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India's neglected widows
The world's first
international conference on widows in South Asia is
designed to highlight the suffering of women who are
often excluded and marginalised.
India alone has
almost 40 million widows.
Traditionally
Hinduism frowns on widows remarrying and many have
their social and economic power eroded too -
although in recent years many widows have benefited
from moves to enhance their status.
Vrindavan is a
pilgrimage town now home to thousands of destitute
widows.
Ashtabala Mundo is
one of thousands of widows who have been driven by
poverty to the holy town.
She was married off
when she was still a baby and widowed when she was
still a child.
"We have to come
and sing here morning, noon and night and for all
that I only get is $10 a month," she said.
"By the time I've
paid the rent, I can't afford to buy cooking oil. So
I often go all day without a hot meal," Mrs Mundo
said.
On the sidelines
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The women line up,
after singing for several hours, to receive a
cup of rice and a few teaspoons of lentils. It
isn't much.
In India, widows are an invisible community.
Meera Khanna, one of the conference organisers,
says although many widows are treated less
harshly nowadays, they still face discrimination
and neglect.
"We treat widowhood not as a natural stage in
the life cycle of a woman, we treat it as some kind of an
aberration. We accept death but we don't accept
widowhood," she said.
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Ahstabala Mundo:
Widowed when still a child |
"Because somewhere in the Indian psyche, the woman's
identity is with the man and the minute he's not
there, it's something that cannot be accepted."
Mr Madhav of
Vrindavan's Shri Bhagwan Bhajan Ashram temple
society says more than a thousand widows a day come
to his temple alone.
"Most of them are
very poor and once their husbands die, they have to
come here. We can at least give them food and
clothes."
Sad tales
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Some sing at local
temples in order to get food |
Outside,
loudspeakers play songs honouring Lord Krishna,
in the town associated with the Hindu God.
Many of the
widows who flock here have nowhere else to go.
Hindu widows
are not supposed to remarry. With little social
or economic status, many become destitute.
We met Nirmala Dasi, a frail 85-year-old,
begging at the temple gate.
When she spoke, she
dissolved into tears.
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"I've been too ill to sing at the temple for the
last three days so I haven't had a thing to eat. You
don't get anything unless you go there."
We were soon
surrounded by widows with sad stories to tell.
"I spend almost
everything I get on a room I share with four others.
I've no relatives, or I wouldn't be here," said
Mithila.
"It's so cold here,
I'm always freezing."
Widows have been a
marginalised and deprived group for generations.
This conference
aims to highlight their suffering - and stop so many
women from losing their dignity and basic rights
when they lose their husbands.
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