Since India’s economic liberalization, media attention has been focused on its development. While its growth has been phenomenal economically, India continues to lag behind in other critical areas such as women’s rights, rural development, and child labor. Despite rapid modernization, India fails to meet some of the millennium goals proposed by the United Nations. In spite of the advancement, India has a long journey ahead. Socially, it has not progressed at the same rate as it has witnessed its economic growth. Women have secured great success in other parts of their lives, although their struggle continues in these areas also. Such achievements include an increasing number of women in the workforce, illegal pronouncement of the dowry system, acquiring political rights and attaining a valuable education.
My thesis addresses the issue of women’s health in India, specifically the subject of women’s sexuality and reproductive health. I will examine how Indian societal views on sexuality have affected its policies on reproductive health, particularly those on abortion rights, contraceptives (implied is safe and protected sex), and pregnancy and child- birth. Furthermore, I intend to compare the trends and access to reproductive health facilities between urban and rural areas. In order to fulfill my latter aim more effectively, I might limit my comparative research to certain key areas, on which I am undecided currently.
In regards with reproductive health, I would argue that it would be beneficial to women and the Indian society to modernize using the western countries as a model. This does not necessarily mean imitation of their struggles against a patriarchical society. It only means that women could use this model as a building block for their movement. It should be noted that even in western countries, women have not fully gained equal rights to those of men. While this is a shortcoming in looking towards the West for inspiration, it does offer Indian feminists a point of departure. As I will show, the western model will have to be tweaked and prodded to accommodate the Indian cultural, political, economic and social environment to achieve equal and complete rights for women. It is my hope that our Indian counterparts will aim to achieve even those goals not yet accomplished by the feminist movements in the West.
Historians normally utilize archives and secondary sources to support their arguments. Consequently, I plan to use both categories of sources, although one more than the other. The majority of my research will be secondary. But I also intend to look into the World Health Reports, other Indian government statistics regarding the health of its citizens, the Indian Constitution and the five year developmental plans, etc.
By examining the current issues facing the progress of women’s reproductive and sexual health, I hope to learn the difficulties of their development. Acknowledging their difficulties and the problems they experience, better governmental policies could be formed. It would aid in establishing more effective and constructive programs for organizations and government to utilize in developing this critical health concern.
NOTE: I have footnotes in the original proposal but in order to save space, I have deleted them on the blog.
