Married 89 times— going for his century

Press, 29 January 1986, Page 17

Married 89 times— going for his century

From

NAGESH RAO,

Bhubaneswar, India

Udayanath Dakhinray is a man with a mission. The amorous, 61-year-old "barefoot doctor” of Orali village in the east coast Indian state of Orissa intends to marry 100 women. So far, he has 89 marriages to his credit — and is still going strong although he presently lives with only one woman, Meerani, his 75th wife. Five other wives also live in the vicinity, but 57 have deserted the elderly Indian Casanova and 26 have died in the 34 years since he embarked on his matrimonial spree. “I am experimenting with this thing called sex and with man’s capacity to make love,” says Dakhinray. “My jjives have come in all sizes ana shapes and from different parts of the coun-

try. I hope to score a century." Polygamy on a fairly grand scale, he points out, is something of a family tradition. His father married 13 women and his grandfather nine. Yet he insists that he started out in married life very much a one-woman man. He married his first wife, Shivapriya, in 1949, the year before graduating in science from Calcutta’s City College. Two weeks after the wedding, she left to continue her studies — and never returned. A year later, Dakhinray married again, but wife number two died in childbirth 18. months later. Dakhinray, at that time a well-to-do farmer, then married Basantilata, the; wife who, with her three sons,£till occupies the double storey family home built

by Udayanath Dakhinray. Her husband lives with Meerani in a ramshackle hut some distance away, wives one, three and four having wrested the family estate from him in a series of legal actions over the years.

"That house is a painful reminder to me of some wives and their treachery,” says Dakhinray, who now manages to make ends meet operating as a “barefoot doctor,” treating local villagers for a variety of ailments. But he still speaks warmly of wife No. 4, Satyabhama, whom he credits with hewing brought

him luck. “She inspired many of my subsequent women,” he enthuses.

Satyabhama, who now lives in the nearby village of Apanda, shrugs off her estranged husband’s comments. But she notes: “He does have that air of authority that makes him truly frightening for any young woman and, I suppose, more attractive.”

It is from the marriage to Satyabhama that Dakhinray dates his matrimonial marathon and he proudly recounts the times when he shared his pedchamber with up to 12 wives at

any one time. Most of the women in his much-wedded life came to him through the use of a traditional marriage broker, who was able to paint an extremely rosy picture of his prospects, especially when he still owned the 170hectare farm. The broker, a family friend, seems, in all cases, to have avoided mention of any other wives. "My brother, who gave me away in marriage, didn’t know Udayababu (father) was already married,” admits Meerani, wife No. 75. “I also did not know. And not that he had earlier married 74 times. But that does not mean I am unhappy. Far from it. “I have also seen 14 girls coming after me, but all of them ran away. I do not know what he

does. He brings his wives. I have no say in the matter,” Meerani says. So what is the secret of his success as an Indian Lothario? Dakhinray beams. “I am still fit,” he says, and proceeds to reel off stories of mystical experiences, laying claim to expertise in both yoga and sorcery. This multitude of talents, he proclaims, will enable him to overcome his present, rather impoverished state, and allow the relentless march to 100 marriages. “Really, I suppose I fully subscribe to the Rajneesh philosophy of realising God and self through sex,” he notes. “And I do regard marriage as sacred.” Copyright — London Observer t Service.