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From: dss00@amdahl.UUCP (dss00)
Newsgroups: net.nlang.india
Subject: Re: dowry
Message-ID: <2118@amdahl.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 17-Oct-85 12:18:04 EDT
Article-I.D.: amdahl.2118
Posted: Thu Oct 17 12:18:04 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 19-Oct-85 06:06:42 EDT
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Raghu Seshadri writes:
> 
> I commend this suggestion . Raising consciousness by tactics such as 
> social boycott is probably the best long term solution.

When you boycott the person who took dowry, you penalize the victim
along with the perpetrator.

> People immune to appeals of decency and ethics are remarkably
> vulnerable to charges of being not 'modern' or 'fashionable'.
> Make dowry unfashionable and it will fade away.
> -- 
> Raghu Seshadri

It is plain economics that works here, not fashion.
Besides, simply blaming those who accept dowry is wrong strategy.
It will not solve any thing.
As long as there are people who want to give dowry, there
will be those who will take it.

While we are at it, let us look at how this tradition came into
being. In old days, girls did not have inheritence rights
in their parents property. Dowry was a father's way of giving
the daughter her share. It was not *negotiated* with the groom
or his parents. The groom or his family had no right on
what ever dowry the bride brought with her. It was her property.
Under the Indian law girls have had equal inheritence rights
for several decades now. But the dowry system has stuck around
in its present degenerated form.

(Oh, no dowry was either discussed or exchanged in my marriage.
So please don't get personal.)
-- 

Deepak S. Sabnis ...!{ihnp4,hplabs,amd,nsc}!amdahl!dss00    (408) 746-6058

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