I asked my dad," Are we taking Dowry?" He strongly denied. Then, I asked what about the "so and so items"…. He replied that "so and so items" are customary…It’s given by your father-in-law with love and also it’s his responsibility. Hmm… Dowry hidden under Love and responsibility!
Everyone feels disgraced if they are told that they are collecting dowry. Because generally dowry is related to abuse, harassment, stove deaths etc… it's attached with a negative connotation. That's why people don’t claim that they take dowry. They cover it under love and responsibility.
According to Dowry Prohibition Act'1961 taking or giving dowry is illegal. But the legal world gets into action only when the abuse is reported. So till that being reported, the dowry is allowed. Till it gets reported it's categorized under various names like "gift", "seer", "Kanyadhanam". But for uniformity we could call it as DHULR- Dowry Hidden Under Love and Responsibility. Here I focus only on DHULR.
As a human being we are happier about our exposing our material possessions