BRIDE AND PREJUDICE - THE BIG FAT INDIAN WEDDINGS AND DIASPORA
Bride and Prejudice - The Big Fat Indian Weddings and Diaspora
The weddings are solemnized in heaven. If heaven is recreated on the earth to say ”I do”, it becomes a US$600 million lavish extravaganza. The reigning superstars from Tinsel Town perform in a wedding venue in India, the sky comes down, and the real stars glitter in the high-end Boutique palaces and the Haute Couture.
Subroto Roy - Sahara, London-based Indian billionaire Laxmi Mittal, NRI Hotel magnet Turban Cowboy Vikram Chatwal from the United States, and Mukesh Ambani, the richest Indian business tycoon - Reliance, the Indian diaspora of Wedding Bells really takes more than Saath Phera.
The wedding season arrives in India, and wedding planners are busy hosting the most expensive and lavish wedding sacraments amongst the global communities. The above billionaires are some of the few who celebrated their progeny’s weddings in a “Band Baja Bharat” (a musical uniformed band with decorated horse carts and the bridegroom in traditional wedding attire mounted on the horse) style with pomp and show. The glamour and glitter of most celebrated weddings are real eye candy for the wedding gazers.
Bride and Prejudice the Movie -
The Bride and Prejudice is a Bollywood flick of 2006 directed by Gurinder Chadha, the “Bend it Like Beckham” fame, casting internationally acclaimed Indian actor Aishwarya Rai Bachchan in the lead role opposite Hollywood actor Martin Henderson.
It tells the story of four sisters of marriageable age and their parent’s search for suitable bridegrooms. The elder daughter, Lalita Bakshi (Aishwarya Rai), is intent on marrying of her own choosing, for love. Lalita endures several hopeful suitors, but the American William Darcy (Martin Henderson) seems different – and not always in a good way. Misunderstandings, Schemes, and Lies threaten to keep the two from true love. The romance between the two takes a beating due to circumstances and boorish opinions.
The movie is a Bollywood adaptation of Jane Austin’s classic “Pride and Prejudice”.
Coming back from the reel world to the real world extravaganzas, Sahara giant Subroto Roy’s two sons' wedding cost in 2004 was a whopping US$ 81 million. The lavish wedding celebrations were spread across Mumbai-Udaipur-Delhi (The Udaipur and Jodhpur palaces in Rajasthan, India, are sought-after marriage venues). The wedding was attended by major politicians, film stars, and other prominent dignitaries including high-flying bureaucrats.
The fairy tale wedding of Vikram Chatwal -
The wedding of Vikram Chatwal to model/actress Priya Sachdev in 2006 had a 6 foot 12-tier Wedding Cake and flowers worth 7 lakh US Dollars. The wedding cost was 20 million US Dollars. Vikram Chatwal is a scion of a sprawling, multi-continental hotel-and-restaurant chain called Hampshire Hotels. His family owns eleven Hotels in Manhattan, including the Majestic and the Dream in Times Square, which has Deepak Chopra Spa and a Serafina restaurant.
Vikram Chatwal used to patronize New York nightclubs in a red or white turban in the company of supermodel Naomi Campbell and was nick-named Turban Cowboy. Raised in an Upper East Side penthouse and sent to the United Nations International School and the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business, Vikram now lives high above Central Park in Trump International in an airy condo filled with African and Indian Art and drives an Aston Martin. His father recalls Vikram wanted to charter a plane for Hollywood actress, Kate Moss. His father entrusted the job of finding a bride for Vikram to Indian socialite Queenie Dhody their family friend. Queenie finally tracked down Priya Sachdev who had also studied at the London School of Economics and worked as an Investment Banker for a year. Priya was an actress and model in Delhi and was camera-friendly. Vikram’s father recalls that his aim was to do the most outstanding wedding that ever existed taking into account Vikram’s lifestyle. There were millions of dollars worth of jewelry used in Vikram Chatwal’s wedding.
Vikram Chatwal’s wedding was really a fairy tale wedding.
