this view of women and marriage is going to take a very long time.

As to the second, given that the custom is so pervasive, if you rule out
everyone who takes dowry, you may rule out all suitors! And given that
you consider marriage a sine qua non, you throws in your pennies and takes
your chances.

Anyway, all this begs the point that I was trying to make. If there are resolute
people who wish to refuse to offer dowry, that's great. I was just observing
that the much simpler (and complementary) action of refusing dowry was 
itself a rare phenomenon; and that even educated and wealthy (the latter
attribute merely emphasizing the fact that they don't need the money) grooms
were willing to sell themselves.

Part of the answer (to why such grooms sell themselves) may lie in one of
our many social hypocrisies. We condemn dowry, and in the same bated breath
say "He got FIVE lakhs in dowry!!". aarrggh.