Article 20

Arranging a Marriage in IndiaSerena Nanda

John Jay College of Criminal Justice

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IN INDIA, ALMOST ALL MARRIAGES AREarranged. Even among the educated mid-dle classes in modern, urban India, mar-riage is as much a concern of the familiesas it is of the individuals. So customary isthe practice of arranged marriage that thereis a special name for a marriage which isnot arranged: It is called a “love match.”

On my first field trip to India, I metmany young men and women whose par-ents were in the process of “getting themmarried.” In many cases, the bride andgroom would not meet each other beforethe marriage. At most they might meetfor a brief conversation, and this meetingwould take place only after their parentshad decided that the match was suitable.Parents do not compel their children tomarry a person who either marriage part-ner finds objectionable. But only afterone match is refused will another besought.

As a young American woman in Indiafor the first time, I found this custom ofarranged marriage oppressive. Howcould any intelligent young person agreeto such a marriage without great reluc-tance? It was contrary to everything I be-lieved about the importance of romanticlove as the only basis of a happy mar-riage. It also clashed with my stronglyheld notions that the choice of such anintimate and permanent relationshipcould be made only by the individuals in-volved. Had anyone tried to arrange mymarriage, I would have been defiant andrebellious!

Young men and womendo not date and havevery little social life

involving members ofthe opposite sex.

At the first opportunity, I began, withmore curiosity than tact, to question theyoung people I met on how they feltabout this practice. Sita, one of myyoung informants, was a college gradu-ate with a degree in political science. Shehad been waiting for over a year whileher parents were arranging a match forher. I found it difficult to accept the doc-ile manner in which this well-educatedyoung woman awaited the outcome of aprocess that would result in her spendingthe rest of her life with a man she hardlyknew, a virtual stranger, picked out byher parents.

“How can you go along with this?” Iasked her, in frustration and distress.“Don’t you care who you marry?”

“Of course I care,” she answered.“This is why I must let my parents choosea boy for me. My marriage is too impor-tant to be arranged by such an inexperi-enced person as myself. In such matters,it is better to have my parents’ guid-ance.”

I had learned that young men andwomen in India do not date and havevery little social life involving membersof the opposite sex. Although I could notdisagree with Sita’s reasoning, I contin-ued to pursue the subject.

“But how can you marry the first manyou have ever met? Not only have youmissed the fun of meeting a lot of differ-ent people, but you have not given your-self the chance to know who is the rightman for you.”

“Meeting with a lot of different peo-ple doesn’t sound like any fun at all,”Sita answered. “One hears that in Amer-ica the girls are spending all their timeworrying about whether they will meet aman and get married. Here we have thechance to enjoy our life and let our par-ents do this work and worrying for us.”

She had me there. The high anxiety ofthe competition to “be popular” with theopposite sex certainly was the mostprominent feature of life as an Americanteenager in the late fifties. The endlessworrying about the rules that governedour behavior and about our popularityratings sapped both our self-esteem andour enjoyment of adolescence. I re-flected that absence of this competitionin India most certainly may have contrib-uted to the self-confidence and naturalcharm of so many of the young women Imet.

And yet, the idea of marrying a per-fect stranger, whom one did not know

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Article 20. Arranging a Marriage in India

and did not “love,” so offended myAmerican ideas of individualism and ro-manticism, that I persisted with my ob-jections.

“I still can’t imagine it,” I said. “Howcan you agree to marry a man you hardlyknow?”

“But of course he will be known. Myparents would never arrange a marriagefor me without knowing all about theboy’s family background. Naturally wewill not rely only on what the family tellsus. We will check the particulars out our-selves. No one will want their daughterto marry into a family that is not good.All these things we will know before-hand.”

Impatiently, I responded, “Sita, Idon’t mean know the family, I mean,know the man. How can you marrysomeone you don’t know personally anddon’t love? How can you think of spend-ing your life with someone you may noteven like?”

