Western Media’s Biased Portrayal of Women’s Issues in India

• Western media coverage of women’s issues in India informed by a simplistic binary of traditional vs progressive.
• Extensive use of first-person accounts and the human-interest story format perpetuates a biased narrative insinuating that Indian society is inherently patriarchal.
• Western media specifically targets Hindu festivals and frames these as “patriarchal” and “anti-women”.
• Western media’s hypocrisy can be seen in the wide contrast between its framing of Hindu women’s issues and Muslim women’s issues in India.
• Feminist rhetoric used as a political tool in the context of coverage of Indian women’s issues.
• Western media’s exaggerated focus on covering sexual crimes against women in India smacks of an agenda.

 As a woman journalist working for an international news channel a few years back, I was often advised that I would do well if I focused on covering women’s issues in India. Now that I work independently, I still get doled out similar advice! Human interest stories on women in “third world countries” are, for some reason, considered a big catch in international media. A cursory look at the “News and Stories” section of the UN Women website gives a peep into how the system functions – most stories uploaded recently create the impression that only women in “certain countries” have to put up with issues like sexual abuse, domestic violence, gender discrimination, lack of education, unequal opportunities at work, etc. [1]

Western media’s coverage of women’s issues in the “global south” has for long been characterized by feel-good stories of good Samaritan Western NGOs “empowering” local women and getting them out of the shackles of oppressive and patriarchal cultures. Also, one gets to see a broad range of human-interest stories, which are often sensationalized and exaggerated versions of women’s lived realities in certain countries; the editorial slant gives a biased and one-sided perspective to these testimonies and creates the perception that there is something intrinsic about these nations that is “anti-women.”

The Western media exoticizes and sensationalizes the range of experiences of Indian women forced to fit into a certain narrative that pits “patriarchal” India against the “progressive” West.

Covering women’s issues in India sounds noble in theory, but it’s somewhat problematic in practice – the coverage often gets deeply rooted in Western stereotypes of Indian women, society, culture, etc. The Western media exoticizes and sensationalizes the range of experiences of Indian women forced to fit into a certain narrative that pits “patriarchal” India against the “progressive” West. In most of these stories, it’s only when Indian women challenge their “patriarchal backgrounds” and embrace the Western “progressive” lifestyle, they are portrayed as “coming of age.”

For example, a story published in Vogue India in March 2024 turns women of rural India into an object of gaze by running the reader through travel portraits of women across Indian villages by an Indian woman photographer. “Asthana is instinctively drawn to stories of sisterhood, of women who are typically unseen or invisible, of women who are breaking the shackles of setbacks, stereotypes, and systems,” says the story blurb.[2] The write-up claims to offer “authentic “portraits of these women by showcasing these photographs, but ironically enough, all it does is stereotype and appropriate their lives for a “Western” or English-speaking “audience, and in the process turns them into something to be showcased in a museum. How many such “authentic portraits” have you seen of “Western women” battling patriarchy, misogyny, etc. Probably none. It cannot be a coincidence that it’s almost exclusively the women of “global south” that become the subjects of such human-interest stories.

The following sections will endeavor to expose Western media’s biased framing of a range of issues related to Indian women. Each section will explore the media’s coverage of a specific issue and reveal the inherent biases. It’s important to note that even though we are focusing on the Western media’s coverage of women’s issues in India, it’s not just the Western media per se but the whole media, academia, and think tank ecosystem that sets the paradigm for certain kinds of framing of Indian women’s issues. The Indian media, as well, especially the mainstream English media, mostly tiptoes the Western media’s line in coverage of women’s issues.

Biased and obsessive framing of Indian society as patriarchal

 Patriarchy exists all over the world. It’s a problem the whole of humanity, irrespective of their geographical location or cultural coordinates, grapples with. Yet, the Western media seems obsessed with portraying India as the “original land of patriarchy.”

It routinely frames women’s issues in India from the perspective of “local women challenging patriarchy.” Most coverage creates the impression that Indian culture is implicitly patriarchal. Even matters signifying legitimate progress in women’s rights in India are subverted to hard-sell the narrative that traditional Indian culture is essentially anti-women.

