The Position of Women in Hindu Civilisation, from Prehistoric Times to the Present Day c16.89

c16.89

It is however true that more writers should have come forward to defend women against such unfair attacks. The absurdity of the charges levelled against them should have been exposed in numerous works. This, however, did not happen. *Pari passu* with the growing popularity of the Renunciation School, education of women declined. Their *upanayana* disappeared and they began to be married at a very early age. Denied the advantages of a liberal education, suddenly transferred to the rather unsympathetic atmosphere of the mother-in-law's house at a very young age, often called upon to bear the unwelcome company of a cowife, frequently forced to drag on a miserable existence in an unterminable widowhood, the character of women as a whole showed some inevitable deterioration after about 200 A. D. Many of them naturally began to show pettiness, narrowmindedness, jealousy and peevishness, as a result of forced repression in some directions and unnatural stimulation in others. So Manu's description of the woman's character as possessing the above defects began to appear as partly true¹. The average man began to feel that there was some truth in some of the charges levelled against women. He therefore began to assume a rather patronising attitude towards them. It cannot be denied that even some of the best writers of the first millennium of the Christian era have often expressed very unfair views about women. Thus Kālidāsa, for instance, while no doubt declaring in one place the wife to be the best companion and counsellor of her husband, proceeds to describe her as merely an instrument of physical pleasure on another occasion¹. Had these authors lived in an age when female education was general and adequate, when lady scholars were making important contributions to the progress of knowledge, when lady poets and authors were not rare in society, when women had not been reduced to the status of Śūdras by their being declared ineligible for *upanayana* and other religious privileges, they would not have made some of their caustic and disparaging remarks about the weaker sex. The illiteracy of women and their general backwardness made the temptation to pass patronising remarks too strong. This tendency will disappear as soon as women take their natural place by the side of men as their honoured, valued and well equipped coworkers.