The Cruel Economics of Menstruation

From unpaid menstrual leave to clandestine hysterectomies, Beed district exposes the hidden violence of informal labour.

Sugar is not as sweet as you think, especially if it is coming from Beed District in Maharashtra where hundreds of women workers in their reproductive age are not allowed paid menstrual leave. That is not the only inhuman practice invested in women. Based on 2026 reports, Beed district in Maharashtra is considered a major hub for sugarcane labour, sending approximately 1.75 lakh (175,000) workers for sugarcane cutting every year, of which roughly 78,000 are women. A 2019 government inquiry found that over 13,000 (13,861) women sugarcane workers had undergone hysterectomies (womb removal) to avoid losing wages during periods.

The findings emerged from a district-level survey and inquiry committee in Maharashtra’s sugarcane belt, particularly Beed, which examined health records of women engaged in seasonal sugarcane cutting work. The report recorded hysterectomy cases among women workers, prompting concern over consent, medical necessity, and healthcare practices. Officials and health authorities have since reviewed the issue through committees and follow-up assessments, though no single conclusive nationwide figure has been established. But nothing positive towards these women has come out till date.

Clandestine Hysterectomies

The problem does not spring from the fact that The Supreme Court of India in March 2026 refused to make menstrual leave mandatory across the nation, warning it could cause employers to hesitate in hiring women, thus impacting their career opportunities. The problem is that women workers in sugarcane factories in Maharashtra are forced to undergo clandestine hysterectomies if they are on leave during their periods. And they do not complain as they might stand to lose their jobs as they belong to unorganized labour and choose the hysterectomy over losing their jobs often dependent on their sole earnings.

While some states like Bihar have provided 2 days of monthly leave for female government employees since 1992, and Karnataka initiated a policy for private sectors in 2025, no universal, nationwide legislation exists. Women working in the unorganized sector are kept out of these provisions. The tragedy lies in the fact that many of these young women are neither married nor have they produced children. This means that they are being deprived of their basic right to motherhood with premature hysterectomies. The Supreme Court has expressed concern that mandating such leaves could deter employers from hiring women. But isn’t reproduction a woman’s primary choice? Shouldn’t the choice be best left to these women? Besides, not giving paid leave during menstruation to young girls and women violates Article 14 of the Constitutional Law of Equality which is tantamount to making the male a human of priority and the female as “the other.”

Let us take a closer look. Anant Mahadevan, an award-winning film actor and director based in Mumbai, made a fiction film called ‘Bittersweet’ focussed on this issue. His film, in Marathi, explores through the eyes of a very young girl, Suguna, the tragic lives of young and biologically productive women working in the sugar farms of Beed in Maharashtra. The first-person account of a cane cutter, Satyabhama, narrating her ordeal alongside that of other women, led to media headlines describing Beed as “the village of women without wombs.” This piqued Mahadevan’s interest in making the film.

According to a report, Maharashtra has nearly 10 lakh sugarcane cutters, half of whom are from Beed district. Figures cited by civil rights organisations allege that the rate of hysterectomies in Beed is 14 percent higher than in the rest of the state.

The bitter experience of the women cane cutters is an irony that tugs at the social conscience. No man or woman is left untouched by this story of cane-cutters pushed to the wall for survival. ‘Bittersweet’ tells the true story of Satya Bhama, the woman who condemned the ritual of having to remove her womb and compared it to the dark slave ages of America.

Catherine A. MacKinnon in her extensive study ‘Towards a Feminist Theory of the State’ (1989) states that any nation and its law courts measure their standards according to the male experience and this is used to measure female experience as well which begins with discrimination on the basis of sex because the menstruating female with its associated health issues is considered an “exception.”

22-year-old Suguna in Mahadevan’s film is just a speck in the truckloads of sugarcane cutters being transported to Beed as the cutting season of six months begins in October. Her father had already run up a debt of thousands of rupees the previous year and was forced to work for free to repay the debt and also because her father is ill. Suguna has her first experience of cutting sugarcane and is determined to increase the output each day, to earn enough to compensate for her father’s labour who falls ill frequently and has aged beyond his years.

During one of these days, Suguna discovers a harsh truth. She is absent for three days because of very painful period. She learns that she has lost a sizable amount of salary for the absence and has to further compensate the sugar contractor by paying a fine. Then the truth of the region hits her - women here are forced to undergo hysterectomy so that work is not hampered even for an hour. She is faced with a tragic dilemma: lose her womb and womanhood forever or resign to a life of poverty and debts.

Suguna looks to the social activist Goyal for advice and though he asks her to protest against the inhumane norm, the sugar contractor offers to pay her an advance to conduct the operation. The cost of hysterectomy is borne by the contractor who has an arrangement with a gynaecologist and nursing home. But the girl must pay back the money in instalments. Suguna is forced to surrender in the end explaining that she has decided never to become a mother in her life, not realising that that right to her body to conceive, carry and produce a child has been illegally, unethically and wrongly snatched from her forever.

Massive Migration

Mahadevan’s research for the film revealed that lakhs of cane cutters migrate to western Maharashtra from October to March, which is the cane cutting season in the sugar belt. As the drought in the region intensifies, the migration also doubles. Contractors have a problem with the menstrual cycle of the women because it hinders the course of work. During their periods, women would often ask for leave for a day or two. This is unacceptable in the cane cutting culture and attracts a fine, instead of allowing the leave. To get rid of this, Beed women find it better to remove their uterus instead of going through the threatening consequences. The contractors draw up contracts with the husband and wife counted as one unit.

There are 99 private hospitals in the Beed district. 11 of these hospitals have carried out more than 100 hysterectomies in the last three years. In three years, 4605 women have had their uterus removed in Maharashtra and the rate in Beed is 14 times more than that for the State or country and we feel the figures may be higher, he says.

In its bid to outdo Brazil as the numero uno exporter of sugar in the world, sugar barons end up surreptitiously exploiting women labour in the fields, says Mahadevan.

By enticing them to undergo hysterectomy, the system, besides inflicting mental stress on the cutters also defies all-natural biological progression of the human race. The people at the helm are so powerful that nothing can be pinned on them for perpetrating this horrific deed. “Suguna dared to spill the beans. This is her true story, that however was quelled and pushed under the carpet. Bittersweet is a story of survival...killing one’s present to protect their future!” he says.

(The author is a noted film scholar who writes extensively on social issues. Views personal.)