Sati: a History

 by Abriti G

The Sati of Ramabai,
wife of Peshwa Madhavrao I, 1772

The ancient Hindu tradition called sati, is where a widow sacrifices her life when her husband dies, initially it was a voluntary act considered courageous and heroic, but it later became a forced/heavily coerced practice. The most known form is when a woman is put on her husband's pyre and burnt, sometimes dead, sometimes alive. However other forms also exist including the woman being drowned or bitten by a snake. 

Although sati is now banned all over India it is still practised, and is regarded by some Hindus as the ultimate form of womanly devotion and sacrifice. “Sati” originally meant a woman who performed the act of immolating herself after her husband’s death. The word is derived from the Sanskrit word “asti’, which means “She is pure or true”. At first, Sati was a symbol of closure to marriage, which showed that the wife was dutiful and would follow her husband to the afterlife. It was thought to be the greatest form of devotion from a wife to her dead husband. It became a symbol of feminine virtue and an integral part of the Rajput ethos, with tales of heroic sacrifice glorified in ballads and folklore.However, over time, it became a forced practice. Traditionally a widow had no role in society so they were considered a burden and commonly shunned. So, unless she was menstruating, if a woman did not have a child who could support her she would be pressured to accept sati. Most of the time, the woman would be drugged with drugs such as opium or bhang which would make her unconscious and prevent her from escaping if she ‘changed her mind’ before being burnt.  The glorification of sati not only reinforced gender norms but also served political purposes, consolidating power and preserving social hierarchies.

There were alternatives to being burnt however, they weren’t appealing. After the death of a husband a widow was expected to live the life of an ascetic, renouncing all social activities, shaving her head, eating only boiled rice and sleeping on thin coarse matting. To many, death may have been preferable, especially for those who were still girls themselves when their husband's died.

Women who committed sati were said to have died chaste, which, people believed, meant she would have good karma and a much better life in her next birth. But this justification didn’t work for Brahmin women as they already belonged to the highest caste, so karmically they couldn’t benefit from sati and thus did not have to practise it.

 There isn’t much data on the beginnings of sati but historical records tell us that sati first appeared between 320CE to 550CE, during the rule of Gupta Empire. Incidents of sati were first recorded in Nepal in 464CE, and later on in Madhya Pradesh in 510CE. The practice then spread to Rajastha, where most sati cases have happened over the centuries. Initially, the practice of sati was confined to royal families of high caste and only later spread to the lower castes, becoming widely practised among all social classes. Sati was at its peak between the 15th and 18th centuries. During this period, as many as 1000 widows were burned alive every year, most commonly in India and Nepal. However, records show that the practice was also popular in other traditions and in countries like Russia, Fiji and Vietnam. Sati was frequently practised in Rajasthan, more specifically by the women of royal families. A sati stone was created, which was a memorial of all the wives of the kings who died this way. Before giving up their lives, the queens left their handprints on the wall, to be remembered as valiant and devotional wives. However most of these handprints are smaller than the average woman's hands, implying that these women could have been girls who had been sent off for marriage at a young age.

If historical facts are to be believed, the practice of sati was prohibited many times between 15th and 18th centuries. In 1582, Mughal Emperor Akbar outlawed sati, and in 1663, Aurangzeb tried to end it again. Even the Portuguese, French and British, who came to India during the European colonial period, tried to stop sati. In 1850, the British hardened their rules against the practice. Sir Charles Napier ordered the hanging to death of any Hindu priest who presided over a burning widow. The princely states of India during that time were also pressured to rule out sati completely. Raja Ram Mohan Roy was one of the key reformers who opposed the practice.

In 1987, in the village of Deorala in Rajasthan, an 18-year-old married woman named Roop Kanwar was forced to become sati when her husband died after eight months of marriage. She refused. Consequently, a group of men from the village forcefully drugged and immolated her. Police investigated the case and those men were arrested. In light of this incident, the government created the Prevention of Sati Act, making it illegal to force or encourage a woman to commit sati, and anyone doing so would be punished by death. And yet, some widows still choose to/ are persuaded to become sati – at least four such cases were recorded between 2000 and 2015.