When we discourse on gender equality in terms of equal opportunities in the field of education, health and social security, property rights for women also assume equal significance. It is because the right is associated with dignity in a woman’s life.
More importantly, single women who are either deserted, abandoned by their husbands, divorced or never married or anyhow responsible to head their daily household chores must be entitled for land and other property rights. It is due to the fact that our patriarchal society hardly opens space to share property with single women neither from their parental properties nor from the properties of in-laws.
Several laws in our country stipulate that family means the person and his or her spouse, minor sons, unmarried daughters, minor brothers or unmarried sisters, father, mother and other members residing with him or her and dependent on him/her for his/her livelihood. This includes a major son/grandson irrespective of his marital status and major unmarried daughter/sister more than 30 years of age/ major unmarried sister; physically and mentally challenged person irrespective of age and sex. But our laws still roam around to define who is a single woman and as a fallout they are facing numerous challenge in availing benefits provided under various schemes and thus fighting to restore their dignity.
There are associated disadvantages for a single woman that needs keen introspection. For example, if a single woman has no landed property in her name, she cannot apply for a resident certificate which is a bare need to avail Government benefits in almost every scheme. Secondly, she cannot avail bank loans and other financial help from institutions as she cannot produce her residence certificate. In case of a single woman in tribal communities, she also cannot avail the free seeds and fertilizer benefits provided under agricultural extension programme. And finally, if a single woman has children, they cannot avail free and compulsory education due to lack of other documents to prove them as residents in a given area.
However, if we take note on the data on the Census of 2001, 7.4 per cent of the female population of India is single. There were 3, 43, 89,729 widows in India and 23,42, 930 divorced/separated women in our country. In 2011 census, we have also missed to include around 40 million single women population in the enumeration who have remained single by their choice or never married. If we add these two, then certainly the single women population in our country will be much higher.
In Odisha, there are progressive laws such as The Orissa land Reforms Act, 1960, The Orissa Government land Settlement Act, 1962, The Orissa Rehabilitation and Resettlement Policy, 2006, the State Policy for Girls and Women, 2014, to ensure the rights of women in the State but neither of these Acts has included a special mention for the single women.
According to the existing legal provisions, a head of the households will be provided land irrespective of their gender. But it is a widely known fact that the single women are never treated as the head of households even though they are managing their kids independently. This offers them an additional disadvantage in terms of availing homestead land under these Government schemes.
In case of Odisha, the Revenue Department undertook a survey in 2003 to identify landless families and found that there are as many as 2,49,334 landless families in the State who do not have a roof over their heads. Therefore in 2005-06, the State Government launched ‘Vasundhara’ scheme to provide 10 decimal land to those landless families whose annual income must not exceed Rs 15,000. However, thousands of beneficiaries among single women have been deprived of the entitlement due to no defining of single women in the laws.
To address the needs of single women’s rights to land and other properties, organizations like landesa and ActionAid have been working to facilitate the process to ensure their rights in the purview of laws, but all that is needed the first is defining who are single womenIJ If the Government does so, then paths will be open for the single women to get benefits of numerous schemes of the State as well as Central Governments.
For a young widow, owning a piece of land and house is of immense social and economic security. Intricacies of single women’s land rights and the vulnerability of their livelihoods should be understood historically, taking into account long-term changes in colonial times and the history of political turbulence and economic stagnation. However, our social practice and customary laws and especially, the rigid patriarchy have posed a challenge in terms of ensuring rights to single women.
These single women too have a dream of a dignified life. The lack of access to land or property by women has not only resulted in economic and financial insecurity, but has also perpetuated the problems of domestic violence and dowry. In this context, land can be seen as more than just a source of material wealth; it is a source of status and recognition for women in her community. Therefore, our country as a welfare State must ensure their rights.
There are some important steps that the Government must initiate to entrust their commitment to ensure rights of single women. For example, the Government should accord high priority to technical skill building in agriculture related activities for women farmers. It can reduce stamp duty for registration of land and house purchased in a woman’s name and gift deeds of immovable property executed in favour of women which will indirectly increase the number of lands being owned by women. Also, there is a need to set up single window systems to provide comprehensive support to women farmers on crops, financial services, technology, inputs and market linkage to single women.
The Government must act proactively to develop a policy to define single women, identify eligible women for entitlement of homestead land patta and ensure other property rights. There is a need of sensitisation and reforms in administrative actions along with a strong political will to ensure single women’s right to homestead land.
(The writer is a freelancer, author and social worker based in Odisha)