Vol 2 No 1, 2026 Research Article
PhD Research Scholar, Department of Philosophy, Rabindra Bharati University, India
DOI: https://doi.org/10.21659/iw/v2n1/v2n113
[Article History: Received: 14 July 2026. Accepted: 04 October 2026. Published: 11 October 2026]
Abstract
Daini Pratha, the Indian witch-hunt, especially prevalent among central-eastern India indigenous communities, is often interpreted as a consequence of superstition, illiteracy, ignorance, or lack of scientific awareness. While these factors surely contribute to this ongoing practice, they cannot explain its heavily gendered character. This paper analyzes the social conditions under which, particularly, women are targeted and identified as Dainis, and argues that Daini Pratha needs to be understood not only as an isolated belief system but also as a misogynistic practice that puts women’s knowledge, autonomy, and access to resources under scrutiny and suspicion. Historical, ethnographic, and folkloric account of several indigenous communities like Santhal, Munda, Oraon, Ho, Birhor, and others indicates that multiple gender factors are functioning underneath: the female Daini versus the male Ojha; women’s healing, medicinal, and reproductive knowledge; restrictions on women’s participation in ritual and political institutions; and the manipulation of women’s labour, income, and property. Special focus is given to knowledge, because women’s knowledge becomes threatening when practised outside male-dominated institutions. To understand these factors, Matilda Joslyn Gage’s feminist theory of witch-hunting provides an excellent framework. In Woman, Church, and State (1893), she argues that the Western witch-hunt was an intentional suppression of women’s knowledge and institutionalization of male authority. I do not simply imply that the Western witch-hunt and indigenous Daini Pratha are equivalent or that indigenous belief systems are simply patriarchal fabrications. But Gage’s framework is useful in translating how women’s knowledge and authority are weaponized against them. By initiating a conversation between Western feminist thought and indigenous knowledge systems, this study explores whose knowledge is recognized, whose authority is legitimate, and ultimately how that constructs the figure of Daini.
Keywords:
Daini Pratha; Indigenous Knowledge Systems; Witch-Hunting; Matilda Joslyn Gage, women,