“My grandmother is challenging patriarchal land rights in India – I’m so proud of her,” “India is the most dangerous country for women, it must face reality,” “I was supposed to grow up to be a ‘good Indian woman.’ I chose freedom instead”. “ ‘I am here, get used to me’: in India, a woman out running is about more than just exercise,” “He lives freely, I live in fear: the plight of India’s abandoned wives, ” and “why is India so bad for women?”, read the headlines of a few articles published by The Guardian over the past 15 years, covering women’s issues in India.

The sensational headlines bias and repulse the reader against Indian society and culture at the outset, even if the subject matter is somewhat different. Most headlines perpetuate dangerous stereotypes about India, creating the impression that something inherently evil about the country is responsible for the plight of its women.

Most headlines perpetuate dangerous stereotypes about India, creating the impression that something inherently evil about the country is responsible for the plight of its women.

The article “India is the most dangerous country for women, it must face reality” [3] talks about a Thomson Reuters Foundation Survey calling India the most dangerous country for women in the world. Another story titled “I was supposed to grow up to be a ‘good Indian woman,’ I chose freedom instead” [4] is a first-person account of an Indian woman “denouncing patriarchy” and supposedly getting out of the clutches of India’s arranged marriage system to find her voice and space.

“I was told to listen to my parents, find a husband, and ignore my own needs. But I decided to take my own path”, reads the blurb. The whole article is a sensational, over-the-top exaggerated sob story of a woman “giving up on being a good Indian woman,” landing a job in Bangalore, and becoming independent (the point being, according to the article, that being a good Indian woman and being independent are mutually exclusive). The author of the article happens to be a “South Asian feminist activist.”

“In India, a Small Band of Women Risk it All for a Chance to Work,”[5] “In Hinduism, Respect the Sacred, Ignore the Sexism” [6], “No Visitors, No Drinking, Home by 9: Renting as a Single Woman in India,” [7] are some of The New York Times headlines over the past couple of years.

The New York Times has also been running a series called “India’s Daughters.”[8] Each chapter of the series dramatizes the life story of an Indian woman, making her the “poster girl” of Indian patriarchy. This is journalism at its sensational worst, yet such “esteemed” media publications continue to invade the privacy of Indian women, who perhaps have no idea about how their stories are being twisted in front of an international audience to defame and mock Indians and India on a global platform.

Demonizing Hindu festivals as “anti-feminist”

 Festivals all over the world are, well, just festivals – cultural expressions of a community, except for Hindu festivals, that is. The global media, academia, and think tank ecosystem have turned Hindu festivals into “demonstrative case studies in patriarchy.” No critical exposition on the ills of patriarchy is complete without a fair bit of bashing of Hindu Dharma and its customs and traditions.

Hindu festivals like Karva Chauth and Raksha Bandhan, where women play a significant role, have been turned into “case studies of anti-women rituals.” Karva Chauth, especially the Hindu festival, during which married women observe a day-long fast and pray for the longevity of their husbands, has been the subject of immense ridicule and condescension amongst media spaces. Every conceivable Western feminist theory penned to date has been mapped onto Karva Chauth; such is the level of collective hatred!

The Western media publishes a barrage of inflammatory articles around Karva Chauth every year, and the Indian media follows suit….usually penned by women journalists with an Indian name, something that lends a degree of “authenticity” to the mindless and baseless criticism.’

The Western media publishes a barrage of inflammatory articles around Karva Chauth every year, and the Indian media follows suit. Such write-ups are usually penned by women journalists with an Indian name, something that lends a degree of “authenticity” to the mindless and baseless criticism.

“Karva Chauth: Anti-Feminism in Designer Wear” reads the headline of an article published by Huffington Post in October 2016. [9] The writer Srinita Bhoumick calls Karva Chauth “that controversial festival where women fast for the longevity of their husband.” The rest of the article goes on and on in its quest for Karva Chauth bashing, portraying it as an anti-woman conspiracy where women are tortured by being forced to stay hungry for an entire day and pray for the longevity of their husbands. This is pretty much the crux of all glorious anti-Karva Chauth scholarship.

