RGS-SA-2025-wl-5814-Confinements of Conjugality: The Law’s Caring Wives and Working Husbands

Family law scholarship has not given much attention to the use of Restitution of Conjugal Rights (RCR) in the context of care work. The paper examines cases involving employed women living apart from their spouses leading to husbands filing petitions for RCR. Such petitions demand that the wives give up their current employment and take up residence with the husband. The paper argues that the jurisprudence of the Indian courts on this issue has reinforced the sexual division of labour and the extraction of unpaid care work from wives. It also highlights the influence of caste and class on the adjudication of such cases.