Archive for India
May 13, 2008 at 3:20 pm
· Filed under Family, India, Leadership, Youth ·Tagged divorce, India, marriage laws
The Indian government is working on an amendment to dowry laws.
Dowry is an age old social evil in India. Everyday dowry related abuse and deaths go unnoticed in India. Battered women, domestic abuse and violence continues across all socio-economic sections of Indian society. A practise that prevails even in educated, well to do communities including Christians. Gender inequality and expolitative socio-economic forces lies at the heart of this evil practise.
Will a new set of law help reclaim diginity of women in India? Legislation banning dowry was passed in 1961 but is still flouted. According to police records, a woman is killed every 77 minutes due to dowry-related issues. According to a study by the United Nations Population Fund, 60 per cent of married women are victims of physical torture or forced sex by their husbands.
So what we need to law enforcement and more accurately a change in mindset in the Indian society. We got to change how woman are viewed in the society, eliminate social stigma and empower women. We need a new worldview on genders.
But the popular feminist approach to dealing with this issues undermines and distorts our understanding of masculinity. I think that might do more harm than good in the long run. We need to develop a healthy and balanced view on genders.
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April 9, 2008 at 3:08 pm
· Filed under Culture, Family, India, News, Youth, health ·Tagged addiction, smoking, urban India, women
Urban Indian women are leaving a new trail - smoke. Women are catching up fast and narrowing the gap across gender lines in the domain of smoking or chewing tobacco. See a report in India Today. It is based on a World Health Organization’s global survey of tobacco usage.
Here are some disturbing finding:
31% women tobacco addicts in India are between age 15-49.
25% Indian women light up over 10 cigarettes per day.
62% of women smokers die in their prime compared to 38% of those who don’t.
1 in 20 women in India to die between age 30-69 due to tobacco in 2010s.
20% girls in Delhi and Chennai studying in Class 6 smoke (AIIMS study)
87% Hindi movies show onscreen smoking; 26% have a heroine who smokes.
In spite of the labeling that ’smoking is injurious to health’, tobacco companies continue to market new and imprved version to younger generations. Targeting women and young kids is a great marketing strategy, but why we don’t learn the damage it has caused to men and older generations. Why are bent on repeating mistakes all over again. Interesting that now they have a pink cigarette too!
Social stigma is out and new trendy fashion statement is drawing scores of women to this addictive habit. “Me too” attitude among women and want to stand on equal footing with man prevails among modern urban Indian women. Smoking becomes a way of keeping up with men. They will not let gender disparity happen in tobacco consumption as well. How foolish!
Some blame the media for promoting it, while other find government regulation insufficient. Bollywood now portrays many women smokers. Magazines continue to circumvent the advertisement ban on tobacco products. Sporting events continues to carry billboard of cigarette makers. Industry is promoting smoking as a cultural icon of sophistication, glamour and sexual allure and there is a large middle class women falling prey to it.
Check out here for resource to help youth quit smoking: Anti-smoking, Teen health.
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March 7, 2008 at 3:36 pm
· Filed under Bible, Culture, Family, India, Leadership ·Tagged Abortion, feticides, India, Punjab, sex-determination
India is facing a new problem - girl deficit! Economy is booming and so is confidence level among the young generation for their palce in the world. Surplus can be seen in almost all facets, except for girl babies. Another progress paradox. Problem is more acute in North India and even in developed states like Punjab.
UNICEF’s State of the World’s Children report found that India’s already abysmal sex ratio is getting worse, with 80% of its districts recording declining child sex ratios (more male births than female) since 1991. Kerala, Pondicherry and the Lakshadweep islands were notable exceptions.
For those girls who do make it out of the womb, survival isn’t a guarantee, say child rights activists. Many die in their infancy because they are given less food and medical care than their brothers. Those who do survive will generally get less of an education — in both quality and quantity — than the boys in the family. Life isn’t always fair to the fairer sex.
Stricter laws against abortion, feticides, infanticides may be easier to pass, but harder to implement. The abhorrent practice of pre-natal sex determination and the many bogus doctors waiting exploit pregnant women cannot be easily contained. The cultural view of a girl child as burden got to be changed. Gender equality need to upheld. THey are not a liability or an investment without return.
Only a worldview that values and nurtures life in every forms can release us from the bondages of the traditions and form a life-affirming culture. We become so self-absorbed that we stake our future with our own. A soceity or nation that does not defend its most vulnerable is destined for doom.
Bible says, “God created human beings in his own image. God created them male and female” (Gen 1:27). After creating woman, God was very pleased and said “very good.” We are created beings and we bear a divine image. God values, affirms us and loves us dearly. That’s why God send Jesus to die in our place.