Silly and super judgmental as this ranting might sound to all the rational-minded folks out there, this sort of vitriolic banter against Hindu festivals like Karva Chauth is what constitutes a major chunk of “feminist scholarship” in India and elsewhere. Let’s check out another piece published by The New York Times. “My Mother’s Imposed Fast: I Feel Her Hunger”.[10] The write-up penned by Natasha Singh was published way back in 2009. It’s a first-person account of a non-resident Indian woman. The article begins with the usual anti-Karvachauth rant about how fasting on the occasion was a big deal for the writer’s mother and how the writer fails to see the point in it.

Then, it goes into a rather embarrassing dramatization of the personal lives of the writer’s parents, who are portrayed as patriarchal, regressive, etc. The narrative then moves from Karva Cauth bashing to overall Indian culture bashing. It’s a typical account of a Western-groomed Indian’s interpretation of Indian culture and the relationship between their parents, and the fact that the Western media solely gives space to such perspectives when it comes to portrayals of Indian womanhood speaks volumes of their agenda and where it comes from.

Raksha Bandhan is yet another Hindu festival that has borne the brunt of a rather twisted portrayal by the Western media. The simple and beautiful custom of a sister tying Rakhi on her brother’s wrist, who offers her unwavering protection in return, has been distorted to signify patriarchy, misogyny, oppression of women, and whatnot.

“Feminism in India” is one such media portal that plays out the dubious agenda of the West when it comes to the representation of women’s issues in India. “Feminism and Raksha Bandhan – A Balancing Act?”, a write-up published by them in 2019, argues that the whole concept of a sister tying Rakhi on her brother’s wrist who offers her protection, thus becoming a breeding ground of toxic masculinity.  Not only that, it goes on to the extent of suggesting that a festival like Raksha Bandhan “justifies sexual assault on anyone as long as the victim is not your sister”. [11]

BBC Hindi offers another twisted take on Raksha Bandhan through a first-person narrative story published in 2022: “Raksha Bandhan par nirbhar naheen hai bhai behan ka saccha Rishta” (the real relationship of a brother and sister does not depend on Raksha Bandhan). [12] The provocative title aside, the story itself is a bizarre narrative of how the writer often felt compelled to feel girly attributes in childhood whenever Raksha Bandhan was around the corner. This story has all the ingredients of how a Raksha Bandhan story shouldn’t be written! It politicizes a festival of heartfelt bonding of a brother and sister by adding the subtext of gender roles, communal violence, and whatnot. But then again, this is Marxist storytelling for you, one that has a highly problematic relationship with anything Indian and Hindu.

Sensationalizing Hindu Social Issues: Vrindavan Widows

 Hindu Dharma is an open-ended system of inquiry, unlike Abrahamic religions, which are closed belief systems. Hindu society has undergone many reform movements over the years; many regressive practices associated with Hinduism have been abolished by the law and are on the wane socially. Yet, Western media continues to sensationalize and exaggerate the “social evils” of Hindu Dharma. Child marriage, for example, is an issue that affects all religions, yet the mainstream media portrays child marriage as an exclusive “social ill” practiced by Hindus. How many Western media articles have you seen talking about the menace of child marriage or polygamy in Islam? But Hinduism, being the soft target, is portrayed as the originator of all social evils impacting women.

International publications like the BBC, The Washington Post, etc., are full of sensational stories about Hindu widows in Vrindavan abandoned by their families. While one is not denying the seriousness of the issue or the fact that it’s an inhumane custom, to whatever extent it still exists, Western media’s obsession with this topic is certainly no altruism. Traditionally, widows haven’t received a fair deal across all cultures. Yet, Western media continues to malign Hinduism as if there is something intrinsically evil about Hinduism that’s responsible for the mistreatment of windows. How many media stories have you seen talking about the condition of widows in Christianity or Islam?

