Dowry Death: The Consequences Of Dowry Death In India

1076 Words3 Pages

The bestowing of dowries is an ancient tradition. Unlike the Western concept of a single ‘‘bride payment’’, the Indian tradition consists of an ongoing series of gifts both before and after the marriage to appease the husband and his family. In Western culture, a young married couple establishes their own home with both partners contributing to the welfare of their new ‘‘family’’, while in India, the husband’s family takes in the bride, adding a financial burden to the extended family living arrangements. When the dowry demands are not met, husbands and in-laws render significant mental and physical harassment on the young brides in an effort to encourage her family to fulfill their dowry obligations and even kill the young bride1. Dowry deaths …show more content…

Most dowry deaths occur when the young woman, unable to bear the harassment and torture, commits suicide. Most of these suicides are by hanging, poisoning or by fire. In dowry deaths, the groom’s family is the perpetrator of murder or suicide.2 Poisonong by pesticides is very common in our country. Suicide rates in India have been reported to be high (Joseph et al, 2003; Aaron et al, 2004; Abraham et al, 2005; Prasad et al, 2006), with 1741 suicides documented in a population of about 100 000 from 1986 to 2005 where hanging (804 of 1741, 46.2%) and poisoning (746 of 1741, 42.8%) were the methods most commonly employed. Detailed analysis of the data from 2001 to 2005 revealed that 68% of the fatal episodes of self-poisoning were a result of ingestion of pesticides3. Self-poisoning with pesticides is a significant public health problem in low- and middle-income countries like …show more content…

The national crime Record Bureau says that there were over 6000 dowry-related deaths every year. There was also surge in dowry related deaths i.e. from 400 a year in 1980s to 6000 a year in 1990s4. Most of the victims reached hospital too late, when the poison had already been absorbed and thus many died within 24 h. If patients reached the hospital in time, they did not necessarily receive proper treatment because of lack of adequate facilities at the PHC level hospital. Most of the incidents occurred during morning hour or midday hour perhaps because of increased tensions and problems at these times. The survival period of within 24 h in 94.25% of fatalities was reported in study conducted at

More about Dowry Death: The Consequences Of Dowry Death In India

Open Document