Polyandry is a social system where a woman is permitted to have two or more husbands at a point of time. Marriage is essential in polyandry. There are two types of polyandry: fraternal and non fraternal.

Fraternal Polyandry: In this the husbands of the woman are all brothers. This type of polyandry is common among the Khasas of Dehra Dun. Among other tribes where fraternal polyandry is present in some or the other form, mention may be made of the Gallongs Mala Madessars, Mavilans, etc. of Kerala. Non-Fraternal Polyandry: In non-fraternal polyandry, the husbands of a woman need not be fraternally related to each other. A woman is free to choose partners from among the persons other than her husband’s brothers. She successively lives in the apartment of her different husbands and while she is staying with one, the other husbands have no right to enter. Among the Todas of Nilgiri a woman has perfect liberty to choose any individual as her mate.

In the recent times study of the polyandrous system in India is being conducted by many scholars from the west. Before the raj system in India, some of them remote Himalayan villages were isolated from the rest of world. The only mountain passage to this part would be blocked by six months of heavy snow fall. The raj-system brought roads to these villages, thus, made way for education and other social economic change. Malang is one such village. Polyandrous system is dying in most parts of the country and so is in Malang.

Buddhi Devi is a widow and is still married. She was 14 when she was married to the oldest son of the family. She was subsequently married to rest of the two bothers of her husband. In 1970’s, when new roads were formed in her village, her last husband moved to the town. He worked there as a mason. He later decided to come out of the polyandry and married another women who stays with him in the town.

Buddhi has five children from her three husbands. The children call the oldest husband as Pitaji while rests of the husbands are addressed as chachaji. Buddhi Devi is one among a few in the dying system of marriage in Malang.

Polygamy is practiced by Jaunsar Bawar tribe in Uttar Pradesh: The people here claim that they are descendants of Pandavas. The Jaunsaris are both polyandrous and polygamous, with several brothers sharing several wives and vice versa.

Unlike in most parts of North India it is the boy who pays an exhaustive amount as dowry to the girls parents in marriage. This probably could be the reason for the birth of polyandrous system in the tribe.

In the Pooh and Yangthang tribes of Kinnaur district in UP all the siblings share one wife, thus, they are united together in the form of a big family working on the same piece of land and flourishing. This also led to preservation of the economic sustainability.

The district of Kinnaur with a population of 78,000 has the highest per capita income among the 12 districts of the state.