Growing Girls in India

Growing up in India can be hard, especially if you’re part of a large family. But in my experience, it’s nearly impossible for girls growing up in India to become the women they want to be. I was born and raised in Andhra Pradesh, a state on the south eastern coast of India. My family was Catholic – in a state where 90% of the people are Hindu and 8% are Muslim! But the culture of mistreating girls pervades everywhere in India, even into Catholic homes.

I know that if I hadn’t fought hard for my education, I would have ended up married off right after secondary school, living in a village in Andhra Pradesh with a husband I didn’t love. This is real life for the vast majority of Indian women. In fact, in India today nearly half of the women who are now between 20 and 24 years old were married before they turned 18. That’s our modern generation!


For an Indian girl, being denied an education means teenaged marriage, no knowledge of human rights, no knowledge of birth control (and therefore many births, dangerous in rural areas), high infant mortality rates, and a low family income ... which just makes it harder to support her many children. It also leads to generations of the same thing, in both her sons and her daughters. Children whose mothers have been educated are twice as likely to go to school as children of unschooled mothers.

Because of this widespread lack of general education, knowledge about AIDS is twice as high in South Asian young men as it is in young women. That probably explains why AIDS affects three times more young women than young men in the region.

Why aren’t girls being educated? Indian culture dictates that boys are just more important than girls. When boys are born there’s a celebration, but when girls are born the ritual is the same as for a funeral. Thousands of girls never even make it into the world – even as you read this, many unborn and newborn girls are being killed. And those that are allowed to live are kept at home to do chores and take care of their little siblings, while their brothers go to school. The expectation is that a girl will just get married and leave the family anyway, so why bother investing in her education? To benefit her in-laws?

In the Himalayan region the situation is especially bad. Husbands and fathers leave their hometown to look for work in the big cities like Delhi. They leave their wives – usually uneducated, of course – and their children at home. But in the cities, the men can easily get hooked on an expensive lifestyle of eating out and visiting sex workers. Often there’s no money left to send home!

So their wives take menial jobs in and around their villages, helping with farming to support the family. You can imagine that menial jobs in India don’t pay that much. Some of their children – which they’re likely to have a lot of, not having knowledge of birth control – have to sacrifice their education to keep the house in order and save money. Do you think the ones staying home are sons, or daughters?

I was a stubborn girl, and when my parents pressed me to marry after I graduated secondary school, I insisted going to university instead. Actually, I even threatened to kill myself if they married me off! My poor parents had to give in, and I was able to get a university education. After I graduated they again strongly pushed me to get married and start a family. But again I pushed back. This time I entered my Master’s degree. My parents realised I was serious. Later I went on to pursue my doctoral studies.

Thanks to my stubbornness, and mostly thanks to God who helped me and gave me boldness, today I’m able to work for Viva in India. My demand for education led me to the place where I am now, in a position to influence the future of thousands of young girls across the subcontinent. I was unique – I suspect most girls, especially ones without a Christian upbringing, don’t have the guts to butt heads with their parents over heavy matters like marriage!

And that’s the tragic thing. 52% of Indian women are illiterate, despite the government’s great attempts and successes at boosting the overall literacy rate. The problem facing India’s girls isn’t necessarily a lack of schools or expertise, it’s a lack of respect. That’s why I do my job – heading up Viva’s Jyoti Forum (Jyoti means ‘light’ in Hindi), so that more girls will be able to stand up for themselves and get an education. My day at work involves talking to project leaders around India about respecting and protecting girls. We organise training courses and bring together community leaders, NGO heads, pastors and project workers for various conferences on girl child issues to learn how and why to protect girls and invest in their futures.

If the goal is Eradicating Poverty, it can’t be done without empowering women … because if half the population is still in the dark ages, poverty will always exist. If the goal is Empowering Women, it’s impossible without educating them … because an uneducated woman will simply never be able to keep up in a man’s world like India. Educating women brings up their social status, gives them job opportunities, releases them from forced dependence on men, gives them the knowledge they need to take care of their children, and ensures the next generation is educated too.

The difficulties facing Indian girls come from many different areas of society, and so it will take many different people to help fight them all. The only way we will have the power to change India’s cultural biases against girls is by bringing together local community leaders, pastors, projects, schools, non-governmental organisations and parents, showing them why they should value girls, and creating practical ways to protect the female half of the next generation. A crisis is facing India as long as girls are undervalued and disrespected. Yet I have hope, I see jyoti -- light -- on the horizon.  When we work together we have real power to make a huge difference, and that’s why I’m proud to be working with Viva.


~  K. in Delhi

Learn more about Jyoti Forum at www.viva.org/girlchild/ 


Why do we do it?  Check out www.viva.org/MissionStatement/