Even the Pakistani daily Dawn seems to take an interest in the issue of widows of Vrindavan. One such headline …suggests that the widows of Vrindavan are breaking the shackles of “Hindu tradition” by playing Holi.

“The widows who can’t return home” (2022)[13], “India’s neglected widows” (2002)[14], “The Indian town with 6,000 widows” (2013)[15], “India’s abandoned widows struggle to survive”^[16], and “India’s invisible widows, divorcees and single women” (2014)[17], read the headline of a few stories done by BBC on this topic. “Vrindavan: City of Widows” (2007), “India’s City of Widows (2010), and “Why widowhood is one of the developing world’s key problems,” read The Guardian headlines.

These are just a few examples. Even the Pakistani daily Dawn seems to take an interest in the issue of widows of Vrindavan. One such headline read “Breaking taboos: First Holi ever for Indian widows” (2015)[18]. The article is a photo feature with a bit of commentary accompanying the pictures. The article overall suggests that the widows of Vrindavan are breaking the shackles of “Hindu tradition” by playing Holi. “Widows say breaking harsh Hindu tradition that prohibits them from playing Holi or dancing in the festivals must be shunned,” reads a caption accompanying one of the photos. It would have been perhaps interesting if the article had also shed some light on the position of widows in “Orthodox Islamic societies.” Or would that have been too much to ask for?

The number of Hindu widows abandoned in Vrindavan by their families would be minuscule in terms of India’s total population, yet Western media amplifies the issue to demonize Hindus and Hinduism. Most stories done by Western media publications on this issue perpetuate the narrative that Hinduism, per se, is inherently evil and thus responsible for the plight of Vrindavan windows.

What explains the Western media’s overwhelming interest in the topic of “Vrindavan widows”? One is that they need sensational stories to fill in pages and spaces of their web publications, and clickbait stories demonizing far-off cultures and civilizations fit the bill perfectly. Another reason, though, is that such topics fit in the overall woke narrative and further its agenda of demonizing Hindu Dharma and simplistically imposing Abrahamic frameworks onto Hindu culture and traditions.

Contradictory Narratives on Hindu and Muslim Women in India

 Western media’s reporting of women’s issues in India is fraught with double standards. It uses the “women’s rights” narrative to play the communal card. While reporting on Indian women’s issues in general, or let’s say Hindu women’s issues (since the majority of Indian women are Hindus), it adopts the tradition vs modernity binary, chiding the “natives” for sticking to old-fashioned and dilapidated customs and rituals, and failing to embrace modernity. But while reporting on issues concerning Muslim women, the most horrorsome and archaic of practices become “freedom of expression.”

Western media nitpicks even the most benign of Hindu rituals, festivals, and traditions to support the notion that these are regressive… But in the case of Islam, vehemently anti-women practices like triple talaq, hijab, etc., are subtly justified and perhaps even glorified by the Western media.

As illustrated through multiple examples in previous sections, the Western media nitpicks even the most benign of Hindu rituals, festivals, and traditions to support the notion that these are regressive and that Hindu women would be better off abandoning them altogether. But in the case of Islam, vehemently anti-women practices like triple talaq, hijab, etc., are subtly justified and perhaps even glorified by the Western media.

You just have to see the Western media coverage of the issue of hijab ban in various countries, and you’ll get my point. The Indian state of Karnataka became the center of a major controversy surrounding the insistence of a few Muslim women to wear hijab in educational institutions. In February 2022, the then Karnataka government issued a circular mandating that all students must adhere to the dress code prescribed by the management of schools and colleges. The circular didn’t officially ban hijab as such, but it granted autonomy to the management of schools and colleges in such matters, that is if an educational institution in the state prohibited the hijab on campus, students would have to adhere to the rule. [19]

The issue reached the Karnataka High Court, which eventually held the order and held that no case was made for its invalidation. The matter then reached the Supreme Court, but the two-judge bench of India’s apex court delivered a split verdict on the appeals against the High Court judgment. [20]

The Western media blew this issue out of proportion. The Indian state was portrayed as a draconian entity, taking away the rights and cultural identity of Muslim women. The ultra-orthodox patriarchal symbol of hijab, which led to the custodial death of the 20-year-old Mahsa Amini in Iran, who was arrested by Iran’s morality police for flouting the mandatory hijab ban, suddenly became a symbol of “women’s liberation” in the Indian context.

