Arranged Marriage

To me, the concept of an "arranged marriage", so rife in this neck of the woods, has to be one of the most ludicrous propositions I have ever come across. Can you think of anything stupider? Here, let's just throw this guy and that girl together and hope that they live happily ever after.

Apparently, parents take it upon themselves as a quasi-religious duty to marry off their offspring before they make for their heavenly abode. It normally all starts when the child approaches what is deemed as a "marriable" age - around 25 if it's a boy, and a few years younger if it's a girl. The parents will start hunting around for prospective spouses - although it is quite likely that they will already have a few names in mind, which they had made a mental note of as their child was growing up. Visits from friends and family provide an excellent time to gather information about potential life partners for their child. Unbelievably, the only things that matter at times like these are the religion, community, caste, family name, social status and other related qualities of the spouse. Also, if they're looking for a guy, then educational qualifications and income matter; for a girl it's her looks and physical appearance.

Ok, so while I agree that money and looks do count for a bit, and to an extent [a very small one, though] religion might as well, I don't see how these can be the most important criteria in selecting a spouse! If these are the things you are looking for, why not just auction off your daughter on E-Bay? Even more importantly than what the parents are looking for in a spouse, is the question of why they are doing the looking in the first place. Maybe I'm mistaken here, but isn't it the children who are going to get married? Aren't they the ones going to be spending the rest of their lives together? So why don't they get to choose whom they would rather spend it with?

Now, the irony of the whole situation is that if you look at society in general [at least in this country], the divorce rate in arranged marriages is noticeably less than that in other marriages [what I like to call 'normal' marriages]! Why should this be so? What possible reason could there be for this? Is it, as is the most common explanation, because there is less expectation from one's partner in an arranged marriage? Makes sense, doesn't it? You were thrown into something without being given much of a choice, and so you just decide to make the best of it. Kunal once suggested that it might be because the people whose marriages are arranged tend to be the quieter type, with less of a pre-marital social life. Thus, they would be less likely to screw up a marriage by fooling around, and also less likely to try and get out of one if things aren't going great. I think it's a combination of both these reasons, mixed with a few other factors too.

I do suspect, though, that the amount of domestic abuse involved in arranged marriages is more. Dowry deaths, harrassment [both mental and physical] and other such forms of abuse are more likely to get covered up in an arranged marriage. For one thing, the wife having been subjected to playing the passive role in her own marriage is less likely to up and leave if her husband should turn violent. Her parents having married her off, are less likely to welcome her back and she has little else to turn to having been completely dependent on her husband. A woman who gets into a marriage on her own, normally has something outside the marriage that she can rely on if she needs to get out.

Personally, an arranged marriage isn't something that I would even stop to consider, and what's more heartening to know, neither would my parents. The downside[?] is that I'll probably remain a bachelor for life!