Mandira Bedi Trolled: Why Are We Uncomfortable With Women At Funerals?

Mandira Bedi trolled: Naysayers, critics and trolls swooped on Mandira Bedi after photos of her partaking in her husband Raj Kaushal's last rites did rounds on social media Wednesday.

Kaushal died of a cardiac arrest in the early hours of June 30th in Mumbai. Bedi, in a move that shouldn't essentially have drawn attention but did because it went against patriarchal convention, partook in her husband's funeral. She carried the earthen pot to be broken later, leading the front of Kaushal's bier.

Women are traditionally not permitted to touch certain funeral objects. And conservative netizens made sure they made the idea known to Bedi under the heartbreaking funeral photos. If that was not enough, Bedi was also shamed by trolls for the attire she donned - a simple white tee and denim jeans.

Why must culture and morality be dictated to women at every step of their lives? For each choice they make, why do self-appointed defenders of tradition position to attack? What right does a third person have to tell a woman how she should mourn the death of her spouse? Trolling and dress policing a woman in her lowest moments - is that the culture we are striving towards?

Mandira Bedi Trolled For Husband's Funeral: When Will We Stop Policing?

Ancient books and Hindu knowledge do not contain instruction forbidding women from taking part actively in funerals. (Even if they did, how &t=189s">sexist would that have been?) But years of patriarchal hierarchy have misshapen the culture to leave women disadvantaged. And for what? The reasons are as random as they come.

Having women at funerals will give off bad energy. Women are faint-hearted and won't be able to handle the grief. Women will hurdle the deceased's attainment of nirvana. Women shouldn't light the pyre.

It's because of these misogynistic customs that women aren't allowed to even process tragedy with full emotion.

Otherwise expected to be emotional beings, they are kept out of that one life event, which comes to everyone, that invokes the rawest feeling.

Bedi was not the first woman to break the toxic chain. Women through the years have put their foot down on patriarchy and reclaimed their right to offer a proper farewell to a beloved other. In Chennai, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra - across states, women have broken the norm to either light the pyre or partake in funerals of family members. Read about them here.

A lot of families may have done away with age-old customs that prevent women from funeral grounds. But the stronghold of tradition still persists, across urban, rural and remote areas of the country that still hold patriarchy above all.

Until every woman isn't assured of her right to say goodbye - to a parent, a grandparent, a friend, a cousin - if and when the time comes, the resistance mustn't stop.

Views expressed are the author's own.