Read the passage given below and answer the question.
Khasi matriliny generates intense role conflict for men. They are torn between their responsibilities to their natal house on the one hand, and to their wife and children on the other. In a way, the strain generated by such role conflict affects Khasi women more intensely. A woman can never be fully assured that her husband does not find his sister's house a more congenial place than her own. Similarly a sister will be apprehensive about her brother's commitment to her welfare because the wife with whom he lives can always pull him away from his responsibilities to his natal house. The women are more adversely affected than men by the role conflict generated in the Khasi matrilineal system not only because men wield power and women are deprived of it, but also because the system is more lenient to men when there is a transgression of rules. Women possess only token authority in Khasi society; it is men who are the defacto power holders. The system is indeed weighted in favour of male matri-kin rather than male patri-kin. (In other words, despite matriliny, men are the power holders in Khasi society; the only difference is that a man's relatives on his mother's side matter more than his relatives on his father's side).
Identify the inherent contradictions in matrilinear systems:
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 2
The correct answer is Option (2) → The separation of the line of descent and inheritance and the structure of authority and control
Option (1) The separation of the line of descent and the rule of residence — Incorrect. The rule of residence says where a newly married couple lives: with the woman’s parents (matrilocal) or with the man’s parents (patrilocal). The contradiction scholars point to is not about residence; it is about who inherits and who controls.
Option (2) The separation of the line of descent and inheritance and the structure of authority and control — Correct. In a matrilineal system descent and inheritance link the mother to the daughter, but authority and control link the mother’s brother to the sister’s son. A woman inherits property from her mother and passes it to her daughter, while a man controls his sister’s property and passes that control on to his sister’s son. The two lines pull against each other, and this is the inherent contradiction.
Option (3) The separation with regard to the rule of residence and the structure of authority — Incorrect. The structure of authority is one side of the contradiction, but the other side is the line of descent and inheritance, not the rule of residence.
Option (4) The separation with regard to place of procreation and place of orientation — Incorrect. The option echoes two terms used for families: the family of orientation is the family a person is born and brought up in, and the family of procreation is the family a person forms through marriage and having children. Every person belongs to both kinds of family in any society, so this is not a contradiction peculiar to matrilineal systems.
Note 1: Box 3.3 on the Khasi matrilineal family, in the chapter ‘Social Institutions: Continuity and Change’, which names this contradiction, was there in the pre-rationalised NCERT, which NTA followed in 2023. This box has been deleted from the NCERT book (2025-26), though the chapter is still there.
Note 2: The concepts behind Option (4), ‘family of procreation’ and ‘family of orientation’, are not in NCERT (2025-26); they have been explained here for the benefit of the students.
NCERT: Indian Society — Chapter 3: Social Institutions: Continuity and Change, Box 3.3 (Pre-rationalised)
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