Women’s worst enemies are women

From warring sisters-in-law, to daughters-in-law jealous of their mothers-in-law, to female work colleagues at war, women’s relationships with each other often end in acrimony.


A recent newspaper report confirmed this theory when I read about Anita*, an alleged victim of the ‘wife-centric’ laws in India. Her kidney ailment did not prevent her arrest when her estranged daughter-in-law charged her son and the rest of her family, including a mentally-challenged daughter, for ill-treatment and cruelty. It is hard to believe how such accusations can be leveled against a mentally-challenged person. I wonder what the advocates of women’s rights will say to that!

The media also believes in fanning the flames instead of reining in such tendencies. Take an advertisement for bake-and-serve glassware published in a reputed magazine for women in India. The advertisement showed two photographs of plum cakes – one was labeled a ‘bechara’ (sorry-looking) cake that had been made by an ‘oversmart’ nanad (sister-in-law). This cake seemed perfectly fine to me except for the fact that it had been placed in an ordinary cake tin and hadn’t been garnished with nuts and chocolate icing. The other cake, made by the intelligent wife of the ‘oversmart’ lady’s brother, had been placed in a bake-and-serve dish and decorated with nuts and icing. It was ‘special’ because the cook was clever enough not to use an ordinary cake tin but an ovenproof glass dish. I wonder if the ad people would have substituted the word ‘nanad’ with ‘behen’ (sister). But, how that could be… isn’t it always the ‘nanad’ who is oversmart and the ‘bhabhi’ or ‘bahu’ always bright and right.

Take other advertisements that are shown on television day in and day out. The detergent soap chosen by the ‘bahu’ is often longer-lasting and perfoms better. The one chosen by the ‘unintelligent’ saas usually cuts a sorry figure. And, the less said about the ‘saas-bahu’ serials on TV the better. Why must they always be at each other’s throats? Of course, the ‘bahu’ is usually the victim and she often finds scheming vamps in her path in the form of interfering sisters-in-law, merciless mother-in-law and fiendish ex-girlfriends of her husband. Why can’t our producers and directors work on better scripts? Is there really a dearth of ideas?

Sadly, that adage about women being their own worst enemies is not untrue.