“If he is a good man, why should I notlike him?” she said. “With you people,you know the boy so well before youmarry, where will be the fun to get mar-ried? There will be no mystery and no ro-mance. Here we have the whole of ourmarried life to get to know and love ourhusband. “This way is better, is it not?”

Her response made further sense, andI began to have second thoughts on thematter. Indeed, during months of meet-ing many intelligent young Indian peo-ple, both male and female, who had thesame ideas as Sita, I saw arranged mar-riages in a different light. I also saw theimportance of the family in Indian lifeand realized that a couple who took theirmarriage into their own hands was takinga big risk, particularly if their familieswere irreconcilably opposed to thematch. In a country where every impor-tant resource in life—a job, a house, a so-cial circle—is gained through familyconnections, it seemed foolhardy to cutoneself off from a supportive social net-work and depend solely on one personfor happiness and success.

Six years later I returned to India toagain do fieldwork, this time among themiddle class in Bombay, a modern, so-phisticated city. From the experience ofmy earlier visit, I decided to include astudy of arranged marriages in my

project. By this time I had met many In-dian couples whose marriages had beenarranged and who seemed very happy.Particularly in contrast to the fate ofmany of my married friends in theUnited States who were already in theprocess of divorce, the positive aspectsof arranged marriages appeared to me tooutweigh the negatives. In fact, I thoughtI might even participate in arranging amarriage myself. I had been fairly suc-cessful in the United States in “fixingup” many of my friends, and I was con-fident that my matchmaking skills couldbe easily applied to this new situation,once I learned the basic rules. “After all,”I thought, “how complicated can it be?People want pretty much the same thingsin a marriage whether it is in India orAmerica.”

In a society wheredivorce is still a scandal

and where, in fact, the di-vorce rate is exceedingly low, an arranged mar-

riage is the beginning of a lifetime relationship not

just between the bride and groom but between their

families as well.

An opportunity presented itself al-most immediately. A friend from myprevious Indian trip was in the process ofarranging for the marriage of her eldestson. In India there is a perceived short-age of “good boys,” and since myfriend’s family was eminently respect-able and the boy himself personable,well educated, and nice looking, I wassure that by the end of my year’s field-work, we would have found a match.

The basic rule seems to be that a fam-ily’s reputation is most important. It isunderstood that matches would be ar-ranged only within the same caste andgeneral social class, although somecrossing of subcastes is permissible if theclass positions of the bride’s andgroom’s families are similar. Althoughdowry is now prohibited by law in India,extensive gift exchanges took place with

every marriage. Even when the boy’sfamily do not “make demands,” everygirl’s family nevertheless feels the obli-gation to give the traditional gifts, to thegirl, to the boy, and to the boy’s family.Particularly when the couple would beliving in the joint family—that is, withthe boy’s parents and his married broth-ers and their families, as well as with un-married siblings—which is still verycommon even among the urban, upper-middle class in India, the girls’ parentsare anxious to establish smooth relationsbetween their family and that of the boy.Offering the proper gifts, even when notcalled “dowry,” is often an importantfactor in influencing the relationship be-tween the bride’s and groom’s familiesand perhaps, also, the treatment of thebride in her new home.

In a society where divorce is still ascandal and where, in fact, the divorcerate is exceedingly low, an arranged mar-riage is the beginning of a lifetime rela-tionship not just between the bride andgroom but between their families as well.Thus, while a girl’s looks are important,her character is even more so, for she isbeing judged as a prospective daughter-in-law as much as a prospective bride.Where she would be living in a jointfamily, as was the case with my friend,the girls’s ability to get along harmoni-ously in a family is perhaps the singlemost important quality in assessing hersuitability.

My friend is a highly esteemed wife,mother, and daughter-in-law. She is reli-gious, soft-spoken, modest, and deferen-tial. She rarely gossips and neverquarrels, two qualities highly desirablein a woman. A family that has the repu-tation for gossip and conflict among itswomenfolk will not find it easy to getgood wives for their sons. Parents willnot want to send their daughter to ahouse in which there is conflict.

