India in Love

by Ira Trivedi

  With Gopalji I go to many homes. I have never been to as many, and such a variety of Delhi homes in my life. In these homes I meet entire families: grandparents, sisters, sisters-in-law, brothers and brothers-in-law. I hold babies, I show biodatas, and I talk to ‘those in question’ about what they are looking for in a match. I eat many kinds of snacks—dhoklas at the Jain homes, kababs at Punjabi, imported biscuits at Sindhi. I have never tasted as many varieties of namkeens and biscuits.

  The Guptas own a typical Marwari home. Marwaris are unusually abstemious, vegetarian, teetotal, and conduct their personal lives in a sober way. They are traditionally a business community and are best known for their ability to make money and keep it. Their homes, though, reflect their vision of the good life and are decorated in a particular style of opulence. The Guptas’ house is of modest size. Although the home itself is not large, all the furniture is, and it overpowers the rooms. The central living room has massive velvet sofas with golden tassels, patterned marble floors, chandeliers in pink and gold. Everywhere there are ‘showpieces’. Two large sculptures dominate the room: one of a mermaid with large breasts and golden hair, the other of a large, cerise-coloured Ganesha.

  Mr Gupta is a snarky, stubby man with a thin, singsong voice. He looks perpetually constipated, barely opening his mouth while speaking. His jowls hang loose from his chin, and he strokes them regularly. He extols his son Vinay’s virtues. ‘He is a very good boy. He manages the entire business. I don’t do a thing. He is also very well-mannered. He touches our feet every morning. When his grandparents come he presses their feet for one hour. He has been convent-educated and has always been a topper.’

  He continues after a pause, wiping his hands on a yellow hand towel that he has laid on the arm rest of the sofa he is sitting on. ‘We have no demand from the girl, but we want an unmarried girl. We are not so comfortable with divorced girls. Caste is also no bar as long as they are not different from us. Marathi and Gujarati are like us, we like them. We don’t like Punjabis.’

  Gopalji interjects, ‘Mr Gupta, Punjabi girls are good looking. Your son is handsome, so you need a good looking girl.’

  Mr Gupta considers, ‘We can think about it. Basically, we need a girl who is friendly and has good values because she will not be in our control because we travel a lot.’

  I have to satisfy my curiosity. ‘Uncle, why have you advertised for a non-working girl? Is it a problem if she works? These days most lively and qualified girls do want a career, you know.’

  ‘Beta, she can work of course. She can work with her husband. There is so much to be done in our business. She can handle cash if she wants to do finance, or she can do billboards if she wants to do marketing. But we don’t want her working out of the house.’

  ‘Why?’ I press.

  ‘Actually, we have had bad experience. That other girl,’ he says referring to his soon to be ex-daughter-in-law. ‘She was working with a company in Gurgaon as an architect. We told her not to work with someone else. We told her to work with us, to build houses for us. We are also in the real estate business. Initially she quit, but then her company called her back. She went to Gurgaon where her parents lived, and sometimes did not come back for two to three days, saying she was tired or there was a birthday or something. She also used to work late nights. We don’t want to accuse anyone of anything, but then…she used to be alone at work, so far away, so…we didn’t like it. Who knows what these girls do at the office so late?’

  After a pause he says sternly, ‘This time our main requirement is for a non-working girl only.’

  He ponders for a second and then says, ‘The problem is that she studied in Italy.’ (She had attended a nine-month course, I find out.)

  ‘Actually, from the beginning we said we didn’t want an Italian. We didn’t want an abroad girl.’

  Talking about his son’s broken marriage has stressed Mr Gupta out. His face turns greyish and he begins to sweat profusely. He mops his face with his yellow hand towel.

  ‘Arre, Mr Gupta, no need to worry. I will find him someone,’ says Gopalji patting him on the knee.

  ‘Of course we are worried. He is divorced. This is the biggest failure of our lives,’ Mr Gupta says in a small voice. ‘Since the girl left, I have not worked at all. I just look at biodatas all day. We don’t want our boy to be alone. It is not natural. We haven’t told anyone that the girl has gone. After one year of marriage, people ask us when the good news is coming. We don’t know what to say.’

  He continues dolefully, ‘We never even asked her to make tea. We gave her all the money to handle. We think to ourselves, why did the girl leave us and go?’

