Women in India, Tell Us How You Voted in This Election and Why

The BJP mandate speaks in support of what the BJP has done for women's rights and welfare. Among these is the revocation of easy divorces by Muslim's aka Triple Talaq that was declared illegal, the installation of toilets meant to recognize the need for basic sanitation and protection of women from having the 'go' in public and risk being raped, the call for save the girl child and encouraging bank accounts for women. A land that had been degraded by a corrupt, family run political party for 50+ years has finally woken up to the need for corruption-free, strong leadership with a national focus and commitment. This fact disappoints many western wannabes of Indian origin who lack a fundamental understanding of Indian history, values, needs and aspirations.

thank you for the article. it looks like Indian women are more advanced than American women because they know their issues and voice them out in large numbers. In American democracy, women voters are more than men voters but even 30% do not show up for voting. would you identify similar 7 issues for american voters in different states so that they show up for voting in large numbers? It is very important to defeat Mr. Trump and bring back the real democracy not autocracy.

Though situation is changing rapidly, it’s unfortunately true that an average Indian, even educated ones, have negative attitude towards girl children education. Right from the beginning, parents do not consider girls as earning members of their family, as after marriage they have to leave their parents’ home. So their education is just considered as a waste of money and time. An uneducated woman is not only suffers but the entire family has to bear the consequences. They face more hardships in life than literate ones and suffer from malnutrition and related health issues. A survey found that infant mortality is inversely related to mother’s educational level. Not only women but their kids also go through the same conditions. She, who does not know the importance of education in life, does not emphasize the same for her kids. This hampers the family as well as the nation’s progress as a whole. Lack of education means lack of awareness. Illiterate women are not aware of their rights. They know nothing about initiatives taken by the government for their welfare. Illiterate women keep on struggling hard and bear harshness of life and family.

While I appreciate the fact that you have invited women in India to comment here, I find it a bit strange because how many women from India are subscribers to the NYT? And even if they are, they would be women from the big cities who think/read/write in English. So, who exactly is this piece addressed to? I don't know about the rest of the country, but in Mumbai there's been a groundswell of support for the BJP because it represents -- exactly what the world saw in Game of Thrones S8E6 yesterday -- a move away from a dysfunctional dynastic rule and entitlement politics. The fact that Narendra Modi is unencumbered and has no heirs to inherit a legacy is working in his favor (worked for Bran Stark, didn’t it?). Rahul Gandhi may be similarly unencumbered, but he carries that legacy of dynasty that the young people in India find distasteful, dispiriting almost. People have grown tired of the elitism, hypocrisy, minority appeasement, and poverty-related planks of his party. The current Modi+Amit Shah combination is pretty astute. They understand that something has to be done for each stratum of society, a very basic understanding that eluded the Congress. I agree with Ms. Dwivedi in that there is hope. MOdi+Shah knows that while the world may want to harp on 'religious divide' and "hindu nationalism', our electorate has moved on from welfare to aspiration. It is this aspirational society they are reaching out to; anything else is just a smokescreen.

This is definetly a great article, because nytimes you let Indians speak for themselves! Compare this to the other articles comparing Modi to Trump, those were very unrealistic and showed sloppy journalism.

Terrific piece .... very resonant as I was recently in India...Would appreciate Jeffrey Gettleman's POV on the new Indian movie Photograph by Ritesh Batra which seemingly romanticises rural vs. urban women issues + glosses over male sexual threats.

India is a very complex society. No matter how much is done there is less.It has gone through 1000 yrs of foreign rule at least on the northern parts and may be 400 yrs in the southern part. The foreign rulers tried to impose their day to day rituals and methods of operation on the local people.Finally the curse is over now since 60 or so years and I believe it will take another 50 to 100 years before the maturity of the originals to come back.Until then I would not count any comments useful from the people as most people you talk about have no solid background to compare with anything reasonable and do not even have education level to say something.Education of all the people is the key and fundamental to really practice the concept of democracy.Otherwise the concept has no meaning.

A diverse view of India’s women voters. However, how does the NYT expects Indian women to share their views here if they are not subscribers?

Nearing 80 I am convinced that unless Indians get out of the stifling superstitious beliefs, nothing will change. Superstition has deadly stranglehold irrespective of the religion in India.. It’s very common story to hear of God men cheating people on some astounding pretext taking advantage just by smooth talk. Just a day back I was hearing a story of a literate man from cosmopolitan city talking of how an astrologer told his son is a manglik. A person born under the influence of Mars (Mangala) as per Hindu astrology is said to have "mangala dosha" ("mars defect"); such a person is called a Mangalik (or Manglik). According to the superstition, the marriage between a Manglik and a non-Manglikis is disastrous. It turns out that Indians pay special attention to astrological compatibility. If one is born “manglik,” or Mars-bearing, he/she is considered to be cursed and cause an early death to spouse. According to an old Hindu custom, the only way to break curse is to marry a peepal or banana tree! Yes, a tree!!! The tree is then destroyed, and the curse is broken. , astrologer makes a colossal amount of money. I am of course most concerned about total lack of scientific temper of Indian and my support any political party swearing by encouraging scientific temper. I don’t think I will ever succeed in locating such a political party.

Much as the present government would like us to believe that there have been no instances of corruption the problem lies in the definition itself. The meaning of corruption has been restricted to scams. But the truth is quite different. The corruption of ideology, muzzling of media, blatant displays of divisive politics, lack of data regarding key issues such as employment, the utter disregard of farmers, diverting focus from what really matters (example education) to issues of national security etc apparently aren't corruption according to the narrative being set. I don't know what we'll get after these elections but I hope whoever comes to power realises the nature of the basic ethos of our nation and stops this corruption from spreading.

In this year's election, it truly will be women that will decide the fate of the government. While backward attitudes towards women still are prevalent, there is more openness to discussing issues that are important to women and it is a welcome change. Both BJP and Congess, the main antagonists in this election have very patriarchal attitudes still, but are starting to adjust their electoral pitches towards women, who have registered higher participation rates in recent elections. Hopefully, whoever the electorate chooses (BJP or Congress), the voters give an actual decisive mandate rather than a fractured and splintered mandate, which makes for a weak, indecisive and corrupt government by regional parties.