Roop Kanwar

Roopkoonvar Kanwar was a teenage Rajput widow in India who was burned on her husband's funeral pyre in an act of Sati at Deorala village in Rajasthan, India. At the time, she was 18 years old and had been married for eight months to Maal Singh Shekhawat, who had died a day earlier at the age of 24. They had no children. The crowd which witnessed her death approved of the act and regarded it as entirely voluntary. Her death prompted public debate in India over the practice of Sati. Roop Kanwar's death led to changes in both state and national laws to prevent sati. 45 people were charged in relation to her death, by 2024, all had been acquitted.