Jashodaben

Jashodaben Narendrabhai Modi (née Chimanlal Modi; born 1952) is a retired Indian school teacher.

She is the estranged wife of Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister of India.

Jashodaben was born in 1952.

Her mother died when she was two years old.

Narendra Modi and Jashodaben had an arranged marriage in the custom of the caste of Vadnagar, starting with a family-arranged betrothal in their very early childhood.

According to Narendra Modi's brother, the couple had undergone vivaaha, the religious ceremony of Marriage when Narendra Modi was 18 and Jashodaben was about 17.

A marriage ceremony was held to begin their married life together when she was 17 and he was 18.

Modi abandoned Jashodaben soon after the marriage.

After about two years of being out of contact with all who knew him, Modi returned to Vadnagar and contacted his family.

He had made plans to go to Ahmedabad to work at his uncle's canteen.

At his mother's insistence, Jashodaben came to the family household to maintain their marriage, but her husband objected to the arrangement, insisting on continuing his life on his own terms and encouraging her to continue in her studies.

"He told me once that 'I will be travelling across the country and will go as and where I please; what will you do following me?' When I came to Vadnagar to live with his family, he told me 'Why did you come to your in-laws' house when you are still so young, you must instead focus on pursuing your studies.' The decision to leave was my own and there was never any conflict between us. He never spoke to me about the RSS or about his political leanings. When he told me he would be moving around the country as he wished, I told him I would like to join him. However, on many occasions when I went to my in-laws' place, he would not be present and he stopped coming there. He used to spend a lot of time in RSS shakhas. So I too stopped going there after a point and I went back to my father's house."

Jashodaben said that she spent a total of about three months with her husband during a three-year period before their final separation.

The couple were married in 1968 when she was about 17 and Modi was 18.

A short time into the marriage, her husband, Narendra Modi, abandoned her.

Jashodaben continued with her professional life, receiving a Secondary School Certificate in 1972 or 1974, completing teacher's training in 1976 and becoming a teacher in 1978.

From 1978 to 1990, she taught in Banaskantha district.

In a later interview Jashodaben said that until 1987, she and Modi spoke "normally".

Jashodaben lives with her brother Ashok and his wife in Unjha.

In 1991, she moved to Rajosana village, where she now remains.

She is retired and her pension is inr 14000 per month.

One commentator said that her low salary would have made much of life a hardship for her.

Talking about her relationship with Modi, in one interview Jashodaben said "We have never been in touch... There has been no communication from his end to this day."

In 1992, Jashodaben refused to be interviewed by the newspaper Abhiyan when that publication presented a story on the marriage of her and Modi.

When required to fill out forms on which his spouse was requested to be identified, Modi had repeatedly been leaving the spousal information section blank or just marked with a dash – including in state assembly elections in 2001, 2002, 2007 and 2012.

At political rallies he had said he was single.

Darshan Desai, a reporter for The Indian Express, located Jashodaben in May 2002, but she and others in her village had refused to speak to him and he was told to leave the town.

In 2009, it was reported that Modi's political enemies had discovered her teaching at a school and living in a one-room tenement.

Modi himself did not quite deny that she was his wife, although he did not explicitly acknowledge it either.

Her marriage to Modi was said to be common knowledge in her village.

She was reportedly diligent and well liked as a teacher, especially among her students.

When found by a reporter, she became worried and nervous, saying only "I will not say anything against my husband. He is very powerful. This job is all I have to survive. I am afraid of the consequences."

He did not acknowledge the marriage publicly until he was legally required to do so prior to the 2014 Indian general elections to the Lok Sabha.

In the 2014 Indian general election, Modi contested the Vadodara seat in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Parliament of India.

Under the Representation of the People Act and following recent rulings stating that a complete response was mandatory, Modi was required to declare any previous marriage.

Following legal advice to "come clean" about the issue, for the first time in public and media, Modi acknowledged that he had a wife.

Sombhai Modi, Narendra Modi's brother, issued a statement saying that the arranged marriage had been forced on Modi by his family.

In 2015, Jashodaben Modi retired from her teaching job.

Jashodaben survived a fatal car wreck in 2018.

Rumours had long been circulating that Modi was actually married.