Vrindavan widows come to Delhi with hopes from Modi govt

NEW DELHI: A hundred widows from Vrindavan and Varanasi were provided a platform by NGO Sulabh International to give voice to the many inequities and injustices suffered by them on International Widows’ Day.
The women, who gathered in the capital, appealed to the Narendra Modi government to introduce and pass a bill to protect their rights drafted by Bindeshwar Pathak, Sulabh founder, in the Budget Session of Parliament next month.
“We will approach Modiji and our MP from Mathura, Hema Malini, for measures to ensure welfare of widows who are living in Vrindavan and Varanasi,” Radha Dasi (84), who is originally from West Bengal, said.
Vrindavan is home to thousands of old widows from West Bengal and their condition used to be pitiable until the Supreme Court intervened and NGOs took up the challenge to ameliorate their plight.

NGOs take care of all needs of widows living in six government-run ashrams.
To highlight inequities and atrocities suffered by many women once they lose their husbands, United Nations officially recognized International Widows’ Day at a New York conference in 2011. “No woman should lose her rights when she loses her husband,” UN secretary general Ban Ki-Moon said.
Some 40 million of the world’s widows live in India and life for many of these women is hard and fraught with struggle. Often with no social security, they are made to feel worthless, undesirable and a burden by their in-laws.
While 8% women in India are widows, only 2.5% men are widowers as men usually remarry. “Widows, sometimes teenagers, are mostly not allowed to remarry. Some mothers have even been cast out by their children and forced to live on streets,” said Pathak, who felt the Bill must be passed at the earliest, said.