My friend’s family were originallyfrom North India. They had lived inBombay, where her husband owned abusiness, for forty years. The family haddelayed in seeking a match for their el-dest son because he had been an AirForce pilot for several years, stationed insuch remote places that it had seemedfruitless to try to find a girl who would bewilling to accompany him. In their social

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class, a military career, despite its eco-nomic security, has little prestige and isconsidered a drawback in finding a suit-able bride. Many families would not al-low their daughters to marry a man in anoccupation so potentially dangerous andwhich requires so much moving around.

The son had recently left the militaryand joined his father’s business. Since hewas a college graduate, modern, and welltraveled, from such a good family, and, Ithought, quite handsome, it seemed tome that he, or rather his family, was in aposition to pick and choose. I said asmuch to my friend.

While she agreed that there weremany advantages on their side, she alsosaid, “We must keep in mind that my sonis both short and dark; these are draw-backs in finding the right match.” Whilethe boy’s height had not escaped my no-tice, “dark” seemed to me inaccurate; Iwould have called him “wheat” coloredperhaps, and in any case, I did not realizethat color would be a consideration. Idiscovered, however, that while a boy’s

skin color is a less important consider-ation than a girl’s, it is still a factor.

An important source of contacts intrying to arrange her son’s marriage wasmy friend’s social club in Bombay.Many of the women had daughters of theright age, and some had already ex-pressed an interest in my friend’s son. Iwas most enthusiastic about the possibil-ities of one particular family who hadfive daughters, all of whom were pretty,demure, and well educated. Their motherhad told my friend, “You can have yourpick for your son, whichever one of mydaughters appeals to you most.”

I saw a match in sight. “Surely,” I saidto my friend, “we will find one there.Let’s go visit and make our choice.” Butmy friend held back; she did not seem toshare my enthusiasm, for reasons I couldnot then fathom.

When I kept pressing for an explana-tion of her reluctance, she admitted,“See, Serena, here is the problem. Thefamily has so many daughters, how willthey be able to provide nicely for any ofthem? We are not making any demands,

but still, with so many daughters tomarry off, one wonders whether she willeven be able to make a proper wedding.Since this is our eldest son, it’s best if wemarry him to a girl who is the onlydaughter, then the wedding will truly bea gala affair.” I argued that surely thequality of the girls themselves made upfor any deficiency in the elaborateness ofthe wedding. My friend admitted thispoint but still seemed reluctant to pro-ceed.

“Is there something else,” I asked her,“some factor I have missed?” “Well,”she finally said, “there is one other thing.They have one daughter already marriedand living in Bombay. The mother is al-ways complaining to me that the girl’sin-laws don’t let her visit her own familyoften enough. So it makes me wonder,will she be that kind of mother who al-ways wants her daughter at her ownhome? This will prevent the girl from ad-justing to our house. It is not a goodthing.” And so, this family of five daugh-ters was dropped as a possibility.

Even today, almost all marriages in India are arranged. It is believed that parents are much more effective at deciding whom their daughters should marry.

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Article 20. Arranging a Marriage in India

Somewhat disappointed, I neverthe-less respected my friend’s reasoning andgeared up for the next prospect. This wasalso the daughter of a woman in myfriend’s social club. There was clear in-terest in this family and I could see why.The family’s reputation was excellent; infact, they came from a subcaste slightlyhigher than my friend’s own. The girl,who was an only daughter, was prettyand well educated and had a brotherstudying in the United States. Yet, afterexpressing an interest to me in this fam-ily, all talk of them suddenly died downand the search began elsewhere.

“What happened to that girl as a pros-pect?” I asked one day. “You never men-tion her any more. She is so pretty and soeducated, what did you find wrong?”

