Short Essay on Command over Property

Bina Agarwal, a champion of feminist movement, begins her article on gender problems pertaining to right to land with the following quotation, which is actually the comment made by an informant in the field:

We want land, all the rest is humbug. Please go and ask the Sarkar (government) why, when it distributes land, we don’t get a title. Are we not peasants? If my husband throws me out what is my security?

The statement made by the landless women in South India raises a basic question: Why do tribal women not have right over land? Agar­wal has traced the history of the problems arising out of gender relations in matrilineal and bilateral tribal communities.

She says that in some of the South Asian communities, such as Garos, Khasis and Lalvngs (in North-East India) and Nayars, Tiyyars and Mappilas (in South India), women enjoy significant rights over land.

The land rights that women enjoyed in matrilineal and bilateral communities fell broadly into three categories: First, among Garos, land was a clan’s communal property and could not be inherited either by indi­viduals or by joint family units.

All clan members resident in the village had rights in this land as individuals. Second, among Khasis, Nayars, Tiyyars and Moppilas, land is inherited in the female line, and is held as joint family property and women had no individual rights of alienation.

Responsibility for land management was vested principally with older men, usually brothers or maternal uncles. Third, in Sri Lanka, both men and women had individual inheritance rights in land.

If the three categories of land rights enjoyed by women are ana­lyzed, we observe that “the picture of gender relations among these groups is a mixed one. On the positive side women enjoyed consider­able social independence and relative equality in marital relations.

Indeed, in all the groups, a daughter’s rights over land and the fact that she either remained in her natal home after marriage or had inviolable rights to return to it if she so chose provided her with a strong fall­back position within marriage.

Women could choose their husband and initiate divorce.” It could also be said that women in these socie­ties had considerable freedom of movement and of public interaction.

But, on the negative side, women’s property rights in the matrilineal and bilateral communities did not alter the overall gender division of labour: domestic work and child care were still a woman’s responsibilities.

The range of sexual mores found among these com­munities indicates that rights in land did not guarantee women the same sexual freedom as men. Formal managerial authority over land in a number of matrilineal communities lay with men.

Thus, though rights over land gave certain benefits to women, but their virtual ex­clusion from property management circumscribed the power they could derive from those rights. The women, therefore, in matrilineal tribes today struggle to get property in land.

In the patrilineal society of tribals women’s right in land is alto­gether denied. The status of tribal women in this regard is on par with that of the caste Hindu women. In North India some movements are reported wherein women demand their right over land.

Commenting on the movement in tribal society, Bina Agarwal observes: today, for women, to gain effective rights in land will require not only removing existing gender inequalities in the law, but also ensur­ing that the laws are implemented. It will involve strengthening women’s ability to claim and retain their rights in land, as well as their ability to exercise effective control over it.

However, in a matrilineal society such as that of Khasi, there is no gender discrimination. The law of inheritance is very simple. Ances­tral property is passed from the mother to the daughter, specially the youngest one. In this society men have no inheritance right. The Khasi family assigns a central place to women.

However, for protec­tion, the mother’s brother is considered very important. Despite the dominance of women in Khasi society man is considered to be quite powerful because of his ‘physical strength’ and the so-called ‘twelve strength’ as the saying goes among Khasis. Man has power and he is taken to be the protector and provider.

There is one disability of women which is very striking. Tilput Nongbri, who has written authoritatively on Khasi society, informs us: “Although there are no formal laws which prevent Khasi women from holding public office, they are not allowed to attend traditional village and ‘state’ durbars (customary administrative and judicial councils).

A woman who dares to voice her opinion on public affairs is regarded as a ‘hen that crows’-a freak of nature. Men jealously guard their political preroga­tives by defining politics as an arena for mature and physically fit persons.”

Nongbri further informs that the youngest daughter’s posi­tion in the religious domain is similar to her position in the economic domain. Women are regarded as the trustees of family rights and tradi­tions as well.

The Khasis say: “The woman holds the religion. It is women who have to ensure that family rights are organized in their due course. But they have to seek the assistance of their male kin to ac­tually perform the rituals. Priesthood is a male vocation among the Khasis.”

In the matrilineal society there is not much gender discrimina­tion. But, in practice, it is the man who does most of the things. He is the manager of property. He provides protection.

But, there is a fear among the women that with the Khasi conversion to Christianity, the matrilineal system is gradually getting weak. Yet another force which weakens the system is modernization.