Wedding Blog
In my Bejeweled post, several commenters brought up a salient point: How do Indian families afford all this jewelry? Indian weddings are known for being lavish and over-the-top, but not much is said about how middle-to-lower class families afford the jewels and clothing, let alone the enormous guest list and multiple days of festivities. I thought it was a query worth exploring and I didn’t really know the answer, so I got to work: I talked to my parents, searched online, and even read a scholarly journal article (yes, I’m a true nerd at heart). And what I found was very revealing.
It’s obvious how wealthy Indian families in the US and India afford such extravagant weddings– they afford it the same way the Platinum Weddings folks do. 
But lower to middle class Indian families, particularly in India, face incredible pressure to give their daughters weddings far beyond their means. Much like in the United States, the wedding industry is soaring in India. Gurgaon boasts India’s first wedding mall, built at a cost of $16 million and with 400 stores. Eight more wedding malls are being planned around the country. The minimum budget for a wedding in India is typically $34,000, while upper-class families are known to spend upward of $2 million. This doesn’t include cash and valuables given as part of a dowry.
The marriage of a daughter is the most expensive event for an Indian family, sometimes driving parents into crippling debt. The crushing societal pressure to have the best wedding you can for your daughter is often the leading factor. A bank in India has even introduced an “auspicious” personal loan, exclusively for weddings. Wedding expenses, which can be more than six times the family’s yearly income, can force a family into poverty, especially if there are several daughters to be married. It is particularly heartbreaking that the financial burden has contributed to female infanticide and domestic violence in India.
In the Kashmir Valley, weddings involve a month’s worth of feasts and exchanges of gifts between the bride and groom’s family. Each side tries to top the other in the lavishness of gifts they offer. The weddings have become so prohibitively expensive that many women are forced to remain single if their parents are not well-off. There are approximately 40,000 Kashmiri women over the age of 40 not married because their parents can’t afford the wedding festivities. A marriage counseling group in Kashmir has started encouraging couples to opt for simpler, less expensive weddings.
In Delhi’s Sikh community, an injunction was passed requiring all Sikh weddings in Delhi to take place in gurdwaras, which are Sikh temples. Wedding banquets are not allowed to be held in hotels, no liquor or meat is to be served, and the ceremony must finish before noon. The injunctions is seen as an attempt to cut away excess and extravagance from a sacred ceremony.
Some families make do by at least providing their daughters with a set of gold bangles and a sari — considered the most basic of wedding necessities. In villages, poor families who can’t afford jewelry use mehndi to adorn the hands and feet of brides– this is how the custom began actually. Unfortunately, modern times have made it more difficult for Indian families to resist spending excessive sums on weddings. And of course, brides in the United States, both Indian and non-Indian, face similar pressures. I think it’s sad that’s there so much pressure for families to have a wedding outside their means– what could have been an intimate and simple event becomes an opportunity to elevate social status, incur debilitating debt, and “show off” for the community.
Newspaper columnist Malika Singh commented that, “where weddings were once celebrated, today they are performed.” Do you agree? What are your thoughts on opulent wedding spending?
images courtesy of New York Magazine and Nirali Magazine
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wow — great post. very interesting. it’s sad that there is so much pressure. i think many non-indian american families feel a similar pressure.
that is why we refused to do that. we had only 45 of our closest friends and family and it was a wonderful celebration and everyone enjoyed themselves!
The first adult wedding I ever went to was a year before my own. The couple was fairly well off and had a beautiful wedding. It wasn’t over the top lavish or anything, but they put their money to work in all the right places and it showed. I remember talking to my guy later thinking there was just no way we could pull a wedding off and worrying that it wouldn’t be a “real” wedding. Not so much “keeping up with the Joneses” but more like “so this is what a wedding looks like”. Like I said, it was my first adult one, so I thought that’s how it was supposed to be. It took me a while to realize (and the knot wasn’t helping) that a wedding is what you make it and all you really need is the exchange of vows between two people who love each other.
So yeah, I think it’s gotten a little out of hand. As for being a performance…I guess it really is. I mean you have a rehearsal, costumes, lines, music and an audience. But I don’t mind buying into that part of it. I just didn’t like the pressure to have an expensive event.
Wedding malls? I wonder how long it will take for that idea to catch on over here.
miss jasmine, thank you so much for this post–i have been having the same feelings and thoughts as you, coming from a family of 4 daughters! it’s nice to know that i’m not the only one who feels sad at how the meaning of the event is lost among all the excess.
