I had a Hindu-Muslim wedding more than 20 years ago. I remember we had blessings, but not the attendance of family members from either side. I was in my early 20s, and was distraught that I would be alone thanks to the families’ “thanks but no thanks” attitude. We were blessed by the truly liberating Special Marriage Act, and the kindness of my mother’s favourite fashion designer Pallavi Jaikishan, who agreed to make me the most beautifully embroidered gold sari with golden roses, and refused the meagre pennies that I could pay for her generosity.
Apologies for how flippant it sounds, but that lavish sari saved me a lot of pain. I felt precious by looking precious. There were a lot of tears, for sure, but I am smiling and beautiful in all my photos.
More than 20 years later, my heart goes out to Sonakshi Sinha. Little has changed for Hindu-Muslim unions in India and elsewhere (she married her steady date of seven years, Zaheer Iqbal). It seems she didn’t have her family’s blessings, and then she did. But the daily coverage of who said what and who did not attend is something the internet won’t let her forget.
I really wish for a world where all that mattered was that a bride giggled her way through her ceremonies—religious or civil. I really wish for a world where all brides could wear the most beautiful outfits, and look and feel like the queens they deserve to look and feel like. I am glad the grooms take the effort to dress up in expensive clothes and wear jewellery, too, these days, but honestly they are so incidental on a wedding day: all eyes are always on the bride.
On the other hand, the Ambani nuptials are here already. The wedding and pre-wedding festivities of Radhika Merchant and her groom Anant Ambani have paled a couture week anywhere in the world, thanks to their gorgeous parade of expensive designer outfits. The bride’s clothes, mother-in-law Nita Ambani’s brick-size emeralds, sisters-in-law Isha Ambani Piramal and Shloka Ambani’s ice-size diamonds, the movie-star guestlist and the international pop icon performances have taken over. It is all so thrilling, and such tantalising eye candy. But I wonder if the nation would be celebrating or ogling as much if it were an inter-community union. Maybe not, albeit the subjects may be the richest family in India.
Marriages are so many mixed emotions at once. The couple (more often than not the bride) is leaving all that is familiar and comfortable and starting a life built (more often than not) on love and a leap of faith. There is joy, there is pain, there is love, and there is worry, too. Regardless, should all of these be anybody’s business except the couple in question? How is the families’ dynamic any concern for the country at large?
I’d prefer to remember Sonakshi’s wedding for that gorgeous ‘chand-buta’ (crescent moon shaped) sari the brilliant Sanjay Garg of Raw Mango made for her. I’d prefer to remember her wedding for the little squeal she let out when signing the civil union papers, or that oh-so-sexy couple’s jig on ‘Chaiyya Chaiyya’ at a wedding party. I suspect so would she.
I would also prefer to remember Sonakshi for her excellent outing as the queen-bee courtesan Fareedan in Heeramandi and, by contrast, as a caste-ridden policewoman Anjali Bhaati covered in dust and blood in last year’s Dahaad.
Women are much more than their wedding days and their marriages, their fantastic saris are their fantasies for the day.