- By Yashashvi Tak
- Wed, 27 Aug 2025 05:29 PM (IST)
- Source:JND
In another dowry case, a 20-year-old woman from Bihar was killed and then hanged by her in-laws in Barkhandi Tola village of Khagaria district, after her family allegedly delayed giving them a gold chain during her brother's wedding.
The victim was married to Vibhishan Yadav about a year ago. Since then, her husband and in-laws allegedly harassed her for dowry, claimed her father, Jago Yadav, a resident of Munger. Speaking to the media, he said that although he had assured them he would fulfil their demands after some time, they refused to relent.
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"I sought two months' time to arrange it," he said, trying to hold back his tears, when another relative chipped in, "Nahi Toh Mar Denge." According to the victim’s family, her husband initially worked as a farmer but later turned to selling ganja and liquor in Bihar, a dry state.
The victim’s brother, Sandeep Kumar, alleged that her in-laws first beat her to death and then hanged her body to make it appear like suicide. “There were injury marks all over her body,” he said. After the post-mortem, her body was handed over to the family. The accused are currently absconding.
"We gave them whatever we could. But they kept demanding a gold chain and a vehicle. I got married two months ago, and that's why they have been demanding a (gold) chain. We said we can't right away and asked for two months. That's why they killed her," the brother said, according to the NDTV report.
Dowry Cases Across Country
According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), nearly 20 women lose their lives every day in India because their families are unable to meet dowry demands.
Dowry not only persists but remains rampant across many parts of India, where, instead of being condemned, it is often normalised, even glorified, by both the groom’s and the bride’s families, women’s rights activist Yogita Bhayana observed.
She cited a study by Jeffrey Weaver of the University of Southern California and Gaurav Chiplunkar of the University of Virginia, which examined more than 74,000 marriages in India between 1930 and 1999. The study found that 90 per cent of these marriages involved dowry, with payments between 1950 and 1999 alone amounting to a staggering quarter of a trillion dollars.
Bhayana added that a sense of male entitlement, coupled with the social conditioning that pressures women to “endure and stay silent,” continues to perpetuate the practice. She further stressed that the parents of victims cannot be completely absolved of responsibility either.