The Devadasi is a Sanskrit term which means servant of Deva (GOD) or Devi (GODESS). This is a kind of religious practice carried on basically in the southern part of India. In which a girl in her pre puberty period was dedicated to worship and service of deity or a temple for the rest of her life by her parents. They would be ‘married’ to the deity and after the ceremony they are required to perform useful functions at temples like cleaning of temples, lighting lamps, dressing the deities etc. They were also involved in singing devotional songs, dancing in devotion to the deities, teaching music and dance to the girls and to carry on and develop the tradition of classical music and dance. Devadasi’s were respected member of the society and it was believed that they are eternally married suhagan who is never widowed. And their presence in marriage ceremony for the purpose of making mangalsutra was compulsory. It was believe that the bride who wears that mangalsutra will die suhagan.
The system of devadasis was misunderstood by the Mughal rulers and Europeans as because they were totally unaware about the idea of art as an offering to God. As per their understanding girls dancing and singing in temple are doing that for the purpose of entertainment of rich people and they were not better than prostitute.
But this religious practice was deteriorated during medieval period due to destruction of large number of temples. This phenomena leads to degrade the status of Devadasi’s in society and because of their financial problem they became mistress of royal and rich man. Any girl child born from that union was also dedicated to temple and boy born were trained as musicians. This led to the religious prostitution in temples of India which continues till date. The devadasis were exploited by the rich, powerful and upper class people and in the other side their economic needs were not permitted them to leave this practice and ultimately they were driven to the valley prostitution.
The first Law which declares this system illegal was enacted in the year of 1934 in the name of Bombay Devadasi Protection Act. Further the Madras Devadasi (Prevention of Dedication) Act, 1947 outlawed this practice in Madras. In 1988, the devadasi system was completely outlawed all over India. What needed to be done is to think serious about the rehabilitation of devadasi’s in society so to allow them to lead their life with human dignity.
