The murder of a Pune realtor, allegedly by his fiancée in concert with her boyfriend, has prised open debates on women’s agency and their lack of choice in romantic relationships.
That even an affluent and educated woman would, allegedly, rather kill her fiancé than confront her parents who arranged the match raises the question how empowered women really are even in urbane settings.
Flavia Agnes, the Mumbai-based veteran women’s rights lawyer, told The Telegraph that affluence often comes with its own restrictions — far stronger
than what working-class women face.
“Social status and economic standards may put more pressure on the girl. Because here, the status (of the family) matters…. The girl needs counselling; the parents also need counselling,” she said.
“There has to be a general social awareness that a girl choosing her own partner is not negative, it is not disrupting the social processes, it is very natural and normal, particularly among educated girls."
Agnes added: “So, the girls are not given to taking these extreme steps. But a girl also needs counselling on how to handle the situation with her parents and not resort to such means.
“Now everybody is in trouble: The boy is dead, she (the prime accused) has been arrested, her friend has been arrested. How does it resolve the core issue that she was struggling with? It can’t be resolved. Violence is never an answer.”
On the role of the police, Agnes said: “Women don’t approach the women’s cell at (district police offices), since these cells are part of the police and they don’t want to approach the police. They don’t understand that these cells are not police — they are social work agencies.”
Former Assam DGP Bhaskar Jyoti Mahanta told this newspaper: “This is a sociological issue and not a crime issue. It’s basically the result of patriarchy continuing to prevail in a manner that forces a particular person to go to extremes, as others make the decisions for his or her life….
“So, this particular woman, despite belonging to a so-called educated family, why did she have to say ‘yes’ to a person whom she doesn’t love? She must have done it only because the societal value system is such that the diktat of the family has to prevail.”
Mahanta, who also served as state information commissioner, added: “It’s about the politics of domination, of gender, of values. Modern people are getting to interact with cultures other than their own and they’re going to hostels and… the wider world.
“They develop their own mind. But then they’re torn between the two worlds. So, this needs to be addressed by society itself in the first place.”
Mahanta added: “A time may come when you need to legislate. An adult’s wishes cannot be washed away by taking recourse to traditional (dispute resolution mechanisms).”
A rash of murders — classified as “illicit relationship” or “love affair” murders in crime records — were reported last year from Cherrapunji in Meghalaya, Bhiwani in Haryana, and Kanpur, Ballia and Auraiya in Uttar Pradesh. The “daayan” (demon) wife stories hogged television rating points.
The share of murders attributed to “illicit relationship” and “love affair” has hovered around 10 per cent in the National Crime Records Bureau’s annual reports since 2020.
Nandini Hebbar N, the author of Gender, Caste, and Class in South India’s Technical Institutions, said: “Whether with Ketan (the victim) or Chetan (the alleged accomplice), Siya’s (the main accused) life wouldn’t have been very different.”
She added: “Young women aspiring to get into careers, I think, have now more or less seen or are seeing the patriarchal conditions of women’s future lives very clearly in front of them….
“The fact (is) that there is a double shift and yet family expectations out of marriage for young women continue to be similar, irrespective of whether they are going out to work or not. This is something that I feel the younger generation is very cognisant about — they recognise it, they see it and they call it out for what it is.”
Hebbar continued: “I haven’t met young women with levels of rage to murder…. But, I think it is a certain agonism (struggle) and tension that at least urban women — who are economically independent but are going through the institution of marriage — live with.”
She pointed to the alleged Twisha Sharma dowry murder in Bhopal last month and the growth of “TradWife” content on social media, in which women carry out household chores that are watched by a large online community.
“The Twisha murder actually holds a mirror to the Ketan murder…. The fact that now you actually have TradWife content shows you that this tension has never been resolved and that women are actually now thinking of the other extreme that this is the way to be,” Hebbar said.
Hamid Dabholkar, a psychiatrist at the Parivartan Foundation in Satara, Maharashtra, told this newspaper: “This (Pune murder) is not an isolated incident, and several such crimes by both sexes have been reported in recent years. In the last two decades, on one hand the family system where problems could be discussed has not been there; social media has taken that space.
“On the other hand, market-driven individualism has grown. This promises you that you can achieve whatever you desire without bothering about the means. Such crimes take place in this scenario…. The anger that develops (in the absence of communication within the family) can be projected outwards — which can lead to murder — or inwards, which can lead to suicide.”
He added: “As a society, we focus only on the external (tangible) skills. We need awareness on mental health and life skills like negotiation, (on) how to say ‘No’, (on) problem solving and empathy. I see this crime as having come from a lack of discussion within the families and the people involved.”
Women’s studies stalwart Prem Chowdhry, who has written extensively on gender relations in north India and campaigned against violence on couples who refuse arranged marriages, said: “Youngsters should have the right to choose their own partners.”
She added: “There should be attempts (to resolve such disputes without violence). Seeing the conditions we live in and the atmosphere at homes and even in universities, it is not very encouraging for them (youth who are against having an arranged marriage).”