By Dr.Ali Mohammad Rather

Women in Kashmir, as with most parts of the eastern world, have been living in a male dominated society, in patriarchal families where a joint family system pre-existed. Traditionally, there was already a weak health care system, which was administratively centralized in nature.

It is now more than established that women’s health problems were not treated properly, punctually and entirely. This may be explained partly in terms of illiteracy, poverty, ignorance, non-availability of doctors, facilities and medicines and partly be cultural lag, cultural ethos and cultural practices. In that situation, if men fell ill, they received medical attention immediately. On the other hand, if a woman fell ill, she did not receive medical assistance with the same promptness. The latter’s cases were often dismissed, delayed or ignored which deteriorated their condition. It was only when their health deteriorated exponentially that they were deemed deserving of seeing a doctor.

The justification for such gender bias was attributed to factors such as women’s significant economic reliance on the eldest male family member, absolute male authority, unequal roles and statuses between males and females, cultural constraints, and finally, the least prioritized concern was gender health.

Reproductive Health and Cultural Practices

Reproductive Health was totally affected by the cultural phenomena such as cultural notions, concepts, orientation, values, norms and practices. Even superstitions played a role and were practically detrimental to the ideals of women’s health. It was observed that conscious and organized negation of women’s health facilities were justified........

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