Puja Awasthi

Sharmila Joshi

Editors

Subuhi Jiwani

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Hira Ninama and Kalpana Rawal, both
35 years old, are separated by 15 kilometres but united in their desire for a
son. “What good are daughters for their parents?” asks Hira, when I meet her in
Sewna village of Banswara
district. “It is good to have an heir – at least one boy,” says Kalpana,
from Waka village in the same district of Rajasthan.

Over seven years, since 2012, Hira,
who works as an occasional agricultural labourer and homemaker, has given birth
to six girls. Her youngest is only
a couple of months old. “I was not told that my [sixth] baby
was a girl. But when I heard my mother-in-law cry, my tears began to flow. I
cried even harder than my husband,” she says. “Since my second daughter [was
born], I have been going to a babaji.
He recites some chants over a coconut. Then I break it open and have the water.
But he says I am even more cursed than my mother,” she adds with a sigh, the
youngest of five daughters herself.

Hira is from the Bhil Adivasi
community in Sewna, a village
of 1,237 people, and is unlettered. She and other women here who survive multiple births often pay a hefty
price in terms of their health – she looks much older than her 35 years, is weak, has constant body aches, and is battling emotional distress too.

It points to why, in Rajasthan, the decrease
in the maternal mortality ratio (MMR) was only 18.3 per cent,
compared to the country’s overall dip of 22 per cent between 2011-13 and
2014-16, according to data from the <a href="http://www.censusindia.gov.in/vital_statistics/SRS_Bulletins/MMR%20Bulletin-2014-16.pdf">‘Special
Bulletin on Maternal Mortality in India 2014-16’</a> (issued by the Office of Registrar
General in May 2018), That is, for
every 100,000 live births, while an average of 130 women die across India, in
Rajasthan this number is 199. 

The state also ranks poorly on most
parameters of the UNDP’s Gender Empowerment Measure of the ability of women to participate in
economic and political life and their command over economic resources. A <a href="http://www.undp.org/content/dam/india/docs/gendering_human_development_indices_summary_report.pdf">2009 report</a> by the
Ministry of Women and Child Development finds that Rajasthan has had
“consistently low achievement” on the UNDP’s Gender Development Index too, which
measures disparities between men and women in health, education and economic
resources. 

Hira though refuses to accept that
she might not be responsible for determining the sex of her children, says Niranjana
Joshi, the auxiliary nurse and midwife (ANM) at Sewna’s health sub-centre and
Hira’s go-to health resource. She is resigned to the physical and verbal abuse
her husband Khema, an agricultural and construction labourer, heaps on her and
accepts that he ignores their daughters. 

In Hira’s and Kalpana’s home
district of Banswara, where three-fourths of the population is Bhil, there are 980 women for every 1,000 men.
This is much higher than the state’s average of 928 women per 1,000 men (Census 2011), but only
slightly more than half of the district’s population is literate (56.33 per cent), compared to Rajasthan’s
average of 66.11 per cent.
And while close to 7 in 10
women in the state have had some education, in Banswara this number dwindles to
4 in 10.

Over
time, these ingrained views are being challenged by Kalpana and others. Kalpana, who is from the Rawal community (listed as a Scheduled
Caste in Rajasthan),  has studied
till Class 8 and  lives in Waka, a village of 1,397 people in Banswara
district’s Ghalkiya panchayat.
She heads the recently-formed local branch of Tajo Parivar (roughly ‘healthy
family’ in the local Bagadi language), a group of 25 women trying to create
more awareness about maternal health in their communities. Tajo Parivar was set
up in December 2018 as part of the  ‘Apna
Swasthya, Apni Pehel’ (Our Health, Our Initiative) of the Delhi-based research
and training centre PRIA (Participatory Research in Asia). It disseminates
information about maternal health, and works to improve child and adolescent
health and strengthen panchayats. 

Tajo Parivar’s work is informed by
studies which establish that women display ‘poor health-seeking behaviour’ in
communities that accord low priority to their well-being. A March 2018 <a href="https://www.pria.org/resources-apna-swasthya-apni-pehel-reforming-local-health-governance-in-rajasthan-30-572">study</a> by PRIA with 1,808 women in two blocks (Banswara
and Govindgarh) found that almost 7 in 10 women in Banswara had no one to turn
to for counselling on maternal and child health, while one-third of the women had
no money for emergency healthcare. And more than 3 in 5 of the women had no
control over decisions regarding their health and nutrition. 

“Our people
live in scattered habitations. We go from door to door distributing condoms,
calling out for immunisation, speaking about simple methods to prevent
infections, and so on,” says Kalpana, explaining Tajo Parivar’s work. Such
groups are now active in 18 panchayats of Banswara and Govindgarh blocks.
On an average, each group has 20 members, all volunteers.

Kalpana, who is also an ‘MGNREGA
mate’ (appointed by the state government to register people for work under the
scheme), says that women suffer in silence. “They will not even call an
ambulance if it is late in the night. Instead of going to the PHC [which is around three  kilometres away in Ghalkiya],
they trust the jhola
chaap [local uncertified medical
practitioner] who leaves medicines at a provision store in the village,” she
says.

But education and awareness don’t
always spell better health for women. As Kalpana’s own experience illustrates, the
bigger challenge of changing perceptions is multi-layered and difficult.
Married for 20 years, she and her husband Gorakh Nath (also an ‘MGNREGA mate’) are
childless – a status that has led to bitter arguments within Gorakh Nath’s family about
their eligibility for a share in three bighas [1 bigha
is 0.40 acres] of ancestral farmland. 

Both Kalpana and her husband
underwent tests to find out why they weren’t able to have children. The tests
showed there were no physiological issues for Kalpana, though Gorakh Nath’s test
results pointed to a low sperm count.  Yet,
this knowledge has not kept her from thinking that her husband could have
offspring if he gets married again. “Why should I object if my husband were to
re-marry? It will be good to have a successor, at least one boy,” she shrugs. 

Gorakh
Nath thinks otherwise. “I know being childless is not my wife’s fault,” he
says. “I have never thought of re-marrying. I do not care if she insists. Elders
in the community and in my family believe that only women are responsible for
bearing children. But I know that both parties should stay equal [are equally
responsible].”

However, he sees the work of
creating awareness and changing perceptions as primarily the responsibility of
women. “Men hesitate to talk about such issues [like
child birth] to women,” he adds. “It is best that women do the work.”  

Kalpana though knows that only the
community as a whole can turn around such perceptions. “We have to become our
own leaders,’ she says.

‘He says I'm even more cursed than my mother’

‘উনি বললেন আমি নাকি মায়ের চেয়েও বড়ো অভাগী’

‘என் அம்மாவை விட கூடுதலாக நான் சபிக்கப்பட்டிருக்கிறேன் என்கிறார் அவர்’

‘তেওঁ কয় যে মই মোৰ মাতকৈও বেছি অভিশপ্ত’

‘ते म्हणतात मी माझ्या आईपेक्षाही कमनशिबी आहे’

’وہ کہتے ہیں کہ مجھے اپنی ماں سے بھی زیادہ بددعا لگی ہے‘

‘वह कहते हैं कि मुझपे अपनी मां से भी बड़ा श्राप है’

‘ସେ କହନ୍ତି ମୁଁ ମୋ ମା’ଙ୍କ ଠାରୁ ବେଶୀ ଅଭିଶପ୍ତ’

Sewna

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‘He says I'm even more cursed than my mother’

In Banswara district of Rajasthan, a state that ranks low on gender indicators, women endure multiple deliveries due to the social pressure to have a son. But these views are slowly being challenged

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