ABSTRACT
Another important theme that emerged within the Adivasi society was gender inequity, as a result of the globalisation initiative. The cultural creation of the ‘dependent wife’, as the author of this chapter observes, is itself a product of the cultural integration of Chhattisgarh into mainstream India. Globalisation, with its pressures for land acquisition and industrialisation in indigenous areas, has brought its own patriarchal baggage and ‘dowry package’. On top of that, the provisions of Panchayat (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996 (PESA), such as participation of women, remain poor in the official Gram Sabhas - a dangerous sign for constitutional values of gender equity, as observed by Sen. She cites examples from Gond society that women are singularly absent from the traditional political structures and remain less than fully integrated in modern structures of representative government. There is also a strong tendency to codify and interpret traditional social norms on sexuality and personal life along fundamentalist premises that tend to relegate women to the margins and destroy the fragile equity that exists in the economic sphere.