“Muslim women in India protest state’s ban on hijab in schools,” read an NBC News headline in February 2022. The write-up politicizes a “woman’s issue,” using it to ramp up its “Hindutva majoritarian“ hyperbole against the ruling BJP. “Hindu nationalism and anti-Muslim sentiment have been rising in India under Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party, or BJP, critics say…Modi says his policies benefit all Indians. But his party faces several key state elections this year, and political observers say the hijab debate could fire up his base”, says the article. [21]

“Hijab verdict: India Supreme Court split on headscarf ban in classrooms,” reads a BBC headline from October 2022. The article selectively quotes Malala Yousuf to construct a case against the Karnataka government’s hijab ban. “Noble prize-winner Malala Yousafzai, who was 15 when she survived an attack by the Taliban in Pakistan for speaking up for the right of girls to be educated, also weighed in on the debate, calling on India’s leaders to do something to ‘stop the marginalization of Muslim women’ “, says the write-up. [22]

“India: Hijab protests banned as row escalates”[23], “India hijab row: ‘All I want to do is study’,” [24] “How is the hijab row threatening Indian secularism?”,[25] “India: What would Uniform Civil Code mean for Muslim women?”,[26] and “ Instant divorce ban draws mixed reactions in India” [27]are some of the Deutsche Welle headlines of its coverage of Muslim women’s issues in India.

“India hijab row: ‘It is a woman’s right to decide what to wear’” reads the Anadolu Agency headline. The report vociferously quotes the then-opposition members of various political parties in Karnataka to construct its case against the 2022 hijab ban order in the state. It further positions the hijab ban within the larger narrative of what it calls the Modi government “legitimizing discrimination against religious minorities and enabling violent Hindu nationalism.” [28]

“Muslim women in India are fighting for the right to wear a hijab,” reads the rather dramatic headline of a website called LifeGate. The story gives various participators’ accounts of anti-hijab ban protests in India and quotes one of the protestors as claiming that “the attack on hijab-wearing is a “part of an onslaught against Islamic values.” [29]

A full-fledged discussion on this topic is beyond the scope of the article. But the point is that the Western media ecosystem unequivocally propagates a rather homogenously ultra-conservative and regressive narrative on women’s rights when it comes to Muslim women. Just contrast this with the hyper-vigilant mode it adopts while portraying Hindu women and how it maliciously labels Hindu festivals and traditions as “patriarchal” without having the slightest know-how of their deeper symbolism or background and context.

The Myth of India as the “Rape Capital”

The Western media gets away with crass generalizations and blatant misinformation when it comes to talking about sexual crimes against women in India. Numerous Western media outlets have categorically labeled India “the rape capital of the world” without any credible evidence whatsoever. A write-up published by StopHindudvesha in June 2023 exposes the Western media’s sensational coverage of sexual violence against women in India. It analyzes a New York Times story that paints India as the world’s rape capital. The story also cites ample evidence to show that rape is rampant in the West and “up to 10 times higher than in India”. [30]

The feverish intensity with which Western media covers sexual crimes against women in India, a layperson might just assume India is the only country in the world where such crimes are committed. “What is behind India’s rape problem?” reads the headline of a piece by Deutsche Welle in 2019. The write-up resorts to value-laden generalizations to prove that there is something intrinsic about Indian culture that makes the country unsafe for women. “A number of rape cases in India in the past few months have put a spotlight on the issue of gender-based attacks in the country. Experts say deep-seated patriarchy has created a ‘second class’ status for women in India”, says the article. [31]

Crimes like rape happen all over the world, yet how many Western media articles have you seen attributing rapes in Western countries to the “patriarchal” culture out there or the “second-class status” of women in these countries. Probably none. Seems like these kinds of wild generalizations have been solely reserved for “third world” nations like India.

