Take a stand

It all started with love she said,

It was a half -lit sky, he sat beside me, played his favorite music and held my hand as the golden ray started to settle behind us. He told me how important I was in his life, and his dimples seemed deeper than usual. He had worn a dark red shirt with black plaid pants, and I could tell that he was nervous by the way he fidgeted his hands. He then paused for a while and he got closer to me, and by now I could hear my heart pound. He was about to say the words that I had only imagined in my mind. He looked straight into my eyes and pulled out what seemed to be an engagement ring and said the most exhilarating words ‘Will you marry me?’ I lapsed for a minute, and with eyes full of tears, head full of dreams, I watched my whole world change as I said word ‘Yes’. It was the happiest day of my life, and on the ride back home, I kept looking at the ring and ruminating about the future in front of me.

I told my parents, and watched them jump in joy. They had been looking forward to this news, and they were extremely happy that I had found ‘’my person’’.

A week later, we had a gathering at their house, and as they welcomed us into their beautiful home with hugs, sweets, and smiles I had felt like I belonged. Both the parents were getting acquainted, and we watched them nervously from the bedroom and hoped everything would go smoothly. Both he and I breathed a sigh of relief as we witnessed our dreams slowly turn into reality. We were both happy for each other as we had crossed miles of struggle with love and hope and longed for this day to come. After a while, we went back to his living room, it had been awfully quite and my parents seemed to look unhappy and flabbergasted. I began to listen to their conversation more carefully and overheard his parents say the daunting word ‘Dowry’. His father began to lay out the expectations of the perfect wedding for his son, which included a high end car, a brand new apartment, insane amounts of cash, and his mother quickly intervened and said ‘’ Don’t you forget about the several sovereign of gold’’. My parents were quite frankly taken aback by the astonishing demands and looked at me with sheer disappointment. Even though, both the parents were clearly from the same generation, it was evident that their thought process was different. His parents kept insisting the demands in the name of customs, traditions and a union called marriage. He then went on to say how this has been the accepted norm for generations, and it should be followed so that their pride and social status will be in place.

Standing there made me feel cheap about myself, I thought to myself ‘Am I being traded?’ ‘Am I a product on the store which could be bought?’ ‘Is this marriage really about two people coming together in the name of love?’ I was angry, upset and and I looked at him listening to all that was being said and discussed. I wondered what’s keeping him mum. I watched him change the topic of the conversation, and all led in vain. On our way back, what seemed like the longest journey of our lives, I apologized for everything that happened, and told my parents that I needed some time alone for my thoughts. My dad paused, smiled looked at me and said the following words that changed everything ‘Money and the materialistic things they ask for are not hard to be fulfilled, but our values and integrity is what stops me from saying yes to their demands, but having said that, my daughter’s happiness is more important to me than my values and integrity. I hugged my father tight and told him ‘Thank you Appa'. I took a walk that evening to contemplate about everything that had happened, and I knew the demands weren’t uncommon in our society, but I asked myself ‘Is this right?’ ‘Is a marriage in India really about everything else except the union of two people? ‘Is this relationship going to strengthen with the interference of the ‘society’? A million questions in my mind, a head full of worry and with a breaking voice, I called him and asked him to meet me. He immediately apologized as he approached me, and got closer to me. He tried to justify his parent’s demands and said ‘I don’t support dowry, and I don’t agree with my parents but they are still my parents, and there’s nothing I can do about this. I wish we could come in terms with the way things are’. I looked at my finger, removed the ring and placed them in his hands and said ‘If I come in terms with this, it would mean that I’m yet another generation who adjusted and accepted the society’s unreasonable, and cruel expectations, and I do not want to put a price on love, neither am I willing to demean or devalue women.’ As I said the strongest but the most uncomfortable statement to man I loved and longed for a life with, I knew it was going to be okay, because it was the righteous thing to do.

It is said that more than 100,000 women are reported to die due to dowry related violence in recent years; there are also a lot of unrecorded cases regarding physical and mental abuse due to dowry. It is said that a women who bring a lot of cash, land, gold, ‘’gifts’’ to the groom will only treated well and accepted in the society, and thus she and her family are often forced to follow the “societal norms” as others.

This brings in discrimination and separation among women and families. This builds a bridge between two people who love each other truly and would like to join hands in the matrimony. Everyone in this world is worth of love, happiness and togetherness, but by supporting the giving of dowry one is not only separating, sectioning and differentiating among two families, but mainly demeaning, devaluing and putting a price on the lives and worth’s of women. For this cycle of inequality, abuse, violence, trauma and explicit expectations of society to end must always choose love over the social evil that sometimes haunts us in the name of ‘norms’.

THANK YOU.