As their husbands” fathers” and brothers migrate to cities in search of work” women across India have become the backbone of the country’s agricultural sector. Nearly 80% of all rural women in India labor in the fields.
A study released Sunday by United Nations Women India and Landesa” a U.S.-headquartered nonprofit working to improve land rights for women and men” found that despite their time spent working in orchards” cotton fields” and rice paddies” and changes to inheritance laws” women rarely inherit the land that has sustained them and that they have sustained.
In 2005″ the government of India amended its inheritance laws to ensure daughters enjoyed equal rights to inherit their parent’s land and property. But the law seems to be having little impact.
The survey of more than 1″400 women and 360 men in agricultural districts with large numbers of women farmers in three Indian states” Andhra Pradesh” Bihar” and Madhya Pradesh” found that just one in eight women whose parents own agricultural land inherit any of it.
This has significance far beyond intra-family squabbles over divvying up the family fortune. It is fundamental to India’s rural development and progress on a host of development indicators.
Simply” if women farm the land but don’t own it” they are little more than migrant laborers tilling fields owned by others. Without legal control over the land” or any documentation that they have rights to the ground they farm” they can’t access institutional credit” such as bank loans. Nor can they take advantage of agricultural extension programs” such as government offers of subsidized seeds and fertilizers. All of this stymies agricultural development.
It also limits agricultural production. This doesn’t just mean women have fewer tools for climbing out of poverty” it can also mean that their children are stuck there too: Researchers have found that women simply direct more of their income than men towards their children’s education and nutrition” which in turn lowers child mortality and helps reduce diseases of poverty.
The 2005″ Hindu Succession Amendment Act giving sons and daughters equal rights to inheriting family land and property was heralded as an important step forward for India’s women.
The study published Sunday” is the first substantial evaluation of the impact of that amendment and indicates that many women have yet to benefit from the legal changes.
But it also found signs of progress. In Andhra Pradesh” where women gained equal inheritance rights more than 20 years ago thanks to a progressive state law” rates of land inheritance among women were significantly higher than the other two states surveyed.
Thirty-four percent of women in the Andhra Pradesh sample had either inherited parental land or expected to do so” compared to 8% in Bihar and 7% in Madhya Pradesh.
Deep cultural biases” the study found” often prevent women from asserting their right to inherit. In fact” a majority of the women interviewed said they did not want to inherit land from their parents.
Why? The simple answer is: tradition. In India tradition dictates that sons inherit family property. To ask for her share” many women fear” would cause conflict within the family. That fear is well founded given that about half of men surveyed considered it wrong for women to inherit their parents’ land.
Many local officials are equally opposed to daughter’s inheritance of family property.
Women need to know their rights. Families” communities” and authorities need to be aware of and support those rights” and women need to be able to exercise their rights without alienating their family members or becoming pariah.
There are a host of models India can draw on to help address this issue including legal aid programs” improved training for local government officials” and a promising new pilot project from Landesa that is helping some of the country’s poorest girls understand their rights to inherit land and use the land to stay in school and break the cycle of extreme poverty.
This would help the women of India inherit property rather than poverty.
Ashok Sircar is India program director for Landesa. Diana Fletschner is the senior director of research” monitoring” and evaluation for Landesa.
Original Article – The Right to Inherit Isn’t Working for Indian Women” Says U.N. Study