Dowry murders in India no longer spark public anger or debate, study finds

A 2007 protest in Allahabad calling for enforcement of a law banning harassment over dowries. Photograph: AP View image in fullscreen A 2007 protest in Allahabad calling for enforcement of a law banning harassment over dowries. Photograph: AP Dowry murders in India no longer spark public anger or debate, study finds Thousands of women are killed in dowry disputes each year, despite the practice being banned in 1961 Dowry deaths in India no longer provoke the public anger they once did, despite thousands of women’s lives still being lost every year, according to new research. The killings – women who are murdered or driven to suicide following dowry disputes between families – have also faded from political debate, despite an increase in cases. In 2022, there were 6,516 dowry deaths in India compared with 1,841 in 1988, according to the paper. Last August, Nikki Bhati , a 28-year-old from Greater Noida, a new satellite town outside Delhi, died from burns after being set alight by her husband in front of their six-year-old son in a case linked to a dowry dispute. As her murder was filmed and shared on social media, there was some outrage online and protests briefly erupted in Delhi before reaction to the case lost momentum. Dr Kriti Kapila, the author of the study, said: “Political protest is problematic globally today. We have strong-handed regimes, including in India, where protest is highly controlled. “Expression of dissent or dissatisfaction is controlled or subject to self-censorship,” said Kapila, a social anthropologist at the King’s India Institute, part of King’s College London. View image in fullscreen A protest in Delhi against dowries in 1999. Grooms’ families still demand the payment in what Dr Kriti Kapila calls a ‘male-child premium’. Photograph: Olaf Krüger/Alamy While dowries have been banned in India since 1961, demands from a bridegroom’s family persist and remain widespread, according to the research, and women who fail to provide them can face abuse, harassment and, in some cases, murder. The study said legal reforms aimed at dismantling caste hierarchies transformed the way dowries operated but failed to eliminate the social structures that sustained them. ‘Evil customs’: why a Kashmiri village abandoned dowries Read more Kapila said that a dowry was historically a ritual offering to compensate the groom’s family for taking on a daughter. After it was outlawed, it mutated into an “extractive demand” where grooms could “command a price” based on caste, class, education and professional status. The dowry became a “premium on the male child”, tied to his economic potential, she said. When the bride’s family could not meet inflating demands, the groom’s family could retaliate by inflicting physical and psychological violence on the bride. “The more urgent question is not why the anti-dowry law hasn’t worked, but why the killing has stopped generating the kind of collective grief that once brought thousands of women on to the stre