By Dr Swati Jindal Garg
Indian housewives are that pillar of the Indian society around whom the entire family revolves. Being a homemaker is the most difficult task a person can undertake. In India, housewives are the largest workforce in the country who work 24×7 without questioning, and in return, get paid nothing. In short, housewives are not only hugely overworked, but also the most unappreciated lot of the society.
A recent verdict passed by the Madras High Court in a domestic dispute case that allowed a housewife equal share in her husband’s property significantly expands the rights of homemakers over their husband’s property and has been hailed as a positive sign by both the women’s rights activists as well as advocates. This is the first time that an Indian court has formally recognised the unappreciated contribution of a housewife to her husband’s income. However, the same has been done in a cautious manner as the Court was quick to point out that the verdict is not binding on other states unless the country’s Supreme Court rules along similar lines in the future.
The case involves a couple from Tamil Nadu who got married in 1965. After 1982, the husband moved to Saudi Arabia for a job in order to support his family and earn a better income. His wife, however, stayed back in India, and even though she was not earning and was a housewife, bought several assets, including real estate and jewellery—all using the money the husband sent home from time to time.
On his return to India in 1994, the man alleged that his wife was not only trying to claim sole ownership over all their properties, but was also hiding her gold jewellery and wanted to sell an asset by giving the power of attorney to a person with whom she was allegedly having an affair. The man then proceeded to file a case before a trial court to claim ownership over all the assets that his wife had bought with the money sent by him, including the gifts he had given her which belonged to her. His main contention was that all the assets were bought with his money and the woman only held them on his behalf as a trustee.
In one of the most forward-looking judgments, Justice Krishnan Ramasamy held that a homemaker would be entitled to an equal share in the properties purchased by her husband with his earnings because he could not have earned the money without the support of his wife in looking after the family. “The property may have been purchased either in the name of husband or wife, nevertheless, it must be considered to have been purchased with money saved by their joint efforts,” the judge observed.
He further went on to state: “When the husband and wife are treated as two wheels of a family cart, then the contribution made either by the husband by earning or the wife by serving and looking after the family and children, would be for the welfare of the family and both are entitled equally to whatever they earned by their joint effort. The proper presumption is that the beneficial interest belongs to them jointly.”
What is being hailed by the women rights activists in this judgment is the fact that the Court has proceeded to rule that the wife had contributed equally towards acquiring family assets by doing domestic chores. It also said that the “contribution made by either the husband by earning or the wife by serving and looking after the family and children” would mean that “both are entitled equally to whatever they earned by their joint effort”. In other words, as per the Court’s dictum, it did not matter in whose name the property was bought or who paid for it—the spouse who looked and cared after the family would be entitled to an equal share in them.
The Court also held that the woman’s domestic labour contributed indirectly to earning the money that enabled the purchase of the assets and that her work allowed the husband to be gainfully employed.
Stressing that a wife in any Indian household practically works for 24 hours in various roles, including that of a chef, a “home doctor” and a “home economist”, the Court clarified that in the absence of the homemaker’s duties, the husband would have to pay for the services these roles provided and hence would not be able to invest the same amount elsewhere.
Proving that money saved is money earned, the Court also said: “By performing these skills, a wife makes the home a comfortable environment and her contribution towards the family, and certainly it is not a valueless job, but it is a job doing for 24 hours without holidays, which cannot be less equated with that of the job of an earning husband who works only for 8 hours.”
The Court was also empathetic enough to add that when a woman gave up her job after marriage, it often led to an “unwarrantable hardship” where she did not own any assets and often had to kill her own wants and needs due to not having any assets or income of her own. While there was no law that directly or indirectly recognised a housewife’s contribution, the Court said that there was no law barring judges from recognising it.
Using this reasoning, the Court ruled that not only the immovable assets equally belonged to the husband and wife, but also that the wife was the sole owner of the disputed jewellery in question since she had bought it by pledging the jewellery she got at the time of her marriage, which was her sole property as per the Hindu law.
The judgment is being praised as a big step in the right direction as it recognises, perhaps for the first time, the value of a woman’s domestic labour.
Even though there have been instances where Indian judges have tried to put a notional value to a housewife’s income to award compensation to their families in motor accident claims, the same was done only in a mechanical manner and it can’t be said that the true worth of a housewife’s work was ever truly computed, as not only were the numbers not very large, but also they were not of a quantity that could ever be termed as meaningful. In one of the cases, namely Arun Kumar Agrawal vs National Insurance Co. Ltd., it was held that “in India the courts have recognised that the contribution made by the wife to the house is invaluable and cannot be computed in terms of money. The gratuitous services rendered by the wife with true love and affection to the children and her husband and managing the household affairs cannot be equated with the services rendered by others.… It is not possible to quantify any amount in lieu of the services rendered by the wife/mother to the family i.e. the husband and children. However, for the purpose of award of compensation to the dependants, some pecuniary estimate has to be made of the services of the housewife/mother.”
It is, however, the recent judgement that can be said to be the first time that a meaningful recognition of the homemaker’s right has been calculated. Until now, the only rule that was used in order to calculate the amount of alimony or maintenance that could be granted to the wife was the so called “lifestyle rule” which took into account the status of the husband and the standard of lifestyle enjoyed by the wife prior to separation. If that was fulfilled, it was said that justice has been more or less rendered.
The “lifestyle rule” was used as the statutes are to a large extent mute on this point and do not specifically articulate the wife’s ownership in the husband’s property by recognising her domestic labour which allows him to earn money to buy the asset. This is the first time that the courts have gone beyond the lifestyle rule and have held that the wife has an equal right to the property that is bought with the money that was solely earned by the husband. The courts we can also say have become more egalitarian as this is also the rule that is adopted by the westernised states wherein all assets that are acquired by either the husband’s or the wife’s salary during the subsistence of marriage are treated as matrimonial assets and are divided equally between the two.
Even though it might be too early to celebrate given the word of caution that has been extended by the Madras High Court, saying that the verdict is not binding on other states unless the Supreme Court rules along similar lines, in future it can still be said to be a step in the right direction as where one leads, others will be quick to follow!
—The writer is an Advocate-on-Record practicing in the Supreme Court, Delhi High Court and all district courts and tribunals in Delhi