In India, when a woman looses her husband her social status is immediately reduced to nil even among higher castes. She carries a burden of spiritual fatefulness towards her deceased husband. The purity she must now observe demands that she be deprived from her femininity. She is therefore pressured to stop wearing colourful clothes, to shave her long hair and is forbidden to attend social events or to celebrate holidays. 

Thousands of widows converge each year to the Holy Cities of India. Vrindavan, where this project is set, is a small northern city host to more than 15 000 widows. They endure high physical and psychological violence throughout their lives and for many of them, the ashrams established around the city are the only safe place to seek refuge and develop a companionship with other women. 

Indian society is starting to address this societal taboo. Human rights organisations have also started providing funds to certain ashrams, but the task is colossal and the stigma is deeply rooted in the culture and mindset of Indian society.