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THE IDEAL OF INDIAN WOMANHOOD
Fidelity is generally considered to be thc essence of marital relation. Hinduism does not ciemand that of men. As far as they are concerned, marriage is legalised adulicry. Polygamy is legalised adultery which is practised on all sorts of pretexts, often most frivolous. A protraciel illness on the part of the wife absolves the husband from the vow of fidelity. In that case, he is morally and scripturally entitled to take another wife for the sake of keeping up the family. And it is a part of the ideal of Indian womanhood not only to acquiesce in that heartless act of descrtion, but to welcome the co-wife cheerfully and love her as a sister. It may be a noble ideal. That is a matter of taste and ethical sensibility. The prescribed conduct, however, is an emotional impossibility. Helpless women conform formally ; but the sense of morality and justice, when not dulled by the L»lind respect for tradition, naturally revolts against the practice, and must condcmn it as a callous inethod of degrading women to the position of chattel-machines acquired by men for manufacturing children.
Adultery is condemned as a moral offence. What is adultery? It is to praciise co-habitation disregarding the pledge of fidelity to the married mate. If the moral condemnation of adultery has any sense, it must logically imply that one cannot be married to more than one person at the same time. The moral sanction for the condemnation
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