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March 4, 2008 at 4:18 pm
· Filed under Culture, India ·Tagged cellular phone, internet, mobile, online devices
The number of mobile devices worldwide has surpassed 3.3 billion–roughly half of the world’s population. In Japan and several other countries, more people access the Web through mobile devices than fixed PCs.
Several countries, including the United Kingdom, now have more mobile phones than people. There are over 500 million active mobile phone accounts in China, as compared to 275 million in India by the end of 2007. Luxembourg has the highest mobile phone penetration rate in the world, at 164% in December 2001. In Hong Kong the penetration rate reached 139.8% of the population in July 2007.
The total number of mobile phone subscribers in the world was estimated at 2.14 billion in 2005. The subscriber count reached 2.7 billion by the end of 2006 according to Informa, and 3.3 billion by November 2007, thus reaching an equivalent of over half the planet’s population.
What are its implications? Does your website content support mobile devices? Recently I tried browsing the Coconut Generation site over an iphone and realized that the flash based main page is not accessible easily, browsing is not easy. Watch out for the next version. Prepare exclusively mobile device strategy for dissemination of information, newsletter, soliciting donations, customer service, networking etc.
Are you ready for the new world?
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February 26, 2008 at 4:12 pm
· Filed under Events, Family, India, Leadership, News, Youth, church ·Tagged faith affliation, religion, USA
A new study is out on changing religious affliation in USA. It’s from Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. It says that - U.S. Roman Catholics and Protestants are leaving the churches of their childhood and either choosing other faiths or no religion at all. Read the report in Chicago Tribune, TIME, and New York Times. See also the article in Christianity Today.
According to the findings, 28 percent, of American adults said they have left the faith in which they were raised. About 16 percent of Americans say they are not members of any religious group, making the “unaffiliated” group the fourth largest religious tradition in the United States. The Catholic Church has lost more members than any other religious group.
Hinduism exhibits the highest overall retention rate with 84 percent of adults who were raised as Hindus saying they were still Hindu. Ninety percent of Hindus marry within their own faith, and eight-in-ten Hindus who were raised Hindu remain so as adults. Eight in 10 Hindus are foreign-born may help explain the high retention rates. Buddhists struggle hardest to pass the faith from one generation to the next.
Other interesting findings - Mormons and Muslims are the groups with the largest families; more than one in five Mormon adults and 15 percent of Muslim adults in the U.S. have three or more children living at home. Black Americans are the most likely to report a formal religious affiliation.
There has been lots of talk of church drop outs lately. This study continues to proves some rumbling in the ground. Mega chruch and many immigrant church leaders are taking note. Denominational head are reevaluating their church planting strategy and approaches toward the new generations. It is so scary and exciting to live in such changing times!
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February 5, 2008 at 4:57 am
· Filed under Culture, Family, India, News ·Tagged divorce, marriage, mumbai, value
Three different friends of mine send me this report from TOI. It says that 2 out of 5 marriage are officially breaking up in Mumbai. No one know how many unofficial divorces takes place… those who sever the relationship and decided to separate without legal hassles.
Sociologists have blamed it on the hyper-urban lifestyle. Often as a result of time-starved relationships. 8-10 hour work days plus 2-3 hrs of commute, leaves couples with very little quality time at their disposal in nurturing the marraige. Other blame on extra marital relationships and some even on the influence of Bollywood culture in Mumbai. Whatever be the case, Mumbai is not financial and film industry capital, but continue to be trendsetter in new sociological upheavals.
Family is the most fundamental unit of the society. When families breakdown, there is weakening in the fabric of the society. It sure is indication of dilution of values and place of morality in the society. When a society grows weaker, soon it begins to show in the national character. Rise and fall of nations can not be seen only in economic or military powers, but need to be seen inner moral courage of its people.
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January 28, 2008 at 5:01 pm
· Filed under Family, India, News, Resources
Bangalore may be the nerve center of technology companies in India. But did you know some 4500 children went missing in Bangalore last year! I was shocked at this report in Times of India.
Sadly police does not even take any complaints and there is no support system for heartbroken parents. Some of them runaway from home, some are drawn by their “dreams” to a job/breakthro into movie industry/gang leader. But many of them end up in living on street, some in forced prostitution or some are trafficked out of the country. All of them drop of school and cut off from their parents. Often they are nipped at the bud, never get to bloom.
How can a society that does not care for the little one excel? Who will speak up for the voiceless? Exploitation and injustice of any kind require our thoughtful and intentional response. Speak up, don’t think your voice will drown in the noises of the world. As I was researching on missing children in India, I came across a National Center of Missing Kids in India, which reported some 1 million kids went missing last year in India.
