In rural India, guarantees of equal representation in village councils are easily violated. But some women are resisting their “boss husbands.”
The video that caused a storm was not pretty to look at. A circle of 12 men, dressed in bright garlands, read out solemn proclamations during a ceremony to form a new local government in a deeply rural corner of India.
The scandal was that six of those elected to the post of village head were women. These six were absent, each was represented by her husband.
The video went viral after the March 3 ceremony, and reporters from India's national newspapers flocked to the village of Parashwara in the central state of Chhattisgarh throughout the following week, including International Women's Day.
The public erasure of six female leaders was shocking but hardly surprising. This kind of informal replacement is common in rural India, precisely where minor leadership positions have long been reserved for women.
Since 1992, national rules governing panchayats, or traditional village councils, have promised that a third, and in some cases half, of all seats would be reserved for women. The idea was to raise a generation of female leaders and make the councils more responsive to women’s needs.
However, the spirit of this law is often ignored even when the letter is followed. Women who are supposed to hold seats in the panchayat end up as deputies for their husbands, who wield power alongside the elected men. There is a popular Hindi term, pradhan pati, for this “husband-boss” role.
