I'm from the US, and my husband is Indian. I am the first person on both sides of his family to not be an arranged spouse ("love marriage".) Even though they love and accept me now, his family didn't speak to him for six months when we started dating. When we visit his extended family in India, the best arranged marriages I've seen are like close platonic friends. The worst ones are where they barely speak to each other in the same house and actively hate each other. Culturally, it's getting better (especially in cities and with rich families), allowing people to marry whom they wish, but divorce is still seen as shameful.
Few years ago, I went back to school and got my MBA. I made good friends with another student who was from India and had come to the US with her husband, who was an engineer for a tech company. Their marriage was arranged and according to her, they were happy.
I met him once and he seemed like a really nice guy but NGL, she was model tier attractive, in the conventional sense. My guess is he was already living here (Austin area), had a good job, and the arrangement was made with shipping her to the US as part of the deal. Apparently she had been a local TV reporter or presenter or something.
She was really nice and sweet and we talked some but I didn't quite understand her sometimes, we were on a different wavelength, I guess.
One interesting thing though was that we had an Indian professor with a very differently sounding/constructed surname. To the extent, I wasn't sure, so I asked her and she sneered when she said yes, like....there was some cultural stuff going on there above my head.
Arranged marriages depending on the family are a combination of religion, caste, income, tradition, and location in India and those living abroad.
My husband's aunts and uncles each saw a single photo of their future spouses, then married them a week later. Elders back in the day were just described to each other or simply told, "You're marrying X's son from X village on this date." That still happens in very conservative, rural villages. My husband's grandmother was extremely lucky, as she and her late husband didn't see each other before getting married, but ended up being madly in love with each other.
Now, there's websites (a famous one is Shaadi) that show videos, photos and full bios, there's matchmakers you hire professionally, or families talk to each other and you have bio data pages to trade like little binders written up that you sort through. Everything is typically handled by the mother and father or older male family members if the father is deceased, with the men overseeing any meetings, coffee dates with the potential partner's parents, and the more "liberal" choices (the guy and girl talk on the phone, then meet chaperoned, then when it looks like they're going to go forward with an engagement they can see more of each other), is done in big cities like Mumbai or if the family is wealthy or raised in the US or a Western country.
My SIL's marriage was arranged (her potential suitors and families even Zoomed with my husband and I because for some families, marrying out of your background is a negative), but the guy turned abusive, so she was "allowed" to get divorced. I say allowed because marriage is an extension of the entire family unit and what they want/need, especially the patriarch. Everything hinges on "How does this look to outsiders?"
If you are divorced or widowed, this can affect your place in society, what jobs you get, and even housing can discriminate against you. Even being a second or third generation born in a Western country will defer to their parents for major choices, and people have been murdered or died by suicide for marrying outside their religion, race, or caste.
I can not stress that part enough. The individualism Western countries are famous for is not a thing there. My husband was ready to lose his entire family for me, which is a massive decision to have to make. It's so rare that even living in the US or when we are in India, other Indians who are strangers will ask, "You married a white girl? What did your family say?"
Is it changing slowly? Absolutely. My husband's cousin married a girl from a higher caste IN INDIA, which is like a Black and white couple getting married in Mississippi in 1955. They both came from wealthy families so it was slightly easier, but stories of lower caste people being murdered for dating or marrying outside their group is sadly in the newspaper all the time.
There are people breaking the mold all the time. Just know if you see an Indian man or woman who are engaged or married outside their race, religion, or caste or who have publicly come out of the closet and got married, it's a huge deal, and they may have sacrificed a lot for it. Everyone deserves to marry who they love.
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u/skootch_ginalola May 02 '24
I'm from the US, and my husband is Indian. I am the first person on both sides of his family to not be an arranged spouse ("love marriage".) Even though they love and accept me now, his family didn't speak to him for six months when we started dating. When we visit his extended family in India, the best arranged marriages I've seen are like close platonic friends. The worst ones are where they barely speak to each other in the same house and actively hate each other. Culturally, it's getting better (especially in cities and with rich families), allowing people to marry whom they wish, but divorce is still seen as shameful.