Page 105 - Communication Processes Volume 3 Communication Culture and Confrontation

80 Karine Bates

Child Marriage Restraint Act was passed. Women obtained the right
to vote in the province of Madras in 1921. In 1937 Hindu women were
given limited rights to property. A brief presentation of two Acts directly
related to widows follows.
The Widow Remarriage Act was enacted in 1856. After its adoption
there were major protests from the orthodox: one petition against the
Bill was signed by 37,000 people, led by Raja Radhkanta Deb and
the pundits of Naida, Trebeni and Bansberial. Women also organized
themselves and joined the debate, as did Sanskrit scholars and social
reformers like Pandita Ramabai Saraswati, a social reformer who be-
lieved in the equality of men and women and advocated for women’s
access to education. As Liddle and Joshi (1986) point out, many people
were of the opinion that the Act of 1856 had contributed to the Indian
revolt of 1857.
The Hindu Women’s Rights to Property Act of 1937 encountered
strong opposition from the orthodox Indian members of the Central
Legislative Assembly. The Act gave Hindu widows the right to in-
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testate succession equal to a son’s share in separate property among
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those governed by Mitaksharav, and in all property among those gov-
erned by Dayabhaga. The widows also had the same interest as their
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deceased husbands in the undivided Mitakshara coparcenary, with
the same right to claim partition as a coparcener, but she could hold
this share only as a limited interest. A widow could only enjoy these
rights during her lifetime, after which it went to her deceased husband’s
heirs. Furthermore, it excluded agricultural land. Finally, her limited
rights in the deceased husband’s property were subject to forfeiture
on remarriage.
The 1937 Act diminished the rights of women in some communities
(Agarwal 1994). This is especially true where inheritance used to be
matrilineal or bilateral, such as the Garos, Kahsis and Lalungs in north-
east India, as well as the Nayars, Tiyyars, Bants, Mappilas, Nangudi,
Vellalars and others. Such a reverse impact of the Act is due to the fact
that the British presumed that the head of the household was a male.
This is an example of how legal reforms inspired by Western ideology
may have had diverse effects, depending on the community in which
it was implemented.
In western India there were indications of a more liberal approach
to women’s property rights before the British period (ibid.: 95).