Gender Inequality in Tara by Mahesh Dattani

The present paper offers a critical feminist reading of Tara, a significant contemporary Indian play by Mahesh Dattani. The play presents a powerful critique of gender inequality and patriarchal ideology operating within the seemingly progressive, urban Indian family. Through the tragic life of Tara, the female protagonist, Dattani exposes how deeply entrenched patriarchal values continue to shape family decisions, medical ethics, and social attitudes toward women. Although the play appears to focus on disability and medical intervention, its deeper concern lies in the systematic denial of female autonomy, opportunity, and identity. Tara’s suffering is not the result of biological fate but of socially constructed gender discrimination. This paper argues that Tara foregrounds patriarchy as an internalized ideological system, sustained through family consent and emotional rationalization, and reveals how gender injustice destroys not only women’s lives but also the moral and emotional fabric of families that uphold it.