Miss Jasmine - i totally agree. The pressure on Indian families to spend a lot on their daughter’s wedding is ridiculous. I recently got engaged and as happy as my parents were my mother was a little freaked out by all the jewellery she would have to buy. In fact, the first thing everyone asked was so how much jewellery have you collected for your daughter? When my mother replied that she hadn’t, there was considerable shock. But the truth is my parents spent their money to educate me at a good university. A far better use of the money in my opinion. But the questions from the relatives and friends about the jewellery don’t stop. And the irony is that most Indian brides can’t wear all the ostentatious jewellery they buy again because it’s just too heavy and they have to break it up.
My parents have decided to buck the trend and buy me simple jewellery. I am sure it will be a big “no-no” per the rest of the family. It should be interesting how that plays out.
NH, I think that’s a great trend to start. Good job on leading the way!
bravo! very well written, jasmine.
we’re not indian but definitely felt the american pressure and our parents’ cultures’ pressure to have a large event. luckily, our parents were pretty laissez-faire as we paid for the shebang.
as much as we tried not to spend above our budget and skip the extras, i’m an admitted sucker for a few things that i didn’t have to have but had to have. we tried our best to honor the sanctity of our religious ceremony and emphasized that it our guests were there to help celebrate, and we reminded ourselves of this repeatedly throughout the process. in the end, our guests commented on how touching the ceremony was and how much fun they had at the reception, so mission accomplished! so they didnt’ comment on the lavish decor/amazing food/added entertainment/crazy details (because we did keep all that pretty simple and moderate), but the importance of the day was maintained…whee!
i’ve always wondered how the families paid for the productions. thanks for the post. i couldn’t imagine my parents going broke to fund a wedding.
i think with the growth of personal wedding blogs, like the bee, there’s a slow but growing movement towards bucking what’s expected at the wedding and going for what the individual couple wants at the wedding. while there will always be people that need things to be bigger and better [i.e. platinum weddings, which i always feel like will be the next step for the kids featured on my super sweet 16] there will always be the majority that find their dream wedding within their means.
Great post, I was in India this past January and saw a few wedding receptions at our hotels and they were AMAZING!! It was intersting to see weddings during the week because that is where everything ‘aligned’ for them. I myself am not Indian so it was a great experience.
Yeah…I don’t think I realized how out of hand it was getting until I looked at my budget planning list and realized that I am now tossing hundreds and thousands like it’s candy. I have always been careful with money, which is why I can afford my dream wedding now but it made me sick to my stomach to see $25k gone in 1 day. Am now strongly reconsidering.
Thank you so much for this post! Very well written and researched! How sad is it that there are women in the world who cannot getting married… not for a lack of true love but for a lack of funds. It makes me thankful that I have the opportunity to have the simple wedding we’re having. If my parents had to throw me a lavish wedding, I know I’d be in the same shoes as these Kashmiri women! Thank you again for this very enlightening post!
Although not indian, I def. feel some pressure.
I mean with all this talk of “perfect weddings” and such, you think perfection has to include lavish food through out the night, thousands of flowers flown in from far away countries, martini louges, jewelry, designer gowns for the ceremony AND reception, extra entertainment etc. It’s hard not to feel like you need all of it yourself.
I am getting married at the zoo, and when I tell people I can practically see their jaw drop with them thinking the cost must’ve been extravagent , (most likely having thoughts that we’re paying to like rent out the entire place) Little do they know it’s not that expensive, and we have connections to help lower the cost even more.
It is something to celebrate for sure, but everyone should feel free to “celebrate” how they want, with whom they want, and not feel pressure to do it in a certain way.
If you get a chance I recommend
but White Weddings: Romancing Heterosexuality in Popular Culture (Paperback)
by Chrys Ingraham (I read it for a Sociology class about three years ago)
It is a fabulous look into the societal pressures to have a big “white wedding”.
Great post, Miss Jasmine! It is crazy how much people spend on weddings.
I’m attending my first indian wedding next year. I’ve heard all sorts of stories and was in disbelief until my indian coworker showed me pictures of his daughters wedding. There as an elephant! I’ve even heard of the groom coming in by helicopter.
