Friday, May 1, 2015

Mass Marriage

It was tense. But it wasn't meant to be so. It was meant to be joyous, perhaps a bit of relief, a dash of anxiety for the unknown future lying ahead too. But the nerves weren't that. It was palpable tension cause so few knew what was happening at the present. Cause they just could not relate to it.

The setting was the mass marriage ceremonies conducted by the government of Madhya Pradesh, under the 'Mukhyamantri Kanyadaan Yojna' for couples preferring not to spend extravagantly for their wedding. It is open to the general public, all classes and communities. The couples get a Rs.17,000 Fixed Deposit in the name of the bride, Rs.5000 worth vessels and pressure cooker as 'Kanyadaan', and Rs.3000 spent for arrangements per couple. This particular one had 46 couples, almost all of them belonging to the ST communities of the Korku and the Bhilala. So what exactly was so alienating, that made the air so tense?

The couples had a small fire alter placed in front of them. There were 8-9 pandits chanting sanskrit slokas, and asking the couples to repeat them, and also perform some tasks like pouring various items into the fire, and on each other. They were clueless about what to do and what to say. The pandit went on and on in the incomprehensible language. The only recognisable words were some of the names of the gods like Krishna, Rama, Narayana, etc - words the people have become accustomed to over the decades. Repeated invocation of the "Brahman Devta Abhishek ji Maharaj" had most couples go "kaun?". Once, the grooms were asked to draw a swastika on the bride's hand - the junior pandit went mad as most of them dint know what a swastika was, or why it was needed here. The pandit kids running around to assist the couples were shocked at levels of ignorance amongst the couples. None of these ever made sense to the bulk of them. The new word most folks learnt that day was the one they had repeated the most - "swaahaa". So much so, that when the actual exchange of garlands took place, one couldn't spot smiling faces of relief. But flat faces, of cluelessness. 

The Bhilala wedding has no place for such fire alters. They have a wooden stump, the 'Kakad' fixed to the ground symbolising their family goddess; it’s the centre piece of their wedding ceremony. There's no place for a pandit chanting mantras in a completely unrecognisable language, and frankly, boring the crap out of them. Their ceremonies have the sister and sister-in-law conducting it, asking for their mutual consents, and fixing what their families would exchange with each other and invoking the sun, the moon, their crop deities and their family goddess. Following this would be the women of the house singing songs about their families, and also some raunchy songs about the pleasures of marriage :P  (Simultaneously of course, you'd have folks having copious amounts of Mahua!)

There are a number of ways of viewing this. I think its commendable that the state launches such schemes, I really do. Weddings are one of those high expenditure activities that cause indebtedness in most parts of our country. Its also one of the several reasons many in our country prefer male kids to female ones. When folks can get together and perform financial transactions through SHGs, or sell crops together through Cooperatives, why cant they get married together! As a development intervention, I think its right up there. I daresay, its ok for the state to subsidise such events. Its got a clever name too. Since the state purchases the items for kanyadaan on behalf of the families, in a sense, the kanyadaan is performed by the state - taking the meaning of the 'paternalistic state' to an altogether different level :)

Now at the implementation phase, the organisers would have had to think about making arrangements. Now, it is at this juncture that our sociological backgrounds come into the picture. The event organisers, mostly block level officers, by default assumed that getting a troupe of Sanskrit pandits to conduct the weddings is the norm - the natural way of doing things. And its quite natural to assume so too. It might not have been something they particularly gave time to think through.  After all, in our lives, we get exposed to marriages of only a certain kind. In pop culture, all portrayals and imageries of weddings involve a sacred thread bearing pandit with mantras and fire alters. The trouble is it’s the norm for only a section of the population - the ones who fall into the patterns set by mainstream Hinduism, along with its thrust on Sanskrit and Vedic rituals. It is precisely this trap that sits like an unmovable block of rock in our heads; it calls for a learning - that our mainstream does not pertain to all. This is even more pertinent when the mainstream norm accounts for the better off in society, while the ones who're outside its fold - the 'others', have been on the receiving end through much of history. The power relations between these two groups blinds the powerful to nuances of the oppressed.

 The 'sickularist' in me naturally tends to laugh at this, but also view this suspiciously through the lens of the state (BJP ruled) attempting to spread Hindutva's tentacles to communities not quite yet within its fold. But it might be too harsh a judgment. I choose to stick with the line of thought of the previous paragraph. 

Another observation on the same note of Hindutva. The block has a sizable Muslim population, especially in the block headquarters. There were no Muslim couples participating in the function. Let us not fool ourselves into thinking expensive weddings are a Hindu problem. It could be that the organisers did not make that much of an effort to canvass for this scheme amongst the Muslim communities, cause we know that there are a few private initiatives amongst the Muslim communities where group weddings do take place. The argument could also be made that the community doesn't come forward for such schemes - as is the favourite right wing argument. But based on how the function went about, I guess it would seem very unwelcoming to couples of other faiths. A small gesture of simply having a Qazi on stage for standby would've been so nice to see - that the organisers had at least given some thought to it. The absence of such things is quite sad.     

Amongst the couples were also two mixed couples - OBC boys with ST girls, specifically landed, moneyed Sirvi boys with Bhilala girls. Being the ravishing romantic, yours truly instinctively took it to be couples madly in love with each other, with parents refusing to accept them. Its only then that it struck me, that a practice has taken off in recent years among the Sirvi community, of marrying Bhilala girls after paying their families, owing to an apparent 'shortage of girls' within their community. At first sight, such a story has all the makings of a torrid time ahead for the girls in question - for it could well be that the boys' folks were 'shopping for cooks'. However, this seemingly strange phenomena should be dealt with in a separate post on the history of the Bhilalas of this place, and their complex relationship with other communities here.

Oh, and by the way, there's apparently a government reward of Rs.50,000 for such inter-caste marriages. Now, go figure that out.

But as the defining piece, I think my everlasting memory of the event would be the following couple, of Savita marrying Gabbar Singh - a match truly made in dreams :)


 With all the youthness in our hearts, let us fervently wish them a truly great future ahead ! 

5 comments:

  1. Compelling piece. Gabbar Singh and Savita sounds about right.

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  2. Do the Bhilala couples go back and do their traditional wedding custom? Is the community happy with this state-sponsored wedding or do they want the traditional ceremony to accept the couple as husband-wife?

    Would the traditional Bhilala wedding go through the process of registering the marriage? If they now feel the need to register their wedding what is influencing this change?

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  3. Good question Nikhil...
    Most folks who come are quite clear that they're here as beneficiaries of the scheme. For many, its not like they care so much for what kind of rituals are being followed.
    In fact, following the wedding, the pandit made the couples come forward and seek his blessings, obviously with expectations of 'donations'. There were many couples who just walked off !
    The meaning I drew from this is that such people are clear about why they came here. Just get the wedding done, and move along !
    Registration of couples is happening almost throughout. Main driving force is that certificates are becoming mandatory for other government proofs like Ration Card, etc.

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  4. Apart from getting the marriage certificate, the couple receives acceptance from both families, peace of mind etc. And the core things is that its enabling those who cannot afford expensive wedding ceremonies to also achieve the married status and this may trigger their performance in terms of personal development and growth.

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  5. Nice article da Rao!! hear about this scheme in the newspapers, but now was able to completely visualize it...hoping to read such interesting blogs from you in the future...cheers!!

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