The Position of Widows in Hinduism
Recently, I received a question from a concerned Mr. Bala regarding the position of widows in Hinduism. Unfortunately, there are a lot of negative misconceptions on this issue which leads to needless pain and misplaced disdain in the society. Below are excerpts from his email and my response.
Bala wrote:
"Radhe Krishna,
Namaskaram Swami,
I would like to know why widows are not allowed to do any pujas or activities in the temple. For example: Doing aarathi, they say only sumangali (explained in my response) only can do it…"
"Recently I went to the temple for some special puja, after all the puja finished the gurukkal (priest) asked for three sumangalis to perform aarati, then came three ladies to perform the aarati, of which one of them is a widow. Immediately one of the ladies told her that she cannot do the aarati because she is a widow, later arguements broke out.
I was very upset about the incident, more over it happened in a temple. The worst thing is that the widow cursed the other lady saying that she will also be a widow one day."
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