Dowry has drastic socials consequences. Keeping in view the weakened position of women in our society, Justice Ranganath Mishra, in State (Delhi Administration) v. Laxman very aptly observed that “Every marriage ordinarily involves a transplant.
A girl born and brought up in her natural
family, when given in marriage, has to leave the natural setting and come into
a new family. When a tender plant is shifted from the place of origin to a new
setting, great care is taken to ensure that the new soil is suitable and not
far different from the soil where the plant had hitherto been growing; care is
taken to ensure that there is not much of variation of the temperature,
watering facility is assured and congeniality is attempted to be provided. When
a girl is transplanted from her natural setting into an alien family, the care
expected is bound to be more than in the case of a plant. Plant has life but
the girl has a more developed one. Human emotions are unknown to the plant
life. In the growing years in the natural setting the girl, now a bride, has
formed her own habits, gathered her own impressions, developed her own
aptitudes and got used to a way of life. In the new setting some of these are
accepted and some she has to surrender. This process of adaptation is not and
cannot be one sided. Give and take, live and let live, are the ways of life and
when the bride is received in the new family, she must have a feeling of
welcome and by the fond bonds of love and affection, grace and generosity, attachment
and consideration that she may receive in the family of the husband, she will
get into a new mould; which would last for her life. She has to get used to a
new set of relationships -one type with the husband another with the parents-in
law, a different one with the other elders and yet a different one with younger
ones in the family. For this she would require loving guidance.
The elders in the family, including the mother-in-law are expected to show her the way. The husband has to be stand as a mountain of support ready to protect her and espouse her cause where she is on the right and equally ready to cover her either by pulling her up or protecting her willingly taking the responsibility on to himself when she is at fault. The process has to be a natural one and there has to be exhibition of cooperation and willingness from every side. Otherwise, how would the transplant succeed?”
