The Jharkhand High Court has said that women are obligated to serve their elderly mothers-in-law or grandmothers-in-law. “It is the culture in India to serve the aged mother-in-law or grandmother-in-law, as the case may be, by the wife, in order to preserve this culture,” the court said.

Reciting lines from the Manusmriti, the High Court said, “Where the women of the family are miserable, the family is soon destroyed, but it always thrives where the women are contented.” “In no world has Brahma created a gem superior to a woman (stri), whose speech, sight, touch, thought, provoke pleasurable sensations. Such a gem in the shape of a woman is the fruit of a person’s good deeds, and from such a gem a person obtains both sons and pleasure. A woman, therefore, resembles the goddess of wealth in a family, and must be treated with respect, and all her wants must be satisfied,” the court further said, reciting the lines from ‘Brihat Samhita’.

The High Court also said that “In the Constitution of India under Article 51-A of Part IV-A, wherein the fundamental duties of the citizen of India are enumerated in Clause (f), it is provided ‘to value and preserve the rich heritage of our composite culture…It was obligatory on the part of the wife to serve her husband’s mother and maternal grandmother and not to insist on unreasonable demand to live separately from his old-aged mother-in-law and the maternal grandmother-in-law.”

The court was dealing with a plea challenging an order passed by a Family Court wherein a man was asked to pay maintenance of Rs 30,000 per month to his wife, and Rs 15,000 per month to his minor son.  The court also said that the wife’s insistence to live separately from her in-laws is unreasonable.

The husband in the case said that the petitioner (the wife) had pressured him to throw his mother and grandmother out of the house. He also mentioned instances where the petitioner refused to dine with him until her demands were met.

The wife had claimed that she faced mistreatment at her in-laws’ house and was mentally shocked when pressured for a dowry of Rs 5 lakhs. Due to the mental agony and pressure, she returned to her maternal house in Maluti (a village in Jharkhand).