‘Ugly girls can be married off’: Nursing college sociology textbook lists dowry ‘merits’

A photo of a book page, listing the "merits" of the dowry system, is going viral on social media. The page is said to be from Textbook of Sociology for Nurses by T K Indrani. The book is a reading material for nursing students and its cover says it is written as per the Indian Nursing Council syllabus. Several netizens have expressed their disappointment over the book’s content.

The book states that dowry is helpful in establishing new household with furniture, appliances such as refrigerators and vehicles.

It then lists girls getting a share of parental property in dowry as another "merit".

It also states that an "an indirect advantage" of the dowry system is that parents have now started educating their girls so that they have to give less dowry.

The last point in the page says the dowry system can help marry off "ugly looking girls".

Shiv Sena leader and Rajya Sabha MP Priyanka Chaturvedi on Monday wrote a letter to Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan to call off this book from curriculum as well as circulation and underlined that their presence in our curriculum is a "shame".