Thursday 14 April 2016

India's First 100% Dowry-Free Village in Kerela



9 years ago, 1/3rd of Kerala municipality Nilambur was homeless because they had sold off their homes to pay for their daughters' weddings. 
The Panchayat found that Nilambur had 60 weddings every month, where Rs. 3-4 lakh was spent on dowry. Those who couldn't pay dowry couldn't marry off their daughters. Those who got their daughters married went bankrupt . A lot of families were broken after paying their daughters' dowry so they demanded it while marrying off their sons.

So, "in 2009, we took a pledge to make Nilambur a dowry-free village in a year,” said Shoukath. The heart of this mission were sensitization programmes and workshops that warned Nilambur it was going broke due to dowry. 
The mission had a great response - local men and women joined in large numbers, and took part in public meetings, door-to-door campaigns, street plays and motivation classes.
‘Dump dowry’ association informers gave tip-offs about dowry cases. Expensive marriage were replaced by mass community marriages.
Volunteer K Shabeer Ali explained how this new mindset was formed. “We fashioned it in a way that dowry is the biggest crime in one’s life and it did wonders.” 
Spreading the word - There's also an upcoming matrimonial website that the Panchayat and NGO Mahila Samakhya Society set up (www.dowryfreemarriage.com) with an obvious dowry-free twist. The site will also talk about dowry, marriage customs, gender justice and matrimonial property rights.

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