Have a kid or pay back over $900k, Indian parents tell son in lawsuit

DEHRADUN (India) • An Indian couple are taking their son to court demanding that he and his wife produce either a grandchild within a year or cough up 50 million rupees (S$900,750).

Mr Sanjeev and Ms Sadhana Prasad said they exhausted their savings raising and educating their pilot son and paying for a lavish wedding. Now they want payback.

"My son has been married for six years but they are still not planning a baby. At least if we have a grandchild to spend time with, our pain will become bearable," the couple said in their petition.

The compensation includes the cost of a wedding reception in a five-star hotel, a luxury car worth US$80,000 (S$111,600) and expenses for the couple's honeymoon abroad, the Times of India reported yesterday.

The parents also forked out US$65,000 to get their son trained as a pilot in the United States, only for him to return to India unemployed, the paper said.

"We also had to take a loan to build our house and now we are going through a lot of financial hardships. Mentally, too, we are quite disturbed because we are living alone," the couple said in their petition filed with a court in north India last week.

The couple's lawyer Arvind Kumar said the petition will be heard by the court on May 17.

India has a strong joint family system with many generations including grandparents, nephews, aunts and uncles often living in the same household.

However, in recent years, the trend has shifted, with young couples preferring to move away from their parents or siblings, and wives - such as in this case - opting to work rather than focus on having children and staying at home.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE