Hasn't it always been about love? Wonder what I
am taking about? I am taking about marriages. India is a confusing country for
a marriage to exist, to one side we have lots of customs and the rich cultural
vibrancy that at this epitome of ethnic diversity throws about and to the other
we have the largely commercialized and institutionalized gala called a
marriage. Somewhere along the way I start wondering what really is a marriage
about? Is it about two people in love uniting or is it just something done
because everybody else seems to be doing and is it just at the primeval end a
means to keep ones clan running.
The one word that describes the ‘wedding’
industry could be magnanimous; the elusive and lucrative industry has stripped Indian
marriages off its essentialities and replaced them with material substitutes
that corrode an institution that has long been considered scared. The sanctity of
the marriage has been long lost; it has been violated and prostituted. But what
surprises me the most is how people could be so blinded that they could for go
what is essential and indispensible in a marriage, Love.
History is the witness when it comes to
marriages in India. History bears witness to the freedom of choice and the
simplicity of the great Indian weddings. Brides were respected and bridegrooms stood
proud without a price tag. What now
appear to have become a largely commercialized and hyped up cultural gala and
festival with much diminished importance
for the actual wedding was not always so. The advent of arranged marriages are
not so clear to me but must probably they came from a group of controlling
fathers eager to extend their family lineage and false prestiges.
It passes my mind how arranged marriages could
ever succeed, it is incomprehensible to me how two people completely unknown,
unaware of each other even to the slightest character could ever co-exist as
such. At least isn’t that not a gamble? A leap of faith? Of course they succeed
what choice does they have? We live in a
society that taken over by its totalitarian dystopia dictates terms and conditions
on our existence. They expect us to obey and follow the crowd like buffaloes
and those that dare to stand apart are either classified as philosophers or mad
men. Then again I believe, this lack of choice and subjection is the one and
only reason as to why such a marriage should exist, Like my friend so daringly
terms it, A compromise!
Don’t for one second believe that I disagree
with the fact that occasionally there comes a couple that are just perfect or
so near to that place. What we call a real match made in heaven. But isn’t that
just and odd chance a, a play of probabilities? Love marriages or as I call it a
real marriage exists and stems from love the sole reason that appeals to me
when committing to such a demeaning soc ial institution. Why else should one
marry if not for love after all marriage is all about love!