Bride burning

Dowry deaths, bride burnings,

You expect shock waves

To chill the city’s nerves;

In-laws of either sex conspire,

Groom an helpless spectator

Or an active participator

In the operation immolation

He witnesses his pretty wife

Engulfed in burning fire,

Whom, in the chill of nights, he

Had enveloped in his burning desire.

The guardians of law,

Are they still asleep?

No witness volunteers to testify,

Police are over-zealous to admit

Their helplessness in public

Sigh with relief in private:

Worsening law and order situation

Is restored in one family at least.

Ancestors had suffocated to death

Before offering lambs to fire

To preserve posh flats in heaven

For an hypothetical life after death.

To-day’s Indian is no fool;

He is enlightened and civilized,

Despite default of her parents

He is considerate to his bride:

She will be anointed with natural oil;

Allowed to breathe freely

Unto her last in bed of fire.

Public are not stupid stuff;

They can’t be fooled thus.

Justice frowns in black gowns,

Un-protesting Ladies’ Clubs turn restive,

Social organisatiosn become vocal.

Farmers from nearby countrysides

In turbans and soiled clothes

Visit city’s manidis as usual.

Their sun burnt skinny faces

Are as expressionless as ever.

And the Jamuna flows quietly,

The epic of Ramayana,

The exploits of Sri Rama

Both his glories and follies

Are eulogized and reversed alike;

They are ingrained in our mentality

Not for any fortune of father-in-law

But might be because of jealousy

(The reason is any-body’s guess)

Rama had commanded Sita

To walk into blazing fire,

None of assembled VIPs protested;

No movement of women’s lib

Had then to break his rib.

(Image: Painting depicting Sīta undergoing the ordeal by fire watched by Rāma, Lakṣmaṇa and Hanuman (British Museum). Source: Wikimedia)