New Delhi: Young Indian women fear and loathe her. Soap operas showcase her iron-fisted rule. And sociologists spend hours debating the torment she is accused of unleashing across the country.
Mothers-in-law have long been demonised and parodied all over the world. But they have an especially fearsome reputation in India, where stories of bitter and abusive struggles with their daughters-in-law abound.
According to a new book, relationships between mothers-in-law and their son's wives have never been more dysfunctional in India, where it says rapid modernisation has collided with staunch family traditions.
"It's a phenomenon that started around the year 2000 and has been building ever since," said Veena Venugopal, author of "The Mother-in-Law: The other woman in your marriage". "This is the worst generation for mother and daughter-in-law conflict," she told AFP.
Women, especially in isolated, rural India, have historically married young and joined their husband's family under one roof -- where they were placed at the bottom of the pile and often relegated to performing household chores.
India's economic liberalisation in the 1990s brought double-digit growth coupled with social progress that allowed legions more women to pursue higher education and a career in cities. Like their peers in the Western world, these middle-class urban Indian women have also started delaying marriage and having fewer children.
But such social changes are often not accepted by their mothers-in-law many of whom are stuck in a different age, Venugopal argued. "Daughters-in-law are more educated and have more options and want to make more decisions for themselves and yet they are trapped in these marriages," said Venugopal, an editor at The Hindu Business Line newspaper.
The book details 11 cases of middle-class women across the country and their relationships with their husband's families. One bride, a television journalist, was forced to hand over her salary every month to her mother-in-law who also forcibly took charge of bringing up her two young children.
She was never allowed to sit on a couch, chair or bed, only a concrete surface in the home that she shared with her husband's extended family, for whom she was expected to cook and clean after finishing her day job. "These are people you come across in your professional life and never imagine that they live such traumatised lives behind closed doors," Venugopal said.
