Ziona Chana - The Man with 39 wives who Lives in India

The global population crossed the seven billion mark in November 2011. But that doesn’t seem to bother Ziona Chana who with a family consisting of 181 members is on record for heading the largest family in the world.

Ziona Chana with his vast family lives in village called Baktawang which is located in Mizoram, a hilly state in the remote north-eastern part of India. The Chana family lives in a huge mansion consisting of a hundred rooms and spread over four storeys. Not surprisingly the Chana house is the largest in the village and is named ‘Chana That Run’ or in their language, ‘The House of the New Generation’. Luckily for a house of such proportions, all the men in the Chana family work as carpenters.

At 66 years old, Ziona Chana is the proud husband of 39 wives and father to 94 children. Other than these his family also includes 14 daughters-in-law as well as 33 grandchildren. It is only natural for such a large household to run to the strictest domestic routine. Ziona’s eldest wife, Zathiang – all of 69 years old – is in charge of delegating duties and chores. She keeps the women of the family, including other wives, their daughters and daughters-in-law in household chores busy by handing out chores such as cleaning, washing and preparing meals. Every day there is a mountain of washing to be done and all by hand.

Then there is the cooking. The women of the family spend several hours in a day preparing meals for the whole household. A typical meal can see them peeling 132 pounds of potatoes, boiling up to 220 pounds of rice and plucking as many as thirty chickens. All the cooking is done on an open fire which is kept burning through the day.

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But what about marital disputes in a family where one husband has to look after the needs of 39 wives? Apparently Chana does a good job considering that the largely wives get along with each other. The secret of this could be the ‘rotation system’ which decides who gets to sleep with man of the house each night. Also Chana has his own double-bedded room while the wives have to make do with communal dormitories. Interestingly though the youngest wives stay in rooms closer to Chana and the older ones further away. The system seems to be working for Chana who can be found being waited upon by at least seven or eight of his wives at any time of the day. Even the wives appear to be satisfied with the arrangements. This is because, as one of the wives named Huntharnghanki says, the family system is based on 'mutual and genuine love and respect for each and every member of the family' .

Apart from having so many women to pamper him, another reason why Ziona Chana is a much-married man is probably due to the beliefs of his community. Chana is the head of a religious sect that has four hundred members and allows a man to take as many wives as he pleases. Chana told the UK tabloid, Sun that 'Today I feel like God's special child. He's given me so many people to look after. I consider myself a lucky man to be the husband of 39 women and head of the world's largest family’. However religious compulsions do not seem to be the only motive for having so many wives. One of his sons insisted that Chana, whose grandfather also had many wives, marries  the poor women from the village so he can look after them.

India has, after China, the second largest population in the world and is expect to cross China by 2030. Despite having one of the highest economic growth rates, India’s inability to emerge from the shadows of inequality and poverty is consistently blamed on its ever-expanding population. However  proudly Ziona affirms that “We don’t want any help from the government”. Also Chana is far from being done yet. He says that he is even willing to go to the US to marry if that helps in expanding his sect.