Moneyless Marriage

Whether Hindu, Moslem or follower of virtually any other religion, India's father of the bride teeters close to bankruptcy. A moneylender's dream, he is forced by custom to fork over a huge dowry for his daughter, start paying off every member of the bridegroom's family with lavish presents of cash and sweetmeats as soon as the engagement is announced. The ideal wedding must be a stunningly beautiful rite that lasts for days, with thousands of gaily colored electric-light bulbs adorning the house, an ornate marquee and a team of cooks to gorge scores of guests. For generations the ancient custom has wiped out families' life savings, made newborn daughters a sure sign of bad luck.

In New Delhi fortnight ago, four couples demonstrated a simple solution: Delhi's first cut-rate mass wedding, with no fuss and no dowries at all. Members of the Jain sect, India's fifth biggest religious group (biggest: Hindus), the couples arrived quietly at a Jain temple. Only ostentation: the four brides' traditionally exquisite silk saris, and the bridegrooms' jeweled turbans. Stripped of party gaud, the go-minute wedding ceremony took on added religious significance, from the sound of the Sanskrit scripture chanted by four pandits to the odor of marigold garlands and the glow of incense-fed fires. Said one happy new father-in-law: "Under normal procedure, this marriage would have cost about $4,200." Under the new procedure, he paid only a fee of $2.30.

Last week two other quiet marriage ceremonies of seven couples were held by the small Namdhari sect of the Sikhs, who have carried on the un-Indian custom for 96 years. Any Namdhari Sikh couple has religious sanction for group marriage so long as it is conducted personally by the sect's leader, Satguru Partap Singh, 68. The cost per couple last week: $5.46. Satguru Partap is so set against pomp that in his sect a couple is excommunicated if a dowry is discovered. In 1911 he sponsored legislation sanctioning group marriage for Indians of all sects. It is still on the books, to be relied on by any Indian who dares to flaunt social pressure and stop spending.

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