Title:	Gender Equality and Inequality in Rural India
Authors:	Carol Vlassoff
Keywords:	India—Rural conditions
Issue Date:	2013
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan
Description:	This was my introduction to India and there were many more unnerving experiences to come. Although the war lasted only 13 days people were unusually jumpy and suspicious of foreigners. Thinking back on it later, it struck me that the sight of two helmeted, white faced strangers riding into town on a motorcycle and not speaking a word of their language, must have been astonishing to people. On other such occasions someone would always appear (just as the policeman had done) to straighten out any misapprehensions. We traveled throughout the country, visiting India’s many historic monuments and sites—Khajarajo, Ajanta and Ellora, Benares (now Varanasi), Kerala, Tirupati, Pondicherry (now Puducherry)—to name a few. We were often pestered by “touts,” offering to be our guide when we preferred to enjoy the magic of these places on our own. In restaurants and other public places people openly stared at us, making us uncomfortable. People who spoke a little English frequently struck up conversations in order to practice, especially the traveling businessmen we would meet in cheap hotels. Typically, they would insist that we visit them if we were traveling to their hometowns and typically, they would be unavailable when we called. Later an Indian friend explained that they probably felt embarrassed to invite us home because they felt that their homes might not be up to our standards. When we boarded a boat to Karachi after six months of traveling through India I felt no regrets, only relief that I was leaving behind its daily hassles. Little did I know that I was to go back three years later for a tryst with that country that has lasted the rest of my life.
URI:	http://10.6.20.12:80/handle/123456789/57813
ISBN:	978-1-137-37392-2
Appears in Collections:	Rural Development Studies

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