  Vinay Gupta, the boy ‘in question’ is a pleasant looking man who smiles shyly and doesn’t say anything in the fifteen minutes that he sits in on our meeting. Nothing except for the occasional officious, ‘Yes papa’, ‘Ji papa’. His parents are in control of the process, and he doesn’t seem to have anything to say for himself. Moreover, his parents seem more distressed about the breakup of his marriage than he does.

  I ask him what he wants in a girl. He looks at me, then his father, and then replies, ‘Whatever papaji wants.’

  ‘What provisions have you kept for A to Z ?’ asks Gopalji who has till now been listening patiently but is now beginning to look bored. ‘There is a lot of work in this job.’

  Mr Gupta is a real estate broker, and he believes that there is some similarity between his work and that of the marriage broker seated across from him. ‘I understand, Gopalji. We have a property business and I deal with brokers all day. Disputed properties always take more time to sell. If it is a clean property we give brokers 2 per cent. If it is a dirty property we give them 4 per cent. We know that you will have to work hard to sell our property.’

  At this point a young boy walks in. He is approaching us, but en route, Mr Gupta pulls him into his lap and smothers him.

  ‘This is my daughter’s son.’

  ‘Hello beta,’ says Gopalji

  ‘He wanted to touch your feet, that was why he was coming to you. He stays very much in the culture,’ says Mr Gupta proudly.

  After drinking our tea, we get up to leave. Mr Gupta hands Gopalji an envelope with a thick wad of cash, Mr Gupta smiles and says, alluding to the indolent Vinay, ‘It is not a straightforward job. Clean, garden-facing properties that are in a good location get sold immediately. Properties that are in the alley, that are congested and illegal, are difficult to dispose of.’

  As we are driving out of the neighbourhood, we stop at the local press-wallah. Here, by the side of the street a few men are busy ironing with industrial-size heavy irons. Gopalji takes out a 100 note, rolls down his window, and beckons to one of the press-wallahs.

  ‘How are they?’ he says pointing to the Guptas’ house.

  ‘Fine, sir.’

  ‘Does the boy drink?

  ‘Uh...’ says the press-wallah looking uncomfortable.

  ‘Tell me! I’ll pay you more!’

  ‘Sir, sometimes.’

  ‘Ah! His biodata said teetotaller,’ says Gopalji, with a knowing smile.

  ‘How is his wife?’ Gopalji asks.

  ‘Sir, she has gone, not come back in a long time. We think, maybe divorce. She was very nice, sir. She was pretty and kind also.’

  ‘Why did she leave?’ asks Gopalji

  ‘Sir, I think they were not having good time in bedroom.’

  ‘How do you know?’ asks Gopalji curiously.

  ‘We found no stains on the clothes, sir. Also, bedroom lights always off very early. We can see from here, see,’ he says pointing to the window. From where the press-wallah stands it is just possible to look into the young couple’s bedroom. Even though Colonel Singh in the office will do a thorough background check, Gopal Suri likes to do a preliminary search. Gopalji thanks the press-wallah and we drive away. He says, ‘See, Iraji, my job is not a simple one. Everyone is lying all the time, the parents, the boys, the girls. And then they expect me
to find a good match for a lifelong marriage. Over the years I have learnt to tell the truth from the lies, and this is what makes me a good marriage broker.’

  ♦

  At A to Z, a recent big-ticket client has caused a flurry. Manav is the handsome young son of industrialist whose biodata boasts a family income of a ridiculous 10,000 crore annually. Manav has recently completed his MBA in the US and is back in India, ripe for marriage. It is common knowledge that his family has employed twenty marriage brokers to find a match for the young scion. If Gopal Suri seals this deal, millions of rupees are to be made and he is determined to win this one.

  Manav’s family, though, has some specific requirements. They want a beautiful, humble girl who may not be ‘monied’ but who has class. She should not have studied abroad. His parents believe that an international education corrupts women. Manav’s family has also specifically asked for a girl who wears full sleeves. This last request, I simply cannot understand.

  One day I find Gopalji looking particularly happy. I comment on this. He beams, lowering his voice, looking around to make sure that none of the staff are around. ‘I’m going to tell you this because you are close to me. I sent them my daughter’s profile, and they liked it. They asked me whose biodata this was and who the father of this girl was. I told them that it was me, that I was the father of this daughter!’

