Increase in dowry payments among Sikhs and Christians: World Bank Blog

The study is based on data from the 2006 Rural Economic and Demographic Survey (REDS) on roughly 40,000 marriages that took place during 1960-2008 covering 17 major states that contain about 96% of India’s population.

Hyderabad: Ayesha Makrani from Gujarat and Vismaya from Kerala were as different from each other as two strangers can be. They lived in two different states, spoke different languages and grew up in different communities with different customs and traditions. And yet they shared the same fate. Both young women ended their lives by committing suicide, and as fate would have it, the reason behind their death was the same as well - dowry.

Dowry has long been considered a social evil, declared illegal in 1961 and yet is prevalent in many parts of the country. The custom of dowry is present in every section of the populace in India, be it the Hindus, Muslims, Christians or the Sikhs. However, a new study has shown a significant increase in dowry among Christians and Sikhs.

According to the analysis published on the World bank's blogsite, while the average net dowry in Hindus and Muslims has remained the same throughout the study period, Christians and Sikhs have shown a striking increase in dowry over the same period, leading to higher average dowries than Hindus and Muslims.

The study is based on data from the 2006 Rural Economic and Demographic Survey (REDS) on roughly 40,000 marriages that took place during 1960-2008 covering 17 major states that contain about 96% of India’s population.

"Dowry is positively correlated with higher caste status and the caste hierarchy of dowry payments has not changed over time. Upper caste marriages have the highest dowries, followed by Other Backward Classes (OBCs), Scheduled Castes (SCs), and Scheduled Tribes (STs)," the findings showed.

The analysis has also shown differences in dowry across states. The report has shown an inflation in dowry in Kerala since the 1970s, with the highest average dowry in recent years. Other states with inflationary trends are Haryana, Punjab, and Gujarat.

"Similarly, the inflationary trend in Punjab—a majority Sikh state—is also consistent with the rise in Sikh dowries. On the other hand, average dowry decreased in Odisha, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Maharashtra," the report said.