She said Indians typically speak of the mother-in-law, the “saas” as an agent of evil, while she feels it’s the mother-in-law who kept the family together when the men moved out to seek job opportunities. Most felt she didn't take into account biases against women that begin from the womb. I know I am drawing stereotypes but ” she trailed off in one of her sentences.Many aged women are in a wretched condition here. The bias against women, which is inherent in our rape laws, comes from the British laws.True. I thought she was very bizarre.While the concept of matrimony ads is not exactly seen as particularly progressive, Greer also expressed her amazement at how these ads in India stress upon the educational qualifications in prospective brides.”Did Greer then, in her trademark backhanded style, ended up critiquing the West She did find one supporter in Mumbai though — Flavia Agnes, legal scholar, author and women’s rights activist. But stereotypes cannot be reaffirmed by such blanket terms,” says Kolkata sociologist Abhijit Mitra. The bias against women there is as much. “I was incensed. We demonise the socks knitting machines mother-in-law here, but in many cases husbands beat their wives after the mother-in-law dies,” Flavia says.“So what ” Mitra asked.On Greer’s female foeticide stance, Flavia said: “Because women cannot abort their children, they are abandoning them.Referring to the Dalit and Adivasi women’s protest movement and even to “what happened in that bus in Delhi” (Nirbhaya), Greer spoke in lofty terms of the courage Indian women display when they come out on streets in protest — she glorified the notion of “Shakti”. There are layers of their existence on the financial rung. But really One of the women sitting in the room was feminist activist and well-known theatre personality Dolly Thakore, who confessed she was tempted to leave the room. Preferring the male child is common in the UK, she said. In UK, the conviction rate is much lower — about 7-8 per cent as compared to 24-25 per cent here. “Cherish it, develop it.Prominent British feminist leaves Mumbai agape by rationalising female foeticide with another social evil — dowry Germaine Greer at the Tata Literature Live festival in Mumbai