  He pulled up his daughter’s carefully crafted biodata and showed me a picture of a smiling, plain-faced girl with Gopalji’s weasel eyes.

  I had not realized Gopalji harboured secret ambitions for his daughter to marry so well, but then again, I shouldn’t be too surprised. Every parent in India wants nothing but the very best for their kids when it comes to marriage, so why shouldn’t a marriage broker aim even higher?

  COCKTAIL MATCHES

  ‘The single most important criteria for eligibility in the Indian marriage market is wealth. Every family wants its match in terms of bank balance and rarely are they willing to compromise,’ says Geeta Khanna, founder of Cocktail Matches, another New Delhi-based matchmaking service.

  Geeta is a modern-day matchmaker or ‘matrimonial consultant’ as she introduces herself. She is in her late forties, fashionably dressed and sports a stylish coif. Her office is basically her home, and when I go to visit, she is in the midst of a gaggle of ladies feverishly discussing matrimony. This is a different set of people from the middle-class to upper-middle-class crowd that frequents A to Z matrimonial. These well-heeled ladies speaking in English, dressed in fashionable western outfits, are what Geeta likes to call ‘the cocktail-going crowd’, the upper crust of society, in other words.

  The caste system is changing, Geeta tells me. Rather than ‘Marwari, Rajput or Brahmin’, it is now ‘businessman from South Delhi, professional from Gurgaon, or doctor from a metro city’. The caste system, originally based on economics, was now reorganizing itself to suit modern needs and was based on a system of wealth. Geeta explains her modus operandi to me. ‘I operate in a close-knit group of people, mostly setting up people from my social circle. It is much easier to check people out this way. Unlike most matrimonial services today, I run a very personalized, boutique matchmaking service. I handle all my clients myself, giving them the kind of attention that they deserve.’

  Her style seemed to be distinctly different from A to Z, which was run as a business. Ironically, though, I discovered that despite the discrepancy in wealth and class, many of Geeta’s and Gopalji’s clients had similar concerns. Here, too, the marriage process seemed skewed in favour of men, and many of the parents that I meet at Geeta’s worry that their daughters will never get married, and remain ‘sitting at home’. I hear this phrase often at A to Z, ‘ladki ghar pe bhaithi huee hai’ (our girl is sitting at home), and even in this rich segment of society, I find the same paranoia.

  Geeta tells me that in the marriage game the ball often lies in the boy’s court. The girl’s family often has to court the boy’s side by displaying their wealth and ability to have a large wedding. Like Gopalji, a higher percentage of Geeta’s clients are girls. For every three eligible bachelors, she has only one bachelorette. Geeta says that she often has to chase the boy’s side to secure a good match. Geeta suggests that I meet one of her old clients, Anjali, to get an understanding of the factors at play to make a good match.

  ♦

  Anjali’s opulent Delhi home is typical of a sybaritic Delhi existence—plush velvet sofas, strange showpieces festooning the walls, and Nepali maids attired in frilly faux French designer uniforms.

  Anjali comes from a middle-class family; her father is an engineer, and her mother a housewife. Geeta arranged her wedding to Gaurav who belongs to a wealthy Delhi family. The caveat was that Gaurav was divorced, after a short-lived marriage to his college sweetheart. Gaurav’s divorced status was balanced by his wealth, and Anjali’s middle-class status was made up for by her youth (she was twenty-two), her looks and her education.

  Anjali speaks optimistically about the matrimonial process. ‘In an arranged setup, it is really difficult to put your demands up front. Everything becomes much easier through a marriage broker. You can place all your requirements on the table, and you have a neutral party negotiating for you. This is really important because each family has their own set of expectations.’

  Marriage brokers, though, like any other type of broker, can sometimes cause trouble. Making sure her mother-in-law is not around, Anjali whispers to me, ‘You have to be really careful of these guys. My parents kept me away from them till the last stage, till it became absolutely crucial for them to see me. Sometimes these guys can be malicious if a family doesn’t respond to their requests. They will spread rumours in the market. They say the boy has different ‘preferences’ implying homosexuality, or that a girl’s ‘character isn’t right’ (the standard line—iska character theek nahin hai). I’m not complaining. I am happily married so far, but I have heard some pretty terrible stories.’

  Anjali continues, since her mother-in-law is nowhere in sight. ‘I got lucky, because I wanted a rich boy, though we weren’t rich. My parents were practical, and knew that we could only get a divorcee if we wanted wealth. So in my marriage process, this is what we focused on, and this is what we got.’

  For some reason, Anjali seems to think that I have come here to get matrimonial advice from her. ‘You should make a list of things that are most important to you and then give them to a marriage broker. You must also present the things that you just can’t accept. For me, I did not want a dark guy. I didn’t mind if he was short or fat. I told Geeta that I would not even look at a dark guy, no matter how rich.’

  As Anjali harped on about marriage, I could have sworn she was talking about buying a car, or a dress, for that matter. It seemed to me that in many ways, marriage had been turned into a merger and acquisition where wealth rather than love was the bottom line.

  ♦

  Mansi is my best friend, and though we are similar in so many ways, our nuptial journeys couldn’t have been more different. Mansi is from a conservative Marwari business family living in Ahmedabad. She had just ended her relationship with a man in Mumbai because she wanted to get married (not because he was an amazing guy, but her parents were insisting that she tie the knot) and he did not. After that she decided to go down the easier-on-the-heart route of arranged marriage. So Mansi quit her marketing job in Delhi to move back home to Ahmedabad and hand over the job of finding her a partner to her parents.

  As it happened, it was the venerable Gopalji who came to Mansi’s rescue when she was going through the worst of her marriage anxiety. Her parents were desperate for her to get married and this stress had made her mother physically ill, her father emotionally. Gopal Suri added an inch to her height, knocked off a few kilos, and used Photoshop to lighten her skin tone by a few shades. A few weeks later, a candidate was chosen. Prem lived in Mumbai where he worked in his family’s business. Mansi’s father immediately flew to Mumbai to inspect Prem and the family. He
approved. After going through a string of rejections, Mansi was ready to accept anyone who accepted her, as long as her father approved. On the face of it, Prem had everything that she was asking for in a man: he was kind, intelligent, and financially sound. He was not dashing like her ex-boyfriend, nor was he as cosmopolitan and well-travelled as she was. He didn’t speak English in the polished way of the chattering classes, and he didn’t dress in the fashionable way of her friends, but she was done with the humping and dumping game. Their common cultural background would hopefully fill in all the lacunae of love. And so they got engaged after one quick meeting.

  I was happy for Mansi, but also a little disappointed. She would miss those moments of madness and crazy highs that come with love, but then she would also avoid the moments of angst, fighting and tumult. Maybe all of this would come after marriage, and hopefully so would the flutters of first love.

  While Mansi found a husband through Gopalji, I hoped to find my husband through love.

  I met Vinayak on the day of Holi—the festival of love. We were both silver-faced, our bodies splattered in pink, red and blue, and in the tradition of the festival, I had consumed so much bhang that the entire world seemed to spin round and round. After the drug-induced high wore off, my world continued to spin. At that time, Vinayak seemed perfect. Like me, he too had recently moved back to Delhi from the US and was finding his feet. We had common friends, and we spent endless hours together. He was bright, kind, and real. After a few months, when our relationship moved beyond flirtation into the realm of the serious, and as I found out more about him, my mind was lacerated with doubt. Could I marry him? He was from a conservative Marwari family and lived in a large joint family with an army of uncles, aunts and cousins. Vinayak was working for his father as was the tradition in his family, and was entirely dependent on him financially.

  Vinayak’s lifestyle in many ways seemed to be a cultural mismatch for someone like me who was brought up in a nuclear family. I was fiercely independent and I wasn’t sure if I could marry a guy who depended to this extent on his family, and even lived with them. Vinayak and I were best friends, and worked well as boyfriend and girlfriend, but could we function as husband and wife? Would I be able to live with his parents for the rest of my life? Could I put up with Vinayak’s financial dependence on his family? I wanted Vinayak to get a job and become independent from his parents, and he was confused about which path to take. We fought often, and sometimes I desperately wished that I could take the practical path of arranged marriage. If both people came from a similar cultural background, wouldn’t marriage be easy? I decided to find out for myself.