Polyandry has been practiced here for centuries, but in a single generation it has all but vanished. That is a remarkably swift change in a country where social change, despite rapid economic growth, leaping technological advances and the relentless march of globalization, happens with aching slowness, if at all.
After centuries of static isolation, so much has changed here in the Lahaul Valley in the past half-century ”” first roads and cars, then telephones and satellite television dishes, and now cellphones and broadband Internet connections ”” that a complete social revolution has taken place. Not one of Ms. Devi’s five children lives in a polyandrous family.
“Times have changed,” Ms. Devi said. “Now nobody marries like this.”
Polyandry has never been common in India, but pockets have persisted, especially among the Hindu and Buddhist communities of the Himalayas, where India abuts Tibet.
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One Bride for 2 Brothers: A Custom Fades in India
Polyandry has been practiced here for centuries, but in a single generation it has all but vanished. That is a remarkably swift change in a country where social change, despite rapid economic growth, leaping technological advances and the relentless march of globalization, happens with aching slowness, if at all.
After centuries of static isolation, so much has changed here in the Lahaul Valley in the past half-century ”” first roads and cars, then telephones and satellite television dishes, and now cellphones and broadband Internet connections ”” that a complete social revolution has taken place. Not one of Ms. Devi’s five children lives in a polyandrous family.
“Times have changed,” Ms. Devi said. “Now nobody marries like this.”
Polyandry has never been common in India, but pockets have persisted, especially among the Hindu and Buddhist communities of the Himalayas, where India abuts Tibet.
Read it all.