The nineteenth century had witnessed the pitiable conditions through which the women of India were going. Several evils had affected the girls right from their birth. Some of the social evils are:-
- Female infanticide: It included killing of girl infants just to get rid of the so called burden of a middle class family who would be unable to pay the dowry or in the depression for not having the successor or the boy child in the family.
- Lack of education: The girls were deprived of education. It was considered an excluded factor on the part of the rights of the girls. They having the lack of knowledge of the right or wrong were more drived by the superstitions and the patriarchy society.
- Child marriage: Girls were married at very tender age to elder men. The girl’s family had to go through great hardships to arrange for the dowry to marry off their daughter. Thus the shoulders of a little soul was laden with great loads of family and her married life.
- Polygamy: This system created a sense of insecurity among the married girls where the men could trifle with any women they felt like. Thus the ladies having no importance in anyone’s life and their feelings were least cared.
- Purdah: This system kept the identity of the ladies of the house away from the male members of the family or strangers.
- Sati: This was a ritual which burned the widows live with the dead bodies of their husbands. This was regarded holy not even considering the pain of the women.