MARRIAGE MARKET

FROM SAMPATH’S DESK:

  

  

MARRIAGE MARKET

Economic empowerment has made Indians over-fastidious especially the adults, who are more fussy and picky. They only want to deal in logic and real life. They are too discerning, pernickety and easily get irritable.

Small Family has already become the norm, thanks to high awareness level and facilitative medical advances. The age at which one gets married is climbing up year after year. The reason invariably adduced by both boys and girls is that they want to get themselves educationally and economically empowered and established first, and then only they could think of marriage. The materialism has penetrated into their minds and they are particular about short-term comforts and present hassle-free life only, disregarding long-term perspectives. The trend started in Japan where youngsters showed apathy and lacklustre interest in getting married at the right age. Though, to some extent, one can understand the compulsions and need to lead a worry-free life for some years before marriage, remaining unmarried for the whole of life is unnatural and rather preposterous. As long as one remains young, he/she may not perhaps feel the need of a life-partner with parents and other relatives around. How long one can remain young? One necessarily needs a life-companion for physical well-being and emotional cushion, for the present and future. Again, how long will the parents and relatives be with their offsprings? It is better to get married at the right age for the matrimonial bliss. The right age of course may differ from person to person but only by a few years - the earlier the better. Late marriage is fraught with a host of hassles. 

Nowadays, girls, in particular, postpone and/or avoid marriage thinking that economic independence and empowerment which they are increasingly comfortable with would suffice and stand them in good stead. They spurn the ‘wedlock’ calling it as ‘the vortex of family life’. This is a wrong notion. Another reason for higher marriage age as a norm is the higher average human longevity. Even if one happens to have a lot of friends, how long will they be able to share your joy and sorrow and give you the much-needed support - physical, emotional, financial, guidance, advisory, etc. - in required forms, formats, and volumes. And, needless to emphasise, none can equal or replace a life-partner.

 

A life-partner is not a person just to hold your hand but the whole of your heart throughout the lifetime. He/she is the right person to melt your heart, capture your soul, and make you get lost in his/her physical/psychological embrace. Maybe, a life-partner is the one who cannot solve all the problems in your life, but would stand with you to face all of them. 

 

The famous quote of the poet Roy Croft, “I love you not because of who you are, but because of who I am when I am with you. I love you not only for what you have made of yourself, but for what you are making of me. I love you for the part of me that you bring out” - is worth recalling here.

Ideal couples should behave in such manners with a lot of love and affection till the last breath to prove that they are made for each other in all respects.

 

Human-being is a social animal and a bundle of emotions; one can’t remain aloof and live in isolation. It takes at least two to tango; isn't it? A life-companion is a sine qua non for everyone. Only marriage can give a blissful life.  That is the swivel on which one's life can be comfortably buttressed. While the couples care for and support each other throughout, they can perhaps fall back upon their children for support in the old age.

Nowadays, girls are particularly demanding, selective, and choosy in all walks of life including obviously and uncompromisingly about her fiancé. Such obstinate and mulish girls put specific conditions like, say – groom should be elder by one or two years only, his income and status should be much higher than theirs, insisting on either continuing in the job or leaving it after marriage, establishment of nuclear family units, etc., to mention a few. With women’s advanced levels of education and economic status, one can understand some of their demands, but totally dictating all terms and conditions can well be avoided. There can be no denial of the stark truth that women-folk had suffered for eons together with discrimination of sorts meted out to them in diverse ways by male chauvinism and by the in-laws like demanding dowry, harassment, teasing, annoyance, torture, etc. which were uncivilized and boorish misdeeds. 

Women rightly deserve economic empowerment and emancipation that they now enjoy after protracted struggles. Males should be more accommodative and treat their better-halves as equal life-partners. Males should share the burden of domesticity. After all, women constitute half of the population and hold half the sky. Girls of the present generation should also be considerate, as, after all, the in-laws do deserve fulfilment they seek in their old age. In India, marriage is not just a union of two hearts but a union of two families. That is in our traditional ethos A reciprocal policy with a shared vision by both will make the family life a seventh heaven. 

 

The youth of today are intelligent outside but hollow inside. The psyche should change for the better.

 

Eerily, the day may not be afar when it will be hard for the boy’s parents to find a girl to get married to him. Or, who knows, maybe, as a reverse-churning effect, girls’ parents or their daughters may start demanding dowry hereafter. Whoever demands dowry, it is wrong and a cognizable offence. It would be ideal and equitable to bring a legislation by which both bride's side and groom's side are made to share the marriage-related expenses equally.

Boys, become alert, make amends, and be ready for great changes and challenges in the offing before they become obvious!

 

 

 

R.SAMPATH

5/1/2022