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Uproar Over Rajput 'Sati': Wife Emolates Herself On Husband's Funeral Pyre
A pretty, young bride of eight months, Roop Kanwar gained universal fame September 4th at Rajasthan's Deorala Village in northwest India. She became a sati - burning herself to death on her husband's funeral pyre. The reaction in India was an unresolved mixture of shock, admiration, outrage, reverence and embarrassment over the young girl's action. Local police failed to stop the sati. The Indian press called the act "a pagan sacrifice" and "a barbaric incident which blackened India's image in the world." Women's groups demonstrated against the sati all across India, prompting belated government action against Roop's relatives. Yet private opinions, even of prominent politicians, were ambivalent.
Roop's people, the martial Rajputs (who have inspired fear in every invader of India from the Muslims to the British), claim sati as their custom and religious right-the free choice of the widow. Groups of Rajput women marched last month in favor of sati and burned copies of the anti-sati ordinance. The situation remains a stand-off, the Rajputs proceeding with plans to build a temple on the site (they have collected over $230,000), despite a government ban and demanding that those arrested be freed.
Many newspaper reports say the widow was forced into the deed; in a word, murdered. According to all available first-hand reports, however, it was Roop Kanwar's personal decision to commit this form of ritual suicide. "Roop did not weep [upon seeing her husband's body], but she kept saying, 'I will not let you go alone, I am also coming,'" recalled eyewitness and neighbor, Meenakshi Khandelwal. When Roop's relatives tried to talk her out of it, she threatened...