This is the story of Orola Dalbot, 28, a woman from Mandi Tribe located in the North-Central remote hill area of Bangladesh. Orola and her mother shares same Husband as the ritual of her tribe since last 25 years.
Noten is the name of her husband cum father and her mother Mittamoni married him when her first husband died. Orola’s mother was alone and tribe offered her to marry Noten who was 17 that time but on a condition that he has to marry Orola, too. Orola said that her mother is very lucky and she hoped she would find a husband like Orola.
Orola and her mother became Noten’s bride on the same day when she was only 3 years old which is a traditional ritual of Mandi tribe. Orola said that she wanted to run away when she found it and wanted her own husband because ethnic Mandi women are free to choose her husband and this is a complete unjust in her eyes.
At the age of 28, Orola is the mother of three, a boy and two girls with Noten. The family is very poor and lives in a mud house with no water and electricity but Mittamoni and Orola owns a few acres of land where they do bananas and pineapples farming.
Those who belong to Mandi tribe, wherever they live they have to follow same rituals. If a widow wishes to remarry she must choose a man from her late husband’s clan and for the widow to get married she has to serve her daughter to her husband as his wife. He can have sex and children with her. Many catholic missionaries converted almost 80 percent of Mandi and treated it as uncivilized practices and are sin.
In Mandi tribe, women are the heads of household and all property and this has been happening since generations. Man do not propose woman, women propose man for marriage.
There are also some strange cases of groom kidnapping came in limelight where Mandi women abducts good looking and powerful husbands but there are no official records about it. People don’t want to talk about it but they follow mother-daughter custom while the local church has glower on have keeping more than one wife.
Noten is the name of her husband cum father and her mother Mittamoni married him when her first husband died. Orola’s mother was alone and tribe offered her to marry Noten who was 17 that time but on a condition that he has to marry Orola, too. Orola said that her mother is very lucky and she hoped she would find a husband like Orola.
Orola and her mother became Noten’s bride on the same day when she was only 3 years old which is a traditional ritual of Mandi tribe. Orola said that she wanted to run away when she found it and wanted her own husband because ethnic Mandi women are free to choose her husband and this is a complete unjust in her eyes.
At the age of 28, Orola is the mother of three, a boy and two girls with Noten. The family is very poor and lives in a mud house with no water and electricity but Mittamoni and Orola owns a few acres of land where they do bananas and pineapples farming.
Those who belong to Mandi tribe, wherever they live they have to follow same rituals. If a widow wishes to remarry she must choose a man from her late husband’s clan and for the widow to get married she has to serve her daughter to her husband as his wife. He can have sex and children with her. Many catholic missionaries converted almost 80 percent of Mandi and treated it as uncivilized practices and are sin.
In Mandi tribe, women are the heads of household and all property and this has been happening since generations. Man do not propose woman, women propose man for marriage.
There are also some strange cases of groom kidnapping came in limelight where Mandi women abducts good looking and powerful husbands but there are no official records about it. People don’t want to talk about it but they follow mother-daughter custom while the local church has glower on have keeping more than one wife.
