Love-cum-Arranged Marriage


This is the latest fashion statement of anybody who is going to get/got recently married. Pray, tell me the meaning of this?

Marriages can happen only in 2 ways – you fall in love with somebody, tell your parents – who are gung-ho about it, or who oppose it – convince them in the latter case; and get married. Or, leave that entire mess of finding somebody to your parents/paraphernalia family – browse thru a couple of photos – say yes to one – meet the girl/boy and say a yes/no. The first one called a “Love Marriage” and the second one called an “Arranged marriage”.

Now what is this Love-cum-arranged marriage then? Ask an explanation to anybody who says his/her marriage is this type and pat comes the reply – Our parents arranged our meeting and we fell his love and got married. Hey! Does that mean that there are “NoLove-cum-Arranged” marriages also? I thought when you married somebody; you either loved him/her beforehand or got to love your spouse after marriage. Why this special tag, then? Do the folks who get married by means of parents fixing the match, feel that it is too unglamorous, that they have to convince others by using this adjective?
Why is so wrong to say that – yes boss my parents found my spouse for me! Anybody who marries the match found by his/her parents ultimately loves the partner right? I have heard folks complaining – “Arre Yaar! Koi ladki nahin mili abhi tak, kya zindagi hai?”. Well, boss – love does not happen that way – you cannot go out into the market and search for it. If it did not happen, well it did not – and if your parents found a nice girl for you, then why feel so bad that you have to inject this phrase and try to make yourself a hero?

There was a time, about a decade ago maybe, when Love marriages were nearly unheard of. In those days, I would see some folks who married this way (after having faced a lot of opposition from family), feeling embarrassed to reveal the fact that theirs was a love marriage. If they themselves felt that they were a sort of stigma to the society – then how can you ever hope to change the opinion of the society about you and such marriages? And, ironically today - if you did not have a Love marriage, you feel so out-of-place that you invent the "Love-cum-Arranged" marriage syndrome!

Comments

Kumari said…
No, i think the term came up somewhere in thelate nineties, when (some) parents decided not to oppose their children's selection and just proceed in a formal manner for the rest. Prior to that i guess the only way love lead to marriage was if you eloped. Maybe that's why the term to signify, "yes we fell in love, yes our parents were awesome enough to arrange this huge wedding for us " :D
8:25 AM
Vidhya Rajesh said…
$ Kumari - Great to hear from you after long. Where are your co-ordinates now ? Write to me sometime.
As for the L-C-A Marriage ... well, this was what I thought too initially ; but after getting explanations from more than a dozen - i gave my conclusion as in the post.
10:26 AM
Usha said…
In a way today's youth have the liberty to find a partner to their liking rather tahn be constrazined by the framework of horoscopes, caste, family background etc which are the key determinants in an arranged marriage. Even then, a lot of youngsters seem less inclined to take the trouble to socialise and find a girl whom they find ideal as a partner. Sometimes it is their nature, sometimes it is their circumstances - in such cases they do prefer to let their parents or family find someone who fit the profile according to their requirements. I was a bit surprised that not everyone actually Wants to find love before marriage!
11:04 PM
Shreya said…
I think u r absolutely right!
1:14 PM
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