2 million dollars! Good heavens. Thank you for this post, it was eye-opening. Thanks for taking the time to research this
I TOTALLY agree with Malika’s point. I’m trying to be inexpensive, but chic for my wedding, but I’m also harboring a really big guilt-ridden secret: I’m having two weddings. I try to convince myself it’s out of our control, because my boyfriend (who is from India) is an only child, and while not very religious himself, his parents are devout. I’m religious (Catholic) and I feel very strongly about having my ceremony in a church. While his parents are paying for the Hindu wedding, I still feel that they could A) use that money for more important things as they’re not very well off, and B) we could have incorporated Sangeet (instead of a rehearsal dinner) into our Catholic wedding so that we’d have the best of both worlds. Even though I think I’d love to have two weddings in full, I can’t help but feel ridiculous and frivolous. His parents don’t want anything less than a full Indian wedding - with mehndi and mooh dikhai. The whole experience is a lot different from what I’ve always thought, and I can’t say I’m that upset about having to wear a gorgeous lehnga choli, but there is an underlying guilty feeling about all this being used to show off to the friends that come. Sorry for the long comment!
Great post Miss Jasmine. I can’t even imagine preparing for a wedding like this.
“I think it’s sad that’s there so much pressure for families to have a wedding outside their means– what could have been an intimate and simple event becomes an opportunity to elevate social status, incur debilitating debt, and “show off” for the community.”
You couldn’t have said it any better. It’s true that this happens in all cultures, but I see it so much more in Indian cultures. I have a good number of Indian friends and when they talk to me about how crazy Indian weddings are, it was such a relief to me knowing I didn’t have to think about it all! I could sense the excitement in their voices, but at the same time noticed the obvious stress in their voice as well, and some of them were still single! Indian weddings are some of the most beautiful weddings I’ve seen, but it is unfortunate that some come at a very hefty price (literally and figuratively).
Wow, thanks for a great post, Miss J! The photog we used has shot several Indian weddings in NY and posted them on her blog, and I kept wondering — how do they afford to keep those parties going for days?! (Much less afford to hire her for 3 or 4 different events! I mean, that right there is at least $10K, but probably a good deal more.)
I agree that it’s not just Indian or Indian-American weddings…it’s a “disease” all over. I “get” the whole feeling that you have to have a beautiful event and you don’t want to be the one that people talk about later in a not-so-good way. What I don’t get is the lack of common sense some people have toward it. I had a friend whose dad was so fixated on providing the liquor instead of getting it through the hotel because *that’s what all his friends did for their kids’ weddings* — even though it cost MORE to do it that way. She did a spreadsheet and everything to show him how it cost more, but he insisted it had to be that way b/c that’s how his friends did it. Whaa??!
Miss J, is renting the jewelry, or borrowing it, considered a big no-no?
This post really touched my heart….I can relate to how expensive weddings are, I had to lower my selections several times over b/c some wedding related things are way out of our budget. Thanks for the informaiton.
That’s makes me so sad whenever I hear that little girls are aborted or abandoned so that their parents don’t have to endure the cost of raising them and paying for a wedding. I think when your population demographics start changing in part due to the extravagence of weddings then there’s a real problem. And a minimum budget of $34,000! That’s more then the average wedding in the U.S. and the per capita income is so much less. Real eye opener.
your posts are always well written.
Great post (and use of research). 
Similarly, I’ve wondered how asian families afford the two or three events invovled in their weddings!
It’s so sad to me that LOANS are an option–for anyone–to afford a wedding. I was extremely fortunate that my parents had a generous savings so I felt that our wedding was everything I’d hoped and dreamed, and with 320 guests!
I totally agree with that quote as well. Something that I was thrilled to receive comments on was our ceremony–personalized and meaningful and that meant the world to me. One woman I work with continues to tell me how special the entire wedding was and how she really feels like she knows us, and how surprising that is to her since it was a fairly large wedding. I think that if families focused more on making the wedding about the couple and not about impressing everyone around them or subscribing to traditions then they wouldn’t go into debt, and would–if nothing else–have a meaningful and special wedding.
Weddings can be expensive and it’s always good to plan early and keep a notebook on everything. That way if you need to go back and rethink it’s easier.
I’m seeing this post months late, but I am so glad you posted it. Thanks for reminding us about what’s really important– not the spending, but the love and family ties!
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Mrs. Jasmine, Chicago/LA
Age and Occupation: 25, Attorney
Fiance's Age and Occupation: 26, Attorney
Engagement Date: March 24, 2007
Wedding Date: June 7, 2008
Blogging Since: September 20, 2007
Venue: Hotel on the westside of Los Angeles
About Me: I'm a happy-go-lucky, imaginative spirit trapped in the body of a lawyer. I love reading, shopping, dining out, and exploring my beloved adopted city of Chicago with my fiance. We're planning the wedding of our dreams in my hometown of Los Angeles and we're excited to incorporate our cherished Indian/Pakistani customs and traditions.
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