Conflict in eastern India makes it harder for women to claim land rights

MUMBAI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Women in parts of conflict-hit central and eastern India are more vulnerable to violence and eviction from their land because a decades-long insurgency has made it harder for them to claim equal land rights, according to a new study.

Thousands of people, mostly men, have been killed or gone missing in the insurgency since the late 1960s led by rebels known as Naxals, who claim they are fighting for the rights of poor farmers and landless indigenous people. That has left women to tend to families with few resources, including land.