No matter whatsoever effort is made or stringent laws formulated to stop polygamy and age difference in marriage, our society is still facing such social anomalies.

Musi Shrestha, a resident of Ward No. 5 in Okhreni Village Development Committee (VDC) of Ramechhap district has become a living example of the problem.

Musi Shrestha, a widow since the past four years became pregnant all of a sudden. Obviously, it was a huge scandal in her village and everyone was eager to know who was behind it. The local elders gathered and interrogated her, she pointed out the finger to Sher Bahadur Gole, a teacher at the local Jana Kalyan Lower Secondary School, Chyasku with whom, she said, had been having sexual relationship since the long time.

But the villagers were not satisfied with her story so they took her to Ward chairman Jung Bahadur Tamang for further interrogation. In addition to her previous story, Musi said that she was also having sexual relationship with her brother-in-law, Buddha Bahadur Shrestha. She, however, said that the teacher was the father of the child she was carrying in her stomach.

Following her confession, the villagers handed over Musi to the teacher. But Sher Bahadur, the teacher handed Musi over to her brother-in-law Buddhi Bahadur by giving him Rs 7,000.

The cultural tradition of marrying the brother’s wife after his death still exists in some rural parts of Ramechap district and accordingly Buddhi Bahadur accepted the pregnant wife of his brother, said an elderly of the VDC.

But Buddhi Bahadur’s neighbours and villagers were not happy with the decision, as Buddhi Bahadur was not the father of the unborn child growing inside the womb of Musi. The villagers decided to expel them from the village and so they took Musi and Buddhi Bahadur out of the village.

This prompted the teacher Sher Bahadur to patch up with Buddhi Bahadur and they together made an effort to hand over Musi to a third person. They collected Rs 16,000 with the teacher contributing Rs 11,000, which they gave to Bhane Shrestha of Sanghutar VDC along with the pregnant Musi. Musi, 30, has now become the 13th wife of 60-year-old Bhane. This was not the first time that Bhane had brought home a new wife along with some money in his hand. All the wives presently live a miserable life. It’s now become a kind of profession of Bhane to accept such women and bring them home, said Gehendra Darlami, secretary of Okhreni VDC.