Short Story Social Issue – Re Arranged Marriage
Photo Credit: www.cepolina.com
Shalini was the oldest of the siblings. She took on this responsibility too just as she had done many other things since childhood. She drafted the advertisement and sent it to her brother . The advertisement read this way “ Nambiar boy 41, Shudhajathakam, MBA, consultant,settled in US, seeks educated girl below 35yrs contact……..”.
Everything seemed to have changed from the way marriage proposals were sought 18 years ago when Shalini had got married. Her father had painstakingly drafted a hand written advertisement and carried it to the classified section of the Malayalam newspaper office. In fact , the choice of the newspaper too was carefully thought of. Most of the people in North Kerala read only the Mathrubhumi. Hence, father had decided that he would place this ad only in that paper. Never mind that he lived then in South Kerala as he was posted with a nationalized bank there. The words in the ad too were chosen with utmost care as the objective was to convey every qualifying requirement for the to be son-in-law in as few words as possible.
But now Shalini’s brother placed a request for the ad online through the website of the newspaper. The money too was transferred online. He informed his sister that the ad would appear the coming Sunday. Father was familiarizing himself with the ways of the new world where you get your ad published without visiting any office. Everything seemed to be changing around him. Shalini now placed orders of books, DVDs and many more things from Secunderabad and it would be delivered to him in his town in North Kerala. He was proud that his daughter even managed to pay the municipal taxes of his apartment in Bengaluru with a click of a button. Shalini was always full of ideas to make life comfortable for her parents.
On the Sunday morning, as expected the ad was published. Calls started coming on the landline and Shalini was designated to handle all the calls. “ Hello! I am calling from Trivandrum. My daughter R is an innocent divorcee. She was married for only 2 months. ……..”. Shalini would listen patiently to all the respondents. By the way what did this innocent divorcee mean? Did it mean that she is still a virgin? Everyone seemed to have an interesting story and all the callers seemed to be the victims.
Father and Mother would listen to the way Shalini handled these calls. Father and mother found it very painful as this was a very new experience for them, handling calls for the remarriage of their son. Shalini’s family was a simple middle class family which believed that the marriage should last a lifetime like all other consumer durables they bought like the fridge, TV etc. The Fridge and TV could go for repair occassionally but they were never discarded for new ones. Presence or rather the absence of love in the marriage was never considered a reason for breakdown of a marriage.
Shalini maintained a record of the telephone numbers and names of the callers for future reference. Father would always hesitate to pick the phone when the bell rings as he found it painful to mention that their son was a divorcee with a six year old daughter. Shalini would make it a point to mention that this daughter lived with his ex wife lest it reduced his chances of getting a suitable bride. Shalini herself a mother of two boys ,never could understand as to how children became a liability in remarriage.
Shalini and her mother visited the local astrologer for confirmation if it was the right time for him to remarry. Despite all her modern views and outlook, Shalini was not too sure if the matching of horoscopes should be bypassed especially when it was a second marriage.
Shalini in a brazen manner asked the astrologer “ Why were the horoscopes matched during the first marriage, if it was to fail? We could have seen another girl.”
The astrologer, ” He has two marriages in his destiny and if only the first one fails, would he be able to marry again. So nobody could have stopped this.”
She was shocked. She decided that she would no longer consider matching of horoscopes as a qualifying requirement in this search for a girl rather a woman for her middle aged brother.
However it was convenient to use the horoscopes or its noncompatibility as an exit route in some proposals . Raman, another father sent Shalini a detailed analysis of the horoscopes of which she could not make head or tail of it. “In my daughter’s horoscope,7th Lord ( Ezhambhavadhipadhi, Budhan is in 8th House, but 8th House Lord Sukra is in 7thHouse making Pariverthana yoga which nullifies all dhoshas in 7th House and 8th house. Hence it can be treated asSudha Jathaka. More over budha who is in the 8th House is in exalted position. This is known as Neejabhanga Rajayogha, which removes neeja nature of Saturn in the 7th House. More over Lagnadipathi Vyazha is in 7th House which also removes dosha of Saturn. In effect it can be surmised that my daughter’s horoscope also is Sudhajatakam…….” S was reminded of the scientific laws she learnt at school where truth is confined to a certain set of conditions.
Mr. Nair sent a mail which looked more like an application for the post of wife and less for a life partner. “She is a post graduate in Economics and has very brilliant academic record all through out. She was an executive with the IT Division of a leading PSU in India. She resigned from the job and did MBA at University of Edinburgh Business School. Immediately after graduation she secured a placement with a capital management company at Edinburgh, as investment analyst. She continues there with a view to gaining international experience.”
Yes moving to America with her brother this applicant would gain truly a global experience what with having covered markets like India and the British Isles already.
Mrs. A called to say that her daughter was divorced twice , the first one for dowry demands and the second one for impotency. But the moment Shalini told her that her brother had a child, she wanted to reconsider. Wasn’t having a child of one’s own the ultimate proof of a virile man? Every interaction in this search for a wife for her brother was churning her insides .
With every caller, she had a peep in to the murky world of failed marriages. Shalini was slowly realizing that there were people out there in the world with all the international qualifications, good parenting, well settled siblings but incapable of choosing their own life partners. Was this situation peculiar to the Indian culture? Why was Shalini’s brother unable to find a partner when life had given him a second chance to choose somebody he loved? Or is understanding, love and tolerance more important than love for marriages to work?
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