Wife's salary & expenses disclosure to husband and vice versa

This is one of the wierdest question I have faced on the forum. Seniors correct me if my analysis is wrong.

1) You being a hindu your marriage is a sacrament rather then a contract. So practically you cannot force your wife to tell her salary.

2) The court has in many cases involving marital disputes opined that it is the duty of both husband and wife to share house hold responsibility. This involves sharing burdens like house hold work and financial responsibility. I am talking here about "Sharing" and not that women should only do house hold work.

Thanks for your reply Akashji.

I agree & confirm that i have only requested and not forced my wife to share salary & expense details.

Also agree & appreciate your point on sharing houshold work.

I believe "non working" woman in India have been the most helpless. Example: My father enjoys his retired life after 60 years but, what about my mother (a housewife)? is there no retirement for her? (BTW i started giving allowance to my Mom soon after i started earning & i don't let her use it for household expenses). Due to my busy schedule i don't have time for household work so, i have taken the responsibility of paying for house-help lady's salary. Now. i am planning to hire a cook as my aging mother does not have the strength to cook alone. 

If my wife can't help in houshold work & cooking, i believe she also should equally contribute to the expenses of hiring a help.

I record all my income & expenditure and share it with my wife diligently. Now, i want to move towards a phase where me & my wife plan our finances together keeping in mind the requirements of our familiy plus her parents.

My question is...how do we make working woman equally responsible financially if they don't even share their salary and not open to discuss how we spend it?

Thanks,

Shashank

Originally posted by : Shashank Raj
	Hello, Does husband have right to know wife's salary details & how it is spent? My wife refuses to share her salary & expense details stating that she requires it for her parent's family only. I document every rupee i spend (both on myself & family) & report it out to my wife & urge her to do the same. I am fine with it as long as we discuss & take a joint decision of how we spend our respective salaries for our family & our respective parents' family. I am happy to see my wife working for her parents well being but, unhappy that she does not actively participate in domestic work at our home (with me & my parents). Also, the entire financial responsibility of our home, upcoming expenses of our kid, savings, retirement planning,etc. is only on me. is it unfair to ask my wife to share domestic & financial responsibilities? Thanks, Shashank

Morally you are entitled to know.  And it is dharma of wife to listen to husband and his instructions and be of use to him domestically, in bed, and also financially wherever possible. But these are for women of character.  Women of character are not found today, but rare.  Todays woman stand neck to neck shoulder to shoulder in terms of earning capacity.  The more they earn, lesser is the respect for husband, it becomes even less if husband earns lesser than her or does not earn at all.

There are women who are the ideal naari even today.  But finding such wife is very difficult.  Marriage's name is adjustment.  If you want earning wife, you need to tolerate all baggage which comes with it, from attitude to being head strong or not paying repect to husband or parent inlaws.

Nothing wrong in her wanting to share her income with her parents.  All this should have been discussed before getting married.  That would only help you guys to understand better each other and not to enter forums like these.

Legally you cant do anything that she should share information with your about where she spends and not.  You can simply track her movements, but that will create doubt in her mind too, the way she has created doubt in your mind.  It appears the relationship is slowly marching towards a point of no return.

So dont meddle with this matter too much nor break your head regarding this. These are small things. You adjust and everything will be fine.  You dont adjust and sooner or later you both will be waiting outside main door of Family Court of your district.