In our society, just as engineering is forced onto a teen even before they can figure out what they want to pursue as a profession, in the same way, after said studies, marriage is arranged. You are told you can figure out life later. This hurry in determining and setting in stone our entire adulthood has a definite reason from our parent’s point of view. The fear that we will fall in love.
How sad that the greatest fear of a parent is not the well-being or happiness of their child but the loss of the facade of greatness they build around the child to show off their own self-grandeur. How absurd that their greatest achievement is to have a child who does whatever the parents want just so that they can be termed ‘நல்லபிள்ளை.’ And one of the basic instincts of being human is denied to us just because loving someone doesn’t need or want parental approval. Just because they don’t get to control the narrative, falling in love is termed as bad, and those who fall in love are portrayed as though they don’t love or respect their parents.
This need to be revered in society as a good parent is manifested twofold. One is children considered investments, especially male children – what are they worth? If I spend ‘x’ on his studies and he procures ‘y’ income, then I can get back that amount as a dowry I can demand from the parents of the woman I can arrange for my son to marry, and so he will look after me in my old age.
The other reason is the caste pride that can only be upheld by the female children who marry the person pointed out by her parents, who are otherwise considered worthless and an expense to the parents. So, they need to be ‘protected’ and ‘given in marriage’ only to someone who can uphold their caste pride.
This results in both sexes being groomed right from childhood in specific ways- boys expect wives who do anything they ask, monetary support from the wife’s family even before they make a demand, and girls who are treated as though they already belong to a hypothetical husband. If you want to wear a sleeveless dress, cut your hair, go out somewhere, or do anything outside the boundary already determined – you can do that after you are married with your husband’s permission. We are never taught what exactly adulthood is – because independence is not something that you can even think of – we get only a distorted view of life, which results in many expectations in married life, which are bound to get shattered.
From childhood, we are taught to fear love, and we are told that people who love are cheaters and that they see love marriage as a way to take away the wealth of the woman’s family, right? The terms நாடக காதல், நாடக கல்யாணம் are bandied about by caste traditionalists to create fear about unknown men and their intentions. But who are the actual unfamiliar men we need to fear? Whose only desire is not the woman but the wealth her family has to offer? It is the men foisted upon us just because they belong to the same caste, sub-caste, etc., as the girl’s parents. At Least in a love match, there is a possibility of having known or talked to the man and taking a liking towards him even before contemplating a friendship or relationship, let alone getting married.
But, the real நாடக கல்யாணம் is ‘Arranged Marriage.’ It is where lying for the sake of getting dowry is considered normal – everything is justified with ‘ஆயிரம் பொய் சொல்லி கல்யாணம் பண்ணலாம்.’ No one pauses to think how negatively it affects the two people getting married.
There are so many conditions with this arranged marriage setup to prevent a real relationship from blooming. The power play starts with who approaches whom, as the one pursued is considered to be in high demand, and they feel entitled to ask for more. Many are even shown photos of who they will marry only after the parents finalize everything. And any meaningful conversation is prevented by saying there may be disagreements, and the engagement could break off. But, If the couple can’t even hold a single conversation together before marriage, how do we expect it to survive after marriage?
In this farce, acts of control are romanticized at every step and made to feel like this is the best you can get. Right from the ceremony of seeing the girl, so many little things conceal the fact that there is no real connection between the two. Has the boy asked to see the girl… ooh he likes her; is he asking to talk to her? Of course, he wants her! He can’t stop talking to her and is even buying her a phone! They couldn’t take their eyes off each other while we went to buy the bridal saree! Ooh, they are meant for marital bliss! Both of them are not allowed even to sit together and talk in the open, but the matchmakers revel as though there has been an outstanding achievement. The haze and hope of something that resembles love actually happening conceals all the red flags.
Arranged Marriage involves a transaction of a massive amount of money. In an average person’s lifetime, we don’t spend such an amount for any other instance. Parents don’t think twice about giving their hard-earned money to a stranger only within this setup. Imagine having that kind of resource right when you have finished your studies. What if it could have been used as an investment for a business? Or for personal and health needs? But no, no, no. Parents spend their lifetime savings on their daughters’ marriage without a second thought. And parents of men consider it their birthright to have ownership of the wealth of the woman they arrange to marry their son just because they gave birth to a boy.
Things have gotten worse instead of better in recent years. There are brokers whose commission for arranging the marriage is a percentage of the dowry that would be given to the groom’s parents. The brokers can even be family members too. Guess how much the transactions can be when the commission goes in lakhs. And so, to get the transaction done, anything is said, preying on the desires of both sides. Arranged marriage is a blatant transaction where concealing things is not considered unethical.
Parents on both sides feel they have won, one because of the dowry they received and the other for the bragging rights they get for bagging a reputable groom. But it is all a mirage that disappears immediately after the wedding day, for some even sooner. The lies built up to make the marriage even possible, come crashing down, leaving only disappointment for everyone involved.
