Importance Of Patriarchy In Indian Society

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Prevalence of Patriarchy is an important characteristic of families in Indian Society. Most of the societies in India are patriarchal except few matrilineal communities in Kerala and Meghalaya. In general patriarchy means rule of the father in a male – dominated family. It is a social and ideological construct which considers men as superior to women. Patriarchy is based on a system of power relations which are hierarchical and unequal and in which men control women’s production, reproduction and sexuality. It enforces masculinity and femininity character stereotypes in the society which further strengthen the unequal power relations between men and women. The whole patriarchal idea is that ‘a woman’s duty is to serve her father, brothers, and husband in her entire life’. Existence of this system is responsible to some extent for the discrimination of women. It is seen that in patriarchal society father is the head of the family. He possesses maximum authority and takes all the decision regarding family including the settling of marriages of other members of the family. If father is not alive then mother or elder brother acts as head of the family and he/she will take all decision regarding the family. In …show more content…

In Indian society daughter is considered to be a burden as her contribution to the family is till her marriage. During marriage the brides’ families have to give certain amount of money or land or other tangible property as dowry to the groom’s family. And the bad thing is that, the property, which was given by the bride’s family to the groom’s family, the bride does not have any right on it even though it was given by her family. Though the system of dowry is prohibited in India, but still it is directly or indirectly prevalent in certain states like Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and

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