However, it also adds that India has a rape rate of 1.80 per 100,000 people as of 2020. Compared to this, the rape figure for the US is 27.3 per 100,000 people. The comparable figure for Sweden, which is placed 6^th on the list of 10 countries with the highest rape incidents, is 63.50, as per the report.

Western media coverage of sexual crimes against women in India shot up phenomenally after the 2012 gang rape and murder of a young woman in a moving bus in Delhi, commonly known as the Nirbhaya case. The Nirbhaya case became a rallying point for the Indian youth, who came out in large numbers to protest the lack of women’s safety in cities like Delhi. However, for the Western media, the Nirbhaya case became an excuse to peddle all sorts of misinformation and propaganda regarding rape culture in India. Unsubstantiated opinion pieces making sensational claims regarding every Indian woman being raped within so-and-so minutes became commonplace in global media.

Yet, ironically, India doesn’t even figure in the top 10 when it comes to statistics on countries with the highest rape incidents. A 2020 report published by The Business Standard gives country-wise statistics on the prevalence of rape. As per the report, the 10 countries with the highest rape rates are South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland, Bermuda, Sweden, Suriname, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, and Grenada. The report does mention India in the list of countries with a high rate of rape, along with Bangladesh, Pakistan, China, Japan, USA, and Russia. However, it also adds that India has a rape rate of 1.80 per 100,000 people as of 2020.

Compared to this, the rape figure for the US is 27.3 per 100,000 people. The comparable figure for Sweden, which is placed 6^th on the list of 10 countries with the highest rape incidents, is 63.50, as per the report. [32]

Yet, how many Western media reports have you seen condemning the rape culture in the US or Sweden? It seems rather bizarre that India, with a rape rate of less than 2 per 100,000 population, receives the worldwide tag of “rape capital,” and the “rape problem” in Western countries like the US rarely even gets pointed out, let alone criticized.

Concluding thoughts

Reporting on women’s issues in India follows a certain paradigm, one that uncritically imposes the framework of Western social sciences theories, including Western feminist theory, on the Indian context. The result is a blatant stereotyping of Indian culture and the simplistic labelling of the traditional roles of women in Indian society as “regressive”.

What essentially accompanies this stereotyping is also an Abrahamic thought system that exoticizes and demonizes Hinduism and portrays its associated cultural practices as anti-women.

The crux of the problem is the academic framing of Indian women’s issues through a Western lens. Media coverage of women’s issues in India, whether in Western or Indian media, simply reflects and reinforces this academic agenda-setting.

Citations

[1] News and stories | UN Women – Headquarters; https://www.unwomen.org/en/news-stories

[2] Photographer Deepti Asthana turns a sensitive, non-stereotypical eye to women in rural India | Vogue India; https://www.vogue.in/content/photographer-deepti-asthana-turns-a-sensitive-non-stereotypical-eye-to-women-in-rural-india

[3] India is the most dangerous country for women. It must face reality | Deepa Narayan | The Guardian; https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jul/02/india-most-dangerous-country-women-survey

[4] I was supposed to grow up to be a ‘good Indian woman’. I chose freedom instead | Sangeeta Pillai | The Guardian; https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/oct/21/i-was-supposed-to-grow-up-to-be-a-good-indian-woman-i-chose-freedom-instead

[5] In India, a Small Band of Women Risk It All for a Chance to Work – The New York Times (nytimes.com); https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/31/world/asia/indian-women-labor-work-force.html#:~:text=The%20Indian%20Constitution%20guarantees%20equality,traditions%2C%20that%20guarantee%20means%20little.

