Women and furies in hell

Ratna Raman

W ILLIAM Congreve’s play, The Mourning Bride, gave us a familiar expression: “Hell hath no Fury like a woman scorned.”  ‘Scorned women’ (women rejected by their lovers) are so bad tempered that they apparently outdo  the furies in hell. Hell, both metaphoric and metaphysical, is the official residence of the Furies, also called the Erinyes or Eumenidies. These goddesses of vengeance in Greco-Roman mythology were ugly crones, who attacked their victims with ferocity. 

The furies dwelling in hell were unseemly and violent females. The line from the play announces that scorned women are worse and generates ‘stereotypes’ of women rejected in love as vengeful and vicious.  Stereotypes reinforce widely held beliefs that are oversimplified. It is therefore pertinent to examine the stereotype of the rejected woman in the contemporary context.

Women live in patriarchal societies that have replaced older ‘matriarchial societies’ (oldest female is head) worldwide. 

Conjuring up figures such as the furies has allowed us  to deflect attention from the treatment of women in real life. Many unhappy women, victims of arbitrary rules, live in private hells, here on earth and lead unequal lives. This is because the ‘double standard’ (any rule unfairly applied)  comes into play whenever and wherever women demand equal rights. Such equality is denied  to women by  religion and cultural practice. 

 Recently, responding to a case filed by a group of women, an all-male  Bench ruled that triple talaq was unfair to women and outlawed it. Let us remember, despite widespread jubilation, men can still divorce their wives by talaaq-e-mughallasah (irrevocable divorce), stretching the triple pronouncement of talaq over several months. If a man can divorce a woman over a period of time, instead of immediately, the nature of equality offered to a woman under such circumstances remains tenuous. Instead of instant death of equal rights for women, what has been sanctioned is the slow and gradual snuffing out of women’s rights. Banning talaq-e-biddat and retaining the routine practice of talaq will not really improve ground reality for  Muslim women or enhance gender equality.

Ironically, things are not any better for Hindu women. Although triple talaq does not form part of their cultural practice, women continue to lead unequal lives, wherein it is possible to abandon them, without so much as a ‘by your leave’ (permission). Left destitute and unsupported by husbands for another paramour or a visible public life, Hindu women  suffer in ‘perpetuity’ (endlessly).

Indian women have access to legal rights and there is plenty of paper work to substantiate this. Yet, the long arm of the law extends itself rather timidly when it comes to formulation and implementation. Our laws remain inadequate in envisioning women as equal and free citizens and our legislations reiterate this.

Women continue to be treated as second-class citizens and are constrained to ‘grin and bear’ outrageous  predicaments. Women need laws that will set them free. Lawgivers and enforcers who merely ‘ameliorate’ (make better) unequal conditions continue to make life hell for women. If only the furies could be unleashed to transform this!