Families, churches and NGOs need to focus on reaching these missing kids. Jesus goes searching for the lost, so we must too. Remember the parable of lost sheep? The joy of finding a lost kid will be ours and who know what he or she is going to grow up to be. Our compassion will help future generations, not to mention impact of caring for such kids will have on our own kids!
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January 22, 2008 at 3:52 pm
· Filed under Culture, Family, India, News ·Tagged court ruling, divorce, marriage, sex
A new court ruling in India - married couple who have aversion towards sex is enough grounds for dissolving their marriage. After 13 years of marriage, the couple got divorced citing wive’s denial of sex. Read entire report on TOI and CNN-IBN.
Is absence of normal sexual relations sufficient reason for dissolving a marriage? What is normal, anyway? What if the husband was sexually abusive toward his wife? What if he is a sexual addict? Or what if there is plenty of sex, but no relationship between the husband and wife?
According to the High Court judge in this case, the denial of sex by the wife lead to mental cruelity and which was enough ground for divorce. Should there be any reason for marital annulments? If any one of the parties in the marriage do not want to continue the relationship, should they be given divorce? Or should they be forced to stay in the marriage superficially? Is this leading to no-fault divorce?
No-fault divorce has only created a culture of divorce and marital instability in the western world. Newly married couples keeps the back door open and exihibit higher inclination towards calling if off without any societal pressures. Marriage is more than sex. Marriage is make us holy, not simply to make us happy.
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January 14, 2008 at 9:17 pm
· Filed under Culture, Family, India, News ·Tagged Family, surrogate motherhood, outsource, womb, infertile American couple
The latest trend in outsourcing, not call center, software development or research; not computer industry or animation or engineering. But it is pregnancy! Increasingly childless American women are looking to Indian woman for their wombs. Of course, at a price. A win-win for all they say, American woman get a baby without hassles of pregnancy and at a fraction of cost. Womb donors makes more than what they would have made in their entire adult life, all within 10 months.
Read the story in New York Times, MSNBC, and Marie Claire. This is also prevalent in UK - Daily Mail. Also check out Chuck Colson’s comments.
Can this be seen as miracle of modern medicine or exploitation of poor woman of India? It is much like controversy surrounding organ donations or right to sell one’s body (prostitution). The experience of American infertile woman or the surrogate mothers in India is not easy or explainable. But everything cannot be reduced simply to economics and global free trade. Ethics and morality does matter for the world order. Diginity of commoner is worth fighting for.
This is the height of medical tourism - by the way it is a booming industry in India recently where they attract Western patients for superspeciality medical services like heart surgery and organ transplants. Now they have extended the idea to “renting” woman’s wombs. The surrogacy is estimated now to be a $445-million-a-year business in India.
Will such developments a result of legal hurdles of surrogacy within US or high cost of the procedure? Why are they forced to look outside? Why not these infertile couples go for adoption? Or what does it take to remain as a childless couple and invest your life and resources for other’s kids or even other parts of the world.
What happens when the child has birth defect or any abnormality? Will the American couple still own such babies? Why do we want pefect babies? Is this a step toward designer babies? Is anything wrong with “baby farms” or assembly line in baby making - industrial effienecy coming to pregnancies?
See photos here.
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December 7, 2007 at 4:14 pm
· Filed under Family, India, News, Youth ·Tagged child labor, Delhi, exploitation kids, Gap, India, lost children, street children
There are reportedly 12 million child laborers in India who sweat it out everyday in shops and factories for meagre salary or paying up for their parent’s debt. I can’t imagine in the early 21st century with pervasive media and so much talk about human rights (not to mention the economic boom in India) we still have millions of young ones who are forced into bonded labor.
Many of Delhi’s lost children work in Shahpurjaat. In a recent raid by polic, fourteen children were rescued from the building making clothes for international retailer, the Gap. They work for more than 12 hours a day makinig clothes for other children! In Sivakasi, children are used to make Diwali fireworks and with construction boom in cities, we find little ones in stone quarries and carrying heavy loads on their heads under burning sun. What a modern predicament of modern India?
In 1996, the Supreme Court issued guidelines for how to deal with child labour. The suggestions included providing employment to an older member of a family whose child earns a living. However, all the government has right now to tackle child labour, is an official penalty of a maximum of two years in prison, and the conviction rate is negligible. Read about unseesn and unheard lost children of Delhi.
Few years ago, I met with an NGO based in Mumbai, that rescued many street children and are raising them. Many of them show scars from growing in broken homes and living on the streets. Now they are back in school and some safe place to call home. They do not have to beg or be exploited by gangs. I was really moved when a little girl called out to the caregivers as Papa and Mummy. She went on to describe her life in the new home and what difference it has made. Wow!!
Who will care for the millions out there? What do children and youth ministry response to this growing crisis?
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