Banks treat women as other’s ‘property’

It takes, on an average, more than 600 days for a victim of railway accident to get his/her compensation because of the lengthy process involved in it.

The Ministry of Railway figures say that it took the 19 benches of Railway Claims Tribunal an average of 605 days to dispose of 762 cases in the last four years (from 2012-13 to 2015-16), while 142 claims are still pending.

Minister of State for Railways, Manoj Sinha said this while replying to a query recently in the Lok Sabha.

Compensation is governed by the Railways Accident and Untoward Incidents (Compensation) Rules. As per rules, exgratia payment is given for immediate need; compensation is given only after the claim is approved by the Raliway Claims Tribunal, set up across the country.

Out of the 142 pending cases 84 are related to death while the remaining are cases of injury. As per government rules, an exgratia payment is given by the Railways after an accident—Rs 15,000 for death, Rs 5,000 for grievous injury and Rs 500 for simple injury. However, for claims, the claimant has to file a claim before the Tribunal. The amount of compensation is paid by the Railways after the claim filed by the claimant is approved. The amount of compensation in case of death is Rs 4 lakh. Admitting that the process of giving compensation is a lengthy one, Sinha said there are various stages involved. On whether any time frame has been fixed for disposal of the pending cases, Sinha said: “It is not possible to indicate any time frame for disposal of pending claims which is a judicial process. However, if a case is completed in all respects, it is disposed of expeditiously. Circuit benches are also arranged by the Tribunal chairman in the benches where posts of members are vacant and pendency of claims cases is high, by deputing members of other benches,” the minister added.

According to a Railway Ministry official, the ministry is also examining a proposal, submitted by an MP, for the creation of a Rail Victim Compensation Fund to provide adequate compensation to victims of rail accidents by levying an additional charge on passenger fare. After the adverse ground reports by intelligence and security grid, Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti has decided to continue with blanket curfew for the 15th continuous day in the entire Kashmir valley to retrieve the situation post Burhan Wani’s killing. Internet services, mobile services also remain suspended while newspapers resumed publication after a gag of five days but their circulation is confined to Srinagar because of severe curfew restrictions. The death toll reached 48 as one more It’s an open secret. Many banks are unwilling to provide home loans to certain combinations of co- applicants, mainly — a father and an unmarried/married daughter, a pair of sisters, and even a brother and a sister. Even as the advertisement campaigns of many public and private sector banks show women in a position of strength and feature women ambassadors, a guarded approach prevails on ground.

It is not without reason, argues Nitin Bhatia, a real estate expert based in Delhi.

“Loans are given upon risk assessment, which in turn depends on the various in- heritance and succession customs in India. If you see the combinations which are allowed (such as father and son, brothers, spouses as coapplicants) and not allowed, you will find they are linked to the inheritance and succession traditions practised in the society,” he says.

He highlights in his blog nitinbhatia.in that lenders are wary of providing loans to a father and a married daughter. “The lender is concerned about who will pay the loan. At the end of the day, what a woman earns after marriage is not Stri Dhan (gifts in the form of money or jewellery a woman receives upon her marriage). Her husband may not allow her to pay the EMIs,” he says.

Of course, the banks have no such policy on paper and it is solely at the lenders’ discretion that such decisions are taken.

Laws too do not discriminate. In the absence of a will, the Hindu personal laws for Inheritance and Succession give daughters full rights over property. In fact, it was over ten years ago, in 2005, when the Hindu Succession Act 1956, underwent a drastic amendment, giving daughters equal inheritance rights over coparcenary property or an “undivided Hindu joint family property” as their male siblings, says lawyer Apoorva Vohra.

But traditionally, “families prefer to hand over immovable property to their sons,” admits a banker who did not wish to be named. This is the general experience, he says, and which is why in order to avoid getting tangled in a dispute and ensure loan repayment, they tread carefully when negotiating loans for these “risky” combinations.

Unmarried daughters and father/mother, however, are given loans on a case-to-case basis — usually when there are no other stakeholders in the property. “Banks think that a daughter as a co-owner is a different entity after marriage. Now assume in case of death of borrower, or father as is often the case, his portion of the property goes to the son, and daughter already owns half (as a co-owner). The son then wants to sell and repay the loan, but the daughter’s ‘new’ family objects. What happens then?” the banker source says.

According to regular procedures, the banks are safe even then. At the time of purchase of property and granting the loan, banks keep the property papers with themselves as security. Banks can sell the property and recover loans in case of default.

According to Ranjana Kumari, director of the Centre for Social Research, it is essentially a “mindset” problem. She says it is bias in society that gives rise to this caution among bankers.

“The property that the father and mother buy can be willed, and the prevalent practice in India is to present it to the son. The parents give some dowry to girls (which becomes another issue). Even the richest of the rich prefer to spend a fortune on their daughters’ weddings and expect the girl to release the property rights to their brothers,” she adds.

“All forms of property should be distributed equally —.whether inherited or acquired. Even now, 99.9% fathers will leave property to their sons.”

Women must be ensured, what Dr. Kumari calls the “Fundamentals of Power” — political power, property rights, and rights over progeny. “And all of these powers, currently, belong to the men in our country in practice,” she says.