Always when I write on my blog about Sanatan Dharma I get many questions about the negativities of Hindu Religion here I will try to address all of them one by one. If someone has some other thing in mind please feel free I will incorporate it in this blog also and try to resolve.
Some of the negativities that are commonly noticed are-
1 . Sati Pratha (where widows are burnt in the fire with the dead body of there husband)
2. Pardah Pratha (Whre the females are not allowed to show there face to anyone except there husband)
Slowly we will address all these issues lets discuss about them one by one
1. Sati Pratha- Sati, or Satī, written as सती in Sanskrit, is the female version of the word or name, meaning 'true', and best known as one of the names of the Hindu goddess Dākshāyani, the goddess of marital felicity and longevity who is worshiped especially by women who hope that their husbands will lead long and healthy lives. In the story of Sati, the goddess Sati took human form as a daughter of Daksha Prajāpati known as Gaurī, following Brahma's wishes that she should take on human form and marry Shiva. As a child she loved the stories of Shiva and became an ardant devotee. When she grew into a young woman, it became clear that she wanted to marry no man other than Shiva, and forsaking the proposals she was offered from valiant and rich kings, she hid away in the forest and devoted her life to worshiping Shiva. When Shiva, having tested her resolve, agreed to fulfill her wishes and marry her, Sati was delighted, but her father was not and cut her away from her birth family. Daksha Prajāpati organised a great yagna, inviting all other gods apart from Sati and Shiva, but Sati could not believe that her father would leave her out in such a cruel manner. She resolved to go, reasoning that as family, her father probably thought she needed no invitation. There, she argued with Daksha Prajāpati about her marriage to Shiva and, furious that he would see no good in her husband, realised that her father was heaping insult on Shiva only because he had married her, and hence she was the source of his dishonour. She burnt herself in the fire and died. There are further stories about her rebirth by the name of Devi Parvati. This story comes from Shiv Puran where the stories about human form of Shiva are mentioned.
But Sati Pratha although picks up the name Sati from the same tale but the custom of females burning themselves or forcefully in there husbands dead body has in fact no relation to this tale.
In fact the custom has relation to one more custom that is Kambal Pratha this custom was born during the period of muslim dominance in India. Muslims became very strong and so called Hindus of that period completely surrendered themselves after the defeat of Rajpoot’s. That period witnessed the time when no Hindu was safe and the muslim Rulers and there army did everything they could to ruin the Indian culture. They openly raped females killed males they wanted every every beautiful Hindu female to be in there service.
In kambal pratha whenever any male died the Muslim army used to capture the female and there was a fight within themselves who is going to own that female, in order to resolve the disputes among themselves they came out with a solution of Kambal Pratha where normally the captured female was allowed to run to save her self and all the so called owners used to run behind her with a blanket in there hand. Who so ever covered the female with his blanket first was the owner of that female and used her for his service. This Crual act was one example how the unsafe the Hindu was at that point in time.
To save themselves from this act slowly females accepted to Burn themselves in the fire of their husbands dead body rather then become captive of any Muslims.
Even during the British rule this custom continued. Actually British rule was not so cruel as Muslim rule. So there was no point in continuing the custom but sill the custom continued. As Hindus have a wrong tendency and most possible reason for this tendency to develop is that when you are suppressed by someone for a long period it is obvious that all the preachers of religion had hidden themselves and were not available and the suppression continued to prevail till many generations. In order to justify there act slowly some baseless stories were generated like female following this custom is holy, she possess lot of powers etc etc. and slowly fore coming generations forgot the actual cause of this act and finally the act continued. Although now in the present context this custom no more exists but still western scholars do not forget to blame our society for this kind of cruality.
