![]() She encourages participation in yoga and garden activities and other activities like knitting, sewing, help in cooking, etc. Over the past 8 years, she has encouraged other members of the home to become healthy and fit for themselves. The staff and the other women call her ‘Kollu Paati’ – meaning the great grandmother – with love. She even maintains the garden in the old age home. She takes care of a small temple in the home, cleans it, decorates it with beautiful kolams and flowers. She has, since then, been helping other women in the home to grow past their pasts and encourages everyone to live in the moment. But seeing the other women here made me realize that I wasn’t alone,” she said and smiled. They told me they will give me food, and so I agreed to come. She was fed and taken care of in the home and had her morale boosted. When she was at her lowest, both health as well as morale wise, almost 8 years ago, she was found by a counsellor and was taken to an Old Age Home in Thiruvarur. I was not the one to blame others were,” she said with tears in her eyes. Soon she grew tired of everything and became depressed about her life’s struggle. She used to work in people’s houses, washed utensils, helped in cleaning their gardens, helped in their harvests, etc. ![]() She was quite old and could not work much. She gathered up the courage and started walking, without any direction in mind, in search of work and food to survive. “I had never seen so much blood and the very fact that it oozed out of me scared me for good,” she told me. She did not know that she was pregnant at the time, and within a few days, she went through a miscarriage. She spent a few days hiding in a cowshed of her parents’ home as she wasn’t accepted back. She was left homeless in the streets of Kumbakonam without any family or relatives to seek help from. She was married at a tender age of 12 to a man almost 10 years older than her. Lakshmi Naganathan, aged 78, was abandoned by her husband several years ago (not known exactly) for another woman without any legal divorce or compensation. Lakshmi and the other members play Pallanguzhi (a traditional game) The ratio of such marriages is reflected in the fact that 10 percent of the women who are married end up either abandoned or divorced. So, this lack of legal binding encourages husbands to ditch their wives without fear of any legal proceedings. There are many such villages along the eastern coast of Tamil Nadu have limited educational opportunities and here girls are married off before they turn 18, hence their marriage is not registered in court. She struggled and filed an RTI to get details of her own husband’s passport. For instance, when Jananiraman Amma applied for a passport a year back, her application was rejected for the reason that “there was no marriage certificate or a joint affidavit with the spouse”. Abandoned wives find it difficult to even get a passport in India. Members talking and telling stories about Lakshmi and her lifeĭespite not living with her husband for over 20 years Janakiraman Amma says that “If he calls once, I will go with him”.īut her husband never responded. They are desperate to live with their husbands, waiting for one call from him. Most live in extremely dire conditions socially and financially, and at immense risk of exploitation by others. ![]() They cannot remarry and start another family due to the fact that they are not divorced. The marital home does not support them as their son has abandoned her and the natal home ignores her as she is traditionally considered paraya dhan – belonging to someone else. Single women face challenges and constraints both in their marital and natal families. The problem of this scale has its roots in most rural villages as well as in many semi-urban cities of India. However, no concrete steps could be taken to support these destitute women. There are close to two million Hindu women who are abandoned and separated this number is 2.8 lakhs for Muslims, 0.9 lakh for Christians and 0.8 lakh for other religions” (as sourced in The Hindu, dated ). “There are 2.3 million separated and abandoned women in India, the number is huge, approximately two times the number of divorced women as per the last census. Women go to the market after a small catch at the Nagapattinam beach by the sun comes out. ![]()
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