Final Reflections

This is my very last blog post. After being in Canada for nearly a month, I am still trying to get back to normal routine as I finish up my project for school, which will be presented on Monday, January 28^th.

Reflecting back on my project, I realize how much I learned in such a limited amount of time. Women’s rights in India is an extremely big topic to tackle, and having the blog set up while I was away helped me organize my information as I traveled. If I had stayed longer in India, I would have researched my topic further and more in depth, as I was only scratching the surface of women’s rights.

The rape case that occurred on December 16^th was truly a terrible crime but sometimes terrible things need to happen so that better things can come. This crime, that was in every newspaper in India and was talked about daily, helped me to explore new topics in my blog while I was traveling and gave me lots to think about. It was also interesting to see how India responded to this crime and,  I think that, many years from now, December 2012 will be remembered as the beginning of a new era for women’s rights in India.

I want to thank all of my readers for keeping up with my blog while I was traveling around India and for taking a deeper interest into the different issues I was looking at. Posting new updates, and reading your comments was one of the highlights of the trip.  Thank you all so much.

Josiah

Last Day In India

Today we took a train from Jaipur back to New Delhi. Tomorrow, we fly to London, England, and after spending 18 hours there; we will fly back to Ottawa.

Today while reading some newspapers, I got some interesting information about women’s rights issues and some more research relating to the New Delhi gang rape incident. The six accused will be tried in the Saket District Court, in the same area where we stayed when we first arrived in India. Murder, gang rape, attempt to murder, and criminal conspiracy are only a few of the multiple charges facing the six accused. One of the six is a youth and is being tried by a Juvenile Board. There has been some debate since he is a youth whether his punishment should be as harsh as the adults, but we will find out soon, as the trial is soon to be underway.

Apart from some more news on the gang rape and other cases that are popping up, I read an interesting article on the education system. Apparently, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), is preparing to teach students and teachers to battle the oppression of women, starting at a very young age. Also, the board has decided to launch an optional topic for students in Classes 11 and 12 on Human Studies and Gender Rights. It seems to me that, indeed the New Delhi gang rape incident was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Although I think it will take years before women’s rights issues even reach rural areas, it is good to see that at least the nation’s capitol is addressing these issues.










The Baha'i Temple in Delhi

Clothing and Women's Status

Yesterday we arrived in Jaipur, the capital of Rajasthan. Today, we visited another fort, and a block-printing museum. I found the block-printing museum interesting, because under the descriptions of the dresses and saris that the museum had, each had a tag saying either “Worn by widows”, or “Worn by married women.” I found this interesting, as the dresses/saris with less brighter colours were the ones that said “Worn by widows”. This illustrates my research that widows are forbidden to wear bright colours once their husband dies. Although I already knew this, it was interesting to see it so explicitly displayed.

Another thing I found that was interesting was that they separated the married women’s dresses from the divorced. I think it was an example even of women coming down on other women saying, “We’re better because we still have our husbands.”


Stamping fabric in the block-printing museum, Amber.