In Hindu India, the role of women is perceived very differently than in North America. Take the first 50 years of India's as an independent nation following its emancipation from Britain. From one third of that time, India had a woman prime minister. In the United States, at least up till the moment I'm writing, if Americans so much as had a strong first lady, half the country would become apoplectic!
Perhaps the reason Hindus seem to feel more comfortable with a female commenderin-chief than North Americans they're because they're constantly exposed to images of powerful goddesses. And the Hindu national epics are full of accounts of intelligent, politically influential women. Or maybe it's because the archetypal role for a women in India is rather than sex object as in the West. You might trust your mother to run the country, but you probably hesitate to have a sex kitten do so!
If you cross the border from Hindu India into Muslim Pakistan, you'll instantly feel the different cultural climate. In most of India, women can travel comparatively free from fear. In Pakistan, a women needs to be covered from head to toe in a heavy robe or accompanied by a male guardian. Otherwise she may find herself in serious trouble.
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