"The Burning Issue"

By Dr DK Giri and Patrick Koohafkan. 

Millions of Indian women have no ownership of their wombs

The Vashistha Smritia, a sacred Hindu text, teaches that ‘to not have a son is a curse upon a person.’ This statement alone carries more power in rural India than any report warning of climate chaos if the country’s exploding population isn’t brought under control.

It is inevitable that in Indian rural communities preoccupied with survival, a child will be viewed to a large extent as an investment. A son comes with a host of perceived benefits, while a daughter brings none. Once married, daughters are considered the property of their husband’s family, even though it is her family that is required to pay the dowry. A son can freely work and support his parents in their old age.

As a result, Indian women living in traditional communities are frequently forced to bear child after child until enough sons are born to satisfy the husband. What’s being overlooked is how this makes women’s rights an environmental issue.

India has an estimated annual birth rate of 25,997,400. Sustainable development is the holy grail of environmentalism and the only solution to our climate change problems. But overpopulation will swiftly crush the sustainable development dream. To cut India’s birth rate, we must combat the misogynistic traditions that make sons more special. Such a cultural campaign would appear to be the only solution in a democracy that cannot stomach China-style enforced population controls.

The majority among those battling for sustainable development and the mitigation of climate change hardly consider women’s rights to be an environmental issue. But if Indian parents could learn to be satisfied with one or two daughters only, then population growth would be curtailed and the depletion of our ecosystems would be dramatically slowed. We live in a finite world with finite food, water and fuel resources. Rapid deforestation is taking place throughout the world to satisfy the fuel and living space desires of an expanding human race.

When we come to understand that climate change is a feminist issue, other revelations emerge. We realise that environmental degradation is not simply a question of industry and corporations visiting a terrible problem upon the ‘little people’ of wider society. It is a problem linked to the sublimation of women by men at every end of society’s spectrum, urban and rural, rich and poor.

We also realise the origins of climate change can be traced back much further than the Western world’s Industrial Revolution two centuries ago. The origins lie in thousands of years of exploitative patriarchal traditions. Only now are the effects of these traditions upon the planet’s ecosystems reaching a tipping point.

Many NGOs involved in women’s rights in India face great challenges. Organisations that encourage women to stand up to their fathers and husbands are sometimes perceived as colonial invaders intent on imposing urban Indian or Western values on traditional cultures. Traditional Hindu society is so powerfully patriarchal that its men are not about to bullied into respecting women. It is in scriptures alone that women are given similar status to goddesses. It would seem the only viable solution is one that offers an incentive for men to change their attitudes towards females.

Of course, this sounds about as naïve as the idea that women can easily gain more rights simply by demanding them. It begs the question of what on earth would entice anyone to give up power and authority? Outside the realm of ethics, what practical motive could any man possibly have for allowing his wife to ignore his commands, or even potentially divorce him?

The answer lies in economics. If a woman has less children, she is more free to work. Families stand to greatly benefit from women having the same potential income as men. This would be much more efficient than men forcing their wives into the trial-and-error method of trying to bear a son. History teaches us that women’s rights come as a package deal; with a woman’s freedom to pursue a career comes more political power and greater respect. Their emancipation begins by allowing them power over their reproductive organs. Not only women but our natural environment would also be freed – from a spiraling human population.

In his 2008 book, ‘More: Population, Nature, and What Women Want,’ Robert Engelman quotes a campaigner who told him this: “The environment begins in the womb of a woman and ripples out all over the world.” Engelman argues that women don’t want more children. He says that instead they want more for their children. Fathers across India must be encouraged, warmly, to adopt this approach as well. We all stand to benefit.

Dr DK Giri is director of Schumacher Centre – www.schumachercentre.org

This article originally appeared in Civil Society magazine – www.civilsocietyonline.com

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