In this system, the bride and groom become commodities marketed for someone else’s gain. This system has so infiltrated our minds that there is an expectation for this transaction to be fulfilled even within a love marriage. It is easier for a man’s parents to accept a woman their son loves if her parents can agree to their demands. Women fare the worst as in no other transaction is the commodity being bought -the wife has to pay for being purchased. The only justification for this is flimsy reasons – the woman doesn’t work, she doesn’t contribute to household expenses, she only does housework, the husband only earns and takes care of the household, and so on. Everything is calm and peaceful as long as the wife remains a servant and slave. How can you expect happiness and contentment when there is no emotional bond between two strangers? Only fear of “what the society will say” keeps the marriage intact.
Just like how only after completing engineering do students try to figure out what they want to do as a vocation in the same way husband and wife get to figure out what exactly their need and want only after they are married. In a rare scenario by chance, there is a sync as a couple, and they are content, but for many, it is an everyday frustration, which is longing for an outlet. This arrangement may have worked in the past when arranged marriage was pushed as the only way of security for women, but that’s not the case now. When given the confidence and opportunity, every woman can and does find a way to support themselves. The pressure of parents only results in courting that should generally be out in the open, pursued in concealment after marriage. And in the world of communication and social media, there is an opportunity to indulge in those longings in many ways.
We, as a society, do not like failures. Parents take pride in their kids succeeding in everything in the first attempt. So, from childhood, everything is a competition with peers, reflected in relationships formed with others at every step of life. Marriage also becomes a competition of who has married whom, how much they got, their status, and all that. But when that marriage fails, it becomes challenging to come out of it because all of the family’s resources are tied up in that marriage, and the woman usually has no backup to rely on. Only the broker walks away with the most profit.
At least in recent times, there have been few changes, but for every two steps women have taken forward, men are three steps back. Maybe because this arrangement is profitable for the boy and his parents, their inherent greed makes it harder to let go of. Mothers of the previous generation who were put on a pedestal just for giving birth to a male baby have a hard time letting go, even when said child has become an adult. But it has been easier to accept because girl children are brought up with the thought that they belong to another. However, in recent years, we seem to be collectively regressing backward again with media glorifying arranged marriages.
I remember how, at the time of my marriage, my parents tried to make sure that there was a connection because theirs was one of the few marriages of the previous generation that worked out. I had one primary condition: I needed to converse with him before deciding. We all needed clarification about how this arranged marriage process worked, as the only other marriage that had happened in my family was a love marriage. Unfortunately, I had not fallen in love with anyone at that point. But every attempt to converse with the person I was going to marry was thwarted by his mother. And I naively got so fooled by how he portrayed himself on his Facebook page (a story for another day, perhaps?) that I thought I understood him, and I insisted I wanted to marry him even without talking to him.
After that point was the engagement, and there were too many red flags, but in a haze of his love bombing and people around and family members who kept saying this is how it is and that everyone is this way, we were too confused to decide the marriage (As days went my father wanted to break off the engagement because of the behavior of my fiance’s parents but I was naively adamant). And I, with my rose-tinted glasses on, couldn’t see the red flags for what they were. But ironically, I couldn’t have any actual conversations with the person I married even after our marriage.
I came to know as days went by that his mother was the one who insisted on him marrying me for her gains (even though he loved someone else). And all his bitterness towards his mother was channeled as rage and hatred towards me. When I couldn’t stand that any longer, I asked why he accepted to marry me; his reason was that he had seen interviews of Sivakarthikeyan and other film stars where they said that they matched the women shown by their mothers, and they were so happy and blessed now. That was when I realized how much mainstream media and movies impact collective mindsets.
Of the ten girls who studied PG with me, 5 have a similar marriage story. But how long can this setup work? In today’s world, individuals can satisfy all their physical needs by themselves. The need for a partner is only predominantly for love and companionship. And women now don’t fit into the cages we are put into by their parents or partners. We have access to a vast world beyond what is emphasized as the status quo. So sooner or later, they realize that it is better to come out of the cage, however hard it is.
Won’t it be beautiful if ways are made for relationships beyond transactional? The focus is on the two people who will be in the marriage instead of the audience. That all comes down to choice, right? Parents need to learn to let go of their children’s hands as they enter adulthood and realize that their children’s life of happiness matters more than society’s. The realization will come sooner when we accept that those left in the arranged marriage pool are the dregs and rejects who don’t dare to pursue and stand up for the person they love.
I’m hoping for the day when arranged marriages become entirely extinct, and celebrations of love become the norm instead of being few and far between.
About the Author
Grace
An avid reader and a creative soul finding beauty in everyday experiences and trying to explore different paths and live beyond limitations.