[6] In Hinduism, Respect the Sacred, Ignore the Sexism – NYTimes.com; https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2013/01/08/with-children-when-does-religion-go-too-far/in-hinduism-respect-the-sacred-ignore-the-sexism

[7] Renting as a Single Woman in India: No Visitors, No Drinking, Home by 9 – The New York Times (nytimes.com); https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/18/world/asia/india-single-women-apartments.html

[8] Chapter 6: Struggle and Hope – The New York Times (nytimes.com); https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/25/world/asia/india-daughters-women.html

[9] Karva Chauth: Anti-Feminism In Designer Wear | HuffPost Life; https://www.huffpost.com/archive/in/entry/karva-chauth-anti-feminism-in-designer-wear_in_5c10e64ae4b085260ba69971

[10] Daughter Studies the Void in Her Parents’ Relationship – The New York Times (nytimes.com); https://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/27/fashion/27love.html

[11] https://feminisminindia.com/2019/08/15/feminism-and-raksha-bandhan-a-balancing-act/

[12] ‘रक्षा बंधन पर निर्भर नहीं है भाई-बहन का सच्चा रिश्ता’ – BBC News हिंदी; https://www.bbc.com/hindi/india-62536836

[13] The widows who can’t return home (bbc.com); https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20160907-the-widows-who-cant-return-home

[14] BBC News | SOUTH ASIA | India’s neglected widows; http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/1795564.stm

[15] The Indian town with 6,000 widows – BBC News; https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-21859622

[16] India’s abandoned widows struggle to survive – BBC News; https://www.bbc.com/news/business-24490252

[17] India’s invisible widows, divorcees and single women – BBC News; https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-26356373

[18] Breaking taboos: First Holi ever for Indian widows – World – DAWN.COM; https://www.dawn.com/news/1167304

[19] Ban on hijab in schools, colleges will be withdrawn: Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah | Mysuru News – Times of India (indiatimes.com); https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mysuru/ban-on-hijab-in-schools-colleges-will-be-withdrawn-karnataka-cm-siddaramaiah/articleshow/106223874.cms

[20] Ibid.

[21] Muslim women in India protest hijab ban (nbcnews.com); https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/muslim-women-india-protest-hijab-ban-rcna17038

[22] Hijab verdict: India Supreme Court split on headscarf ban in classrooms (bbc.com); https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-63225351

[23] India: Hijab protests banned as row escalates – DW – 02/09/2022; https://www.dw.com/en/india-hijab-protests-banned-as-row-escalates/a-60718780

[24] India hijab row: ‘All I want to do is study’ – DW – 02/10/2022; https://www.dw.com/en/india-hijab-row-all-i-want-to-do-is-study/a-60732224

[25] How is the hijab row threatening Indian secularism? – DW – 03/23/2022; https://www.dw.com/en/how-is-the-hijab-row-threatening-indian-secularism/a-61235100

[26] India: What would Uniform Civil Code mean for Muslim women? – DW – 08/03/2023; https://www.dw.com/en/india-what-would-uniform-civil-code-mean-for-muslim-women/a-66429364

[27] https://www.dw.com/en/triple-talaq-instant-divorce-ban-draws-mixed-reactions-in-india/a-49830803#:~:text=The%20%22triple%20talaq%2C%22%20or,Skype%2C%20emails%20and%20phone%20calls.

[28] Instant divorce ban draws mixed reactions in India – DW – 07/31/2019; https://www.aa.com.tr/en/asia-pacific/india-hijab-row-it-is-a-woman-s-right-to-decide-what-to-wear-/2498339#

[29] Muslim women in India are fighting for their right to wear a hijab – LifeGate; https://www.lifegate.com/muslim-women-right-to-wear-hijab-in-india

[30] Rape Capital: It’s the West, not India, that leads in sex crimes – Hindu Dvesha (stophindudvesha.org); https://stophindudvesha.org/rape-capital-its-the-west-not-india-that-leads-in-sex-crimes/

[31] What is behind India’s rape problem? – DW – 12/19/2019; https://www.dw.com/en/what-is-behind-indias-rape-problem/a-51739350

[32] Countries with the highest rape incidents | The Business Standard (tbsnews.net); https://www.tbsnews.net/world/countries-highest-rape-incidents-144499