Indian politics encourages durgas, snubs women.

This article talks about four Indian women--Sonia Gandhi, Jayalitha, Mayawati, and Mamta Banerjee--in contrast with India's stereotypes in the political realm. India is a land of mind-boggling diversity. Yet stereotypes about India, which reduce the Indian reality to a unidimensional monolith, hold powerful sway. One such powerful stereotype is that Indian women are brutally oppressed, denied a voice in their family and community, and marginalized in politics as in other power structures. Without doubt, there is much truth in this stereotype; but how can the current political scene be explained? A few women are holding the entire political establishment of India at ransom. The machinations of Sonia Gandhi, Jayalalitha, Mayawati, and Mamta Banerjee have caused enormous upheavals in the polity and recently brought about the fall of the BJP government. Powerful politicians dance to the erratic tunes of these women and are shamefully submissive to them.