“She is too educated. We’ve decidedagainst it. My husband’s father saw thegirl on the bus the other day and thoughther forward. A girl who ‘roams about’the city by herself is not the girl for ourfamily.” My disappointment this timewas even greater, as I thought the sonwould have liked the girl very much. Butthen I thought, my friend is right, a girlwho is going to live in a joint family can-not be too independent or she will makelife miserable for everyone. I alsolearned that if the family of the girl haseven a slightly higher social status thanthe family of the boy, the bride may thinkherself too good for them, and this toowill cause problems. Later my friend ad-mitted to me that this had been an impor-tant factor in her decision not to pursuethe match.

The next candidate was the daughterof a client of my friend’s husband. Whenthe client learned that the family waslooking for a match for their son, he said,“Look no further, we have a daughter.”This man then invited my friends to din-ner to see the girl. He had already seentheir son at the office and decided that“he liked the boy.” We all went togetherfor tea, rather than dinner—it was less ofa commitment—and while we werethere, the girl’s mother showed usaround the house. The girl was studyingfor her exams and was briefly introducedto us.

After we left, I was anxious to hearmy friend’s opinion. While her husbandliked the family very much and was im-

pressed with his client’s business accom-plishments and reputation, the wifedidn’t like the girl’s looks. “She is short,no doubt, which is an important pluspoint, but she is also fat and wearsglasses.” My friend obviously thoughtshe could do better for her son and askedher husband to make his excuses to hisclient by saying that they had decided topostpone the boy’s marriage indefi-nitely.

“If a mistake is madewe have not only ruined

the life of our son or daughter, but we have

spoiled the reputation of our family as well.”

By this time almost six months hadpassed and I was becoming impatient.What I had thought would be an easymatter to arrange was turning out to bequite complicated. I began to believe thatbetween my friend’s desire for a girl whowas modest enough to fit into her jointfamily, yet attractive and educatedenough to be an acceptable partner forher son, she would not find anyone suit-able. My friend laughed at my impa-tience: “Don’t be so much in a hurry,”she said. “You Americans want every-thing done so quickly. You get marriedquickly and then just as quickly get di-vorced. Here we take marriage more se-riously. We must take all the factors intoaccount. It is not enough for us to learnby our mistakes. This is too serious abusiness. If a mistake is made we havenot only ruined the life of our son ordaughter, but we have spoiled the reputa-tion of our family as well. And that willmake it much harder for their brothersand sisters to get married. So we must bevery careful.”

What she said was true and I prom-ised myself to be more patient, though itwas not easy. I had really hoped and ex-pected that the match would be made be-fore my year in India was up. But it wasnot to be. When I left India my friendseemed no further along in finding a suit-able match for her son than when I hadarrived.

Two years later, I returned to Indiaand still my friend had not found a girlfor her son. By this time, he was close tothirty, and I think she was a little wor-ried. Since she knew I had friends allover India, and I was going to be therefor a year, she asked me to “help her inthis work” and keep an eye out for some-one suitable. I was flattered that myjudgment was respected, but knowingnow how complicated the process was, Ihad lost my earlier confidence as amatchmaker. Nevertheless, I promisedthat I would try.

It was almost at the end of my year’sstay in India that I met a family with amarriageable daughter whom I felt mightbe a good possibility for my friend’s son.The girl’s father was related to a goodfriend of mine and by coincidence camefrom the same village as my friend’s hus-band. This new family had a successfulbusiness in a medium-sized city in cen-tral India and were from the same sub-caste as my friend. The daughter waspretty and chic; in fact, she had studiedfashion design in college. Her parentswould not allow her to go off by herselfto any of the major cities in India whereshe could make a career, but they hadcompromised with her wish to work byallowing her to run a small dress-makingboutique from their home. In spite of herdesire to have a career, the daughter wasboth modest and home-loving and hadhad a traditional, sheltered upbringing.She had only one other sister, alreadymarried, and a brother who was in his fa-ther’s business.

I mentioned the possibility of a matchwith my friend’s son. The girl’s parentswere most interested. Although theirdaughter was not eager to marry just yet,the idea of living in Bombay—a sophis-ticated, extremely fashion-consciouscity where she could continue her educa-tion in clothing design—was a great in-ducement. I gave the girl’s father myfriend’s address and suggested thatwhen they went to Bombay on somebusiness or whatever, they look up theboy’s family.

