After news broke out about a Class XII Sociology textbook in Maharashtra listing "ugliness" as one of the reasons for dowry to exist in society, several feminists who lost their jobs overnight have decided to start beauty parlours.
"I was working in an NGO that deals with domestic violence," says 43-year-old Ritu. "There, we used to get many cases where women were being harassed for dowry. We used to spend hours counseling these women when we should have just given them a nice facial."
An enlightened Ritu is currently looking for good deals on make-up on Amazon and other e-vendor sites to prevent gender-based violence in the country. Other feminists who've at last got some sense knocked into their heads are helping her.
20-year-old Malini, who is Ritu's subordinate, says, "I'm still not married. So after spending hours on the computer helping Rituji, I make sure I put cucumber slices on my eyes. Otherwise, if I get dark circles, my ugliness levels will go up and my father will have to pay extra dowry."
But what if the women become too beautiful for their own good? Won't it then be their own fault for increasing gender-based violence in the country?
"We don't have to worry about the women becoming too pretty and attracting unwanted attraction," Ritu explains. "Especially if they're in UP."
She points out that Amit Shahji has benevolently promised an anti-Romeo squad to save girls from "evil eyes" and that she hopes this wonderful scheme will be extended to the entire country.
Meanwhile, Alok, a certified Romeo who had previously committed to spending the rest of his lifetime outside a women's college says, "I really wanted to do only love marriage because I'm very sincere in loving. Any girl is ok. I used to send 'I luv u' to all girl profiles on Facebook. But things have now become very difficult for people like me."
Alok is considering a compromise and deciding on an arranged marriage after all. "See, love marriage means I can't ask for too much dowry. If I tell the girl's father your daughter is ugly, so give more money, he will ask then why did you do love marriage? But in arranged marriage, I will be saving an ugly's girl life and also becoming well-settled myself."
The research so beautifully presented in the Maharashtra textbook has had international repercussions.
Last year, filmmaker Ram Gopal Varma, who has spent years coming up with a systematic method of categorizing ugliness in human beings succeeded in boiling it all down to one simple equation: Dark skin = ugly. He had ably pointed out that while Melania Trump was very attractive, Michelle Obama was decidedly not so.
After the revelations made in the Maharashtra textbook, Donald Trump (who follows his ardent fan Varma on Twitter) has reportedly called for an investigation on the dowry demands made by Barack Obama at the time of his marriage with Michelle.
A small section of society, however, is not convinced by the statements made in the Maharashtra textbook. They've called the text downright stupid. Reacting to this, the authors of the book have said, "Why are they complaining? Don't they think about the jawans at the border?"