Steel tycoon Laxmi Mittal’s daughter Vanisha’s wedding -
The other “Big Fat Indian Wedding” was the London-based NRI(Non-resident Indian) billionaire Laxmi Mittal’s daughter’s wedding. Laxmi Mittal’s daughter Vanisha Mittal’s wedding was the second most expensive wedding extravaganza in recorded history. Being a vegetarian, Laxmi Mittal threw a lavish “Vegetarian Reception” for his daughter in the Palace of Versailles, France.
Laxmi Mittal is Chairman & CEO of ArcelorMittal the world’s largest steel-making company.
Laxmi Mittal won the Forbes Life Time Achievement Award and the Government of India’s top National Honor “Padma Vibhushan”. He had also won Wall Street Journal’s “Entrepreneur of the Year” award in 2004. In 2007, TIME magazine included him in their “100 most influential persons in the world”.
Laxmi Mittal has been a member of the Board of Directors at Goldman Sachs since 2008.
Laxmi Mittal has been a member of the Board of Directors at Goldman Sachs since 2008.
Anant Ambani's Wedding with Radhika Merchant -
Anant Ambani is the second son of India's number one business tycoon Mukesh Ambani and Nita Ambani.
He has an elder brother Akash Ambani and a sister Isha Ambani.
Anant's wife Radhika Merchant comes from a well-known Indian business house and a childhood friend of Anant Ambani.
The celebrities from India and the world were on the guest list.
According to reports, the celebration cost a jaw-dropping Rs 5,000 crore (approximately US$600 million). When it comes to lavish weddings, few can compare to the scale of the Ambani nuptials.
The King and Queens of entertainment in lavish Indian weddings –
The reality shows of entertainment makers in “Big Fat Indian Weddings” are debatable. The Bollywood actors do dance numbers in a wedding celebration for a monetary reward. The celluloid dream merchants stooping down from their acting skills to gyrate a dance number for a fee is not aesthetic. It is agreed that the tinsel world dedicates their life to entertainment and often they are objects of fantasy for the general public.
The reality shows of entertainment makers in “Big Fat Indian Weddings” are debatable. The Bollywood actors do dance numbers in a wedding celebration for a monetary reward. The celluloid dream merchants stooping down from their acting skills to gyrate a dance number for a fee is not aesthetic. It is agreed that the tinsel world dedicates their life to entertainment and often they are objects of fantasy for the general public.
An ardent fan who always appreciates and respects the acting histrionics of their favorite actors is let down when seeing the cult figures are reduced to “naach gaana”(song and dance) in front of wealthy participants of lavish weddings for monetary considerations. This is nothing better than bar dancers in a hotel. A request to them to refrain doing from anything for money and remain respectful actors and not just stars.
Social evils – a curse in Indian society -
After the glitter and glamorous side of big fat weddings, let us examine the other side of marriages that exist in some parts of India.
Child Marriage is a curse in Indian society wherein the couple is not mature enough to make such a big decision about their life. The parents and other elders in the family decide the bride and bridegroom for their children when they are still at a tender age. This is high time to ban Child Marriage and allow the wedding partners to have a say in their life-long unison. We must only legalize the wedding of a person who has attained adulthood. The body and mind have to be mature enough to choose one’s partner.
Thomas Moore’s Utopia envisages a society in which a prospective bride's physical attributes are laid bare to choose the partner.
Though the conservative Indian society is far from such permissiveness, the right to seek the opinion of wedding partners has to be upheld.
Though the conservative Indian society is far from such permissiveness, the right to seek the opinion of wedding partners has to be upheld.
Another social evil is not allowing widows re-marriage. A girl who loses her husband in an early marriage is made to live without considering another marriage in her entire lifetime. We must encourage widow re-marriage and allow a life for the widow after her husband’s death.
A wedding is generally a common happening in a person’s life. Every parent wants their daughters to marry handsome, well-educated, and well-settled boys. However, the age factor after attaining adulthood is not a criterion for marriage.
The saying goes that there are many hardships in marriage, but where is the happiness in single status. The mutual respect for a trustworthy partner with love, care, and sacrifice triggers a happy married life. A marriage with fewer adjustments is considered to be a successful one.
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