KHETTERMONI DASSI Vs. KADAMBINI DASSI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a suit brought by a Hindu widow against her co-widow, for partition of the estate of her husband, Nilmoni Dey, who died on the 22nd May 1910. The plaintiff was married in January 1860 and the defendant in 1866. It is admitted that these are the only two heirs whom he left him surviving. The defendant, however, questioned the plaintiff s right to succeed on the ground that she bore "malignant hostility and bitterness towards her husband all through her life." It has been strenuously argued on behalf of the defendant that, under the Hindu Law, she is under the circumstances not entitled to succeed The contention, as I have understood it, is this. That the word Patni (* *) in the text of Yajnavalkya, II, 136-137, means lawfully wedded wife, one married according to one of the approved forms of marriage. The word etymologically means a wife who is an indispensable associate of her husband in religious rites and observances. That being so, she must be a sadhwi (* *) which is defined in Manu thus: **** **** Manu V, 165.

(2.) The passage is rendered by Sir William Jones thus--"While she who slights not her lord, but keeps her mind, speech and body devoted to him attains her heavenly mansion and is called sadhwi by goodmen." I may mention that Haughton in his Institutes of Manu, Edition 1825, page 372, refers to this couplet and the next one as not found in the three copies of Medhatithi that he had the opportunity of consulting. These couplets, however, appear in Kulluk Bhatta s commentaries, and we may proceed upon the basis that they are not interpolations. His note is as follows:: **** **** Namely, that so far as Vak and Manas, speech and mind, are concerned, this verse contains the Vidhan (*) and that, so far as the body is concerned, the mention of it is an Anuvad (*) a repetition, superfluous or self-evident. It has to be remembered that the Manava Dharma Shastra (* *) is a book of mixed religion, morality and law, and in a great many instances contains appeals to one s moral side and it is impossible to accept the whole of it as a legal thesis. These couplets occur in a chapter of miscellaneous character, dealing with edibles, impurities, and methods of purification, and finally with rules relating to the duties of women (stridharma) and can hardly be looked upon as anything more than directions for regulating one s life, some of them in the way of precepts or moral injunctions. Verse 166 says that a woman by this course of life acquires high renown in this world, and in the next, the same abode with her husband. It is quite clear that the word sadhwi has not received the wider meaning that has been given to it in Manu Smriti in dealing with the question of inheritance. In Yajnavalkya the passage about the right of a widow to inherit is the subject of a long commentary. We find that Briddha Manu as there quoted says that "the widow succeeds keeping unsullied her husband s bed, and persevering in religious observances (* *)." Katyayana is also there quoted: "Let the widow succeed to her husband s wealth, provided she be chaste," the word used being abyabhicharini (* *), which admits of no ambiguity. Then we find in the Vyavahara Mayukha, Section 8, Part II, Katyayana is again quoted, followed by a quotation from

(3.) "Harita" which has been thus translated:: If a woman, becoming a widow in her youth, be headstrong (suspected of incontinence,), a maintenance must in that case be given to her, for the support of life," II Cole. Dig., 536, ccccix. The word used is (*) which has been translated as headstrong, (suspected of incontinence)--Sankitavyabhicharaya--See Viramitrodaya, Chapter III, Part I, Section 10. In Vivadachintamani, Harita is again quoted. The passage has been thus translated: "If a young widow is untractable," &c, II Cole. Dig., 538, ccccix. The commentator says that the chaste wife is entitled to the property. In the Vishwakosa, one of the meanings given to the word Karkasa is "unchaste" "Vyabhicharini." In Saraswati Vilash, ? 528, Vishnu is quoted thus: "The share allotted to women who transgress their limits may be resumed"--"who transgress their limits" means "unchaste." Narada is quoted. The passage has been thus translated: "His women if they keep their husband s bed inviolate shall be maintained till their death, but if they do not, they shall not be." Narada xiii, 26.