THE COMPLICATED MARRIAGE
| S |
ometimes in life ,we got the options but their selection is not in our hands. The fate as they say is already sealed.
The day started and our dear Roy was flunging his hands to embark the day. Mr. Roy , you can say he is the hero of our story but we would let the destiny decide this.
Roy belonged to a well off family with the structure the Indian Govt. always dreamt of. Mr. Harish , Roy’s father was a retired Govt. employee with the quantum of pension that crossed the salary of many inspired bachelors in this country. Mrs. Harish was rendering her services at a govt. organization with both the repute and money flowing in considerable amount and to complete the family, here came our fourth character Priya, the sister of Roy who had been married just to shorten up her role as can be witnessed in a typical Indian family.
Roy was knocking at that age when the parties and functions become the quest for a match and even Roy’s parents were not lagging behind in the race. Roy had the habit of over valuing himself at times and whims & fancies of Roy were not always digestible for people around him.
So the search for a suitable candidate for the post of wife was on and there came an application. I beg your pardon but the marriages in India are quite akin to selection for a job. In both the cases, the interviewer doesn’t pay much heed towards the sentiments of other candidate. So the application was of a girl with whom our dear Roy was quite familiar as both used to be college mates and I should not waste my literature in describing anything else. The cable and internet have turned the readers really smart. Pooja, as the name suggest was a girl hailing from a medium income sized family. All the particulars of application form were appropriately filled except the two columns of Income and Caste.
As the Roy was the “ONLY MALE CHILD”, these two columns were definitely having more weightage than others. Sometimes, I feel the “ONLY MALE CHILD” has become a slogan with the passage of time and in the shadow of it, we overlook the broader picture which should be seen. So the application was pending and with the dialogues of Roy’s parents it can be silently presumed, that the application was disposed off.
Though our Govt. is expressing concern over the declining sex ratio but same cant be witnessed when it came to the issue of finding a girl for marriage. With the passing by of few days, there was another knock of an application. This time, the girl’s family was better off in money and repute than of Roy’s. One of the close friend of Harish was acting as a intermediary between the two families. After many cups of tea and repeating rounds of sweets, the deal was almost decided. So now it was the time of some serious talks. The discussion of so called give and take was finally concluded and soon the name of would be couple was their on the marriage cards. The marriage date as decided after consultation with Saturn & Jupiter came to 28rd Nov 2010. Though many would be interested in knowing what was the above discussion but I will reserve my comments on it.
So it was 20th of Nov. 2010, a bright morning much to the relief of people with sun in continuous battle with the upcoming cold weather. Everybody was busy in the work assigned to them with a bit of confusion always prevailing there. The cards were distributed and a substantial outflow of Goddess Lakshmi had already occurred by the way of advance of tent, caterer, florist, band and many such other advances. Just to shake the myth in the mind of some people , even the boy’s parents pocket is heavily drained though there may be inflow in other pocket by the way of so called gift.
Suddenly there was a sound of the door bell and everyone telling everyone else to open the door. Finally Priya was selected for this heavenly task. I hope you remember Priya, that’s the way it goes in an Indian family, married daughter’s role is always cut short. So lets the come back and meet the person on the other side of door. There was a gentleman of about 5’10’’, fair complexion and peculiarities any girl would dream of. He was welcomed in but the Roy’s family didn’t know it was a giving invitation to a can of worms. The gentleman was the boy friend of the girl whose name was engraved on the marriage cards. Everyone was stunned and young blood of Roy started taking a toll. But Harish was a man with a mind, he knew if there would be a brawl, it wont take much time for the neighbors to have a spicy topic for discussion. This is I think called experience. So with the both the young blood sharing some hot discussion, Harish pulled the curtains down.
The same was discussed with the girl’s family and on their bizarre acknowledgement of all this, a consensus was arrived at, the girl won’t step in this house as daughter-in-law. The knot which was going to be tied was freed.
Now the Roy’s family was in a tangle. The cards had been distributed and preparations were made. Soon the house would be swarming with the guests and relatives. Which end to go now????? There came a savior , an old acquaintance who offered her daughter to be the mother of Roy’s would be child. There is an old hindi saying “ MARTA KYA NA KARTA” . So with some moderate discussions, the contract was finalized.
It was 26th Nov, not so shiny day for the Roy’s family. All the relatives had arrived with ladies sangeet tomorrow to be succeeded by marriage day after. So when everything seems to be on the track, there comes a road block. One should always remember there is word pathetic much worse than poor. Mr. Harish got a call from the girl’s father just to leave him in despair with no way out. The girl had ran away with another boy just before two days of marriage. This is not something which happen everyday. Its just like adjudging out twice in a same cricket inning. The self obsessed Roy with his whims and fancies was finding himself the most helpless creature on this earth. The news spread among the relatives and there was a hot topic on the offering which can be utilized for many coming days.
So again the four were involved in discussion with some trembling lips and shaky legs. After about half a dozen hours of discussion, something struck in the mind of Mrs. Harish. So the four were in their car and much to the surprise of relatives ,they drove away. An array of thoughts started upspringing. HAD they ran away? Where had they gone? There was a sense of urgency but what was going to happen nobody was sure of.
So the Roy’s family was at a door looking at each other for the volunteer to ring the bell and after all backed away, Harish took up the heavy task. Now the question is whose house it was. They say life goes a full circle. Remember Pooja, our first applicant, it was her house. “ DOOBTE KO TINKE KA SAHARA”, sometimes I found myself short of words for offer as praise for these worldly sayings. There was a second round of discussion but this time the firm tone of Roy’s family paved way for a polite and soft tone. Pooja had always liked Roy, but her parents as any other prudent person were concerned about the marriage arrangement and the justifications to be given for marriage at such short notice. With Harish agreeing to make all the arrangements and the daughter’s love, the down turn proposal was revived.
The ladies sangeet passed & so as the marriage, but everyone who was not familiar with this whole plot was found saying “ Look at Roy’s parents faces. Are they marrying a boy or a girl?” The expressions on their faces resembles those of the parents of a marrying girl with full of tension and a fear that something new and demanding would just crop up. But for those who knew it all it all, they had only three words for it “ THE COMPLICATED MARRIAGE”.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
The author “Vaibhav Singh” has just given his CA Final Exams and was hanging in the mid way waiting for the result when he decided to rub the tip of his pen against the paper.
No comments:
Post a Comment