Returning to Bombay on my way toNew York, I told my friend of this newlydiscovered possibility. She seemed tofeel there was potential but, in spite ofmy urging, would not make any moves

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herself. She rather preferred to wait forthe girl’s family to call upon them. Ihoped something would come of this in-troduction, though by now I had learnedto rein in my optimism.

A year later I received a letter frommy friend. The family had indeed cometo visit Bombay, and their daughter and

my friend’s daughter, who were near inage, had become very good friends. Dur-ing that year, the two girls had frequentlyvisited each other. I thought thingslooked promising.

Last week I received an invitation to awedding: My friend’s son and the girlwere getting married. Since I had found

the match, my presence was particularlyrequested at the wedding. I was thrilled.Success at last! As I prepared to leave forIndia, I began thinking, “Now, myfriend’s younger son, who do I knowwho has a nice girl for him… ?”

Appendix

Further Reflections on Arranged Marriage…

This essay was written from the point ofview of a family seeking a daughter-in-law. Arranged marriage looks somewhatdifferent from the point of view of thebride and her family. Arranged marriagecontinues to be preferred, even amongthe more educated, Westernized sectionsof the Indian population. Many youngwomen from these families still goalong, more or less willingly, with thepractice, and also with the specificchoices of their families. Young womendo get excited about the prospects oftheir marriage, but there is also ambiva-lence and increasing uncertainty, as thebride contemplates leaving the comfortand familiarity of her own home, whereas a “temporary guest” she had oftenbeen indulged, to live among strangers.Even in the best situation she will nowcome under the close scrutiny of her hus-band’s family. How she dresses, how shebehaves, how she gets along with others,where she goes, how she spends hertime, her domestic abilities—all of thisand much more—will be observed andcommented on by a whole new set of re-lations. Her interaction with her familyof birth will be monitored and curtailed

considerably. Not only will she leavetheir home, but with increasing geo-graphic mobility, she may also live veryfar from them, perhaps even on anothercontinent. Too much expression of herfondness for her own family, or her de-sire to visit them, may be interpreted asan inability to adjust to her new family,and may become a source of conflict. Inan arranged marriage the burden of ad-justment is clearly heavier for a womanthan for a man. And that is in the best ofsituations.

In less happy circumstances, the bridemay be a target of resentment and hostil-ity from her husband’s family, particu-larly her mother-in-law or her husband’sunmarried sisters, for whom she is now asource of competition for the affection,loyalty, and economic resources of theirson or brother. If she is psychologically,or even physically abused, her optionsare limited, as returning to her parents’home, or divorce, are still very stigma-tized. For most Indians, marriage andmotherhood are still considered the onlysuitable roles for a woman, even forthose who have careers, and few womencan comfortably contemplate remaining

unmarried. Most families still consider“marrying off” their daughters as a com-pelling religious duty and social neces-sity. This increases a bride’s sense ofobligation to make the marriage a suc-cess, at whatever cost to her own per-sonal happiness.

The vulnerability of a new bride mayalso be intensified by the issue of dowry,which although illegal, has become amore pressing issue in the consumer con-scious society of contemporary urban In-dia. In many cases, where a groom’sfamily is not satisfied with the amount ofdowry a bride brings to her marriage, theyoung bride will be constantly harassedto get her parents to give more. In ex-treme cases, the bride may even be mur-dered, and the murder disguised as anaccident or suicide. This also offers thehusband’s family an opportunity to ar-range another match for him, thus bring-ing in another dowry. This phenomena,called dowry death, calls attention notjust to the “evils of dowry” but also tolarger issues of the powerlessness ofwomen as well.

Serena NandaMarch 1998

From Stumbling Toward Truth: Anthropologists at Work, edited by Philip R. Devita, 2000, pp. 196–204. Published by Waveland Press. © 2000 bySerena Nanda. Reprinted by permission.

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