Mar 12, 2014, 03.27PM IST TNN
BANGALORE: It was that typical, old-fashioned arranged marriage. The bride had no clue about the groom until the wedding day. And last Sunday was D-day for this 20-year-old Bangalore bride. But that was until the bickering over biryani revealed the true colours of the groom and his folks. The bride too showed she was no doormat and called off the wedding.
The incident showed how women’s empowerment manifests itself in the strangest of circumstances. This is how it played out at Shaadi Mahal on Tannery Road on Sunday.
The wedding reception was under way, relatives were trickling in and inspecting the buffet. Suddenly a quarrel erupted over the biryani that was served. The groom’s family took exception to the chicken biryani that was on the menu. They wanted mutton biryani and entered into an argument with the bride’s family. As emotions ran high in Shaadi Mahal, a young voice spoke out loud and clear. It was the feisty bride, conveying her decision not to marry the man.
“The wedding date was fixed about 20 days ago, I had not even seen him earlier. They hurried with the wedding as ‘he’ had to fly back to the Middle East at the earliest,” the girl told TOI.
It was not just the fight over biryani, she says. The alliance itself seemed a recipe for disaster, she says in hindsight. “My family also had doubts about his moral character and that set me thinking. Finally, the biryani episode settled it and I knew I would not have been happy in the relationship .”
She recalled walking straight to the KG Halli police station to save herself from what she believed would have been an unhappy marriage. “My parents accompanied me and the police had promised this would not become public,” she said, disappointed over a section of the media having taken her name.
“I have been let down by the police and fear social stigma,” she said. But that hasn’t stopped the brave girl from moving on with life. “Right now, I have decided to go ahead with my studies and not think of marriage,” she said.
And thankfully, she has the support of her parents in this.
