The Position of Women in Hindu Civilisation, from Prehistoric Times to the Present Day c17.s4.2

c17.s4.2

When girls of 17 or 18, equipped with proper education, enter matrimony, they cannot but be treated with instinctive respect and consideration by all the society around. Family responsibility, and not inherent incapacity, would be the normal cause of their not being earning members of their families; they would therefore receive the same respect that is instinctively given to the bread-winner. Their practical attainments would add to the beauty of their households, lead to economy in its expenditure and promote sound education of the children of the family. This would surely ensure for them an equality of status with their husbands in all cultured families. Knowing that a woman equipped with the above education can earn her living and support her family, if necessary, society would cease to regard her as a parasite; nor would she allow to be looked upon with an air of condescension. Economic value, actual or potential, excercises considerable influence upon the status of a class. The dominating position of man has been largely due to his being the chief earning member of the family. The observation of a Sanskrit dramatist that a man becomes a woman when he is economically dependent upon her, and vice versa, is true to a very gretat extent¹.