Brahmin widow head shave video series#

Now she can barely walk because of a broken leg. Most of the money her husband made was spent on two sick sons who died, and the rest on the treatment for her husband who suffered from tuberculosis. Here lives Prabha Rani Bhowmick, 70, from Nadia district, married at the age of 11, and widowed at 35. Vrindaban is strewn with these living wrecks of humanity. But when they die, sometimes on the streets, they are simply picked up by garbage collectors and dumped into the Yamuna. Slumlords charge the widows anything between Rs 15 and Rs 40 a month for a cage-like dwelling and also insist on a Rs 120 deposit for advance funeral services. But the life-styles of the ashram staff have become opulent.' 'All this money comes in because of the widows but it is scandalous that there is very little accounting for it and the widows do not benefit from it. Then they disappear into the city.Īccording to Professor Ashok Bansal, lecturer in Mathura's Babu Shivnath Aggarwal College, who has made a detailed study of the situation, the Bhajan Ashram, on account of its regular kirtans, has attracted crores of rupees from contributors. they return - collect a Re 1 token at the entrance - and chant again for four hours in sad, tired voices. At the end, they are given 250 gm of rice and a pinch of salt - their only meal. Vacant, unsmiling, they gather and chant Hare Rama Hare Krishna for four hours under the watchful eyes of dais (monitors), who prod them physically if they tire or flag.

Dressed in white, with white tilaks on the foreheads, they trudge to the ashram - bent widows, eyeless widows, younger widows with expressionless eyes, limbless widows. and troop to cavernous, dungeon-like rooms for the first kirtan at 6 a.m.

The bais, as they are called, rise at 5 a.m. In 1910, a rich Marwari founded a bhajan ashram to get them off the streets where they would beg and make them perform kirtan in the ashram for which they would be paid Re 1 a day out of the donations of the benefactors. Many of the managers and caretakers of the ashrams are reported to be millionaires.Īt any given time there are about 2,000 Bengali widows in Vrindaban. Most of Vrindaban's havelis and ashrams were built by rich Bengalis who also contributed generously for the feeding and clothing of widows who went there. Even though traditions are slowly changing in Bengal - the forcible shaving of heads is no longer widespread - widow remarriage is still rare, widows are still considered unlucky, banned from participating in auspicious ceremonies, and are either forced to perform maidservant duties at home and stay out of sight or forced out into ashrams. Vrindaban offers a final refuge to Bengali widows and mirrors most accurately their plight.

Then, divested of her home and insulted by her only daughter, she was driven out of Calcutta. Widowed at 15, she slaved at household chores at her in-law's Satto Ghosh, 56, lives in Vrindaban on a charity dole of Rs 2 a day. While there are some signs of improvement in the treatment of widows and widow remarriage in urban areas, the general attitude towards them is perhaps best summed up by this Mewari proverb: Teetar varani baadali, na vidhwa kajal rekh, ba barase ba ghar kare, bee me meen na mekh (When clouds have the colours of a partridge, it is sure to rain, and when a widow wears kajal, she is sure to bring destruction of the household.) Widow pension schemes haven't taken off in most states and even in those places where widows are registered for pension schemes they are told that states have failed to sanction enough money. This is partly as the Government has also been content to sweep them under the rug. There are no accurate statistics on how many widows there are.

Brahmin widow head shave video series#

Reduced to virtual non-status through a series of rituals masquerading under obscurantist religious sanction - the breaking of her bangles or banishing her from auspicious functions - she loses her independence and capacity to fight for her property rights. She becomes the flotsam and jetsam of Indian society washed ashore at the portals of exploitative ashrams in the hope of dying there and attaining moksha (salvation), or remains prey to the predations of relatives who enslave or mentally torture her. In the absence of widow remarriage, even if she lives with another man, she has no pati and therefore, no home. Conditioned from childhood to accept a totally man-centred existence - ' pati ho to ghar ho, pati nahin to ghar nahin (your home is only where your husband is) - the widow becomes a non-person when her husband dies, so closely is her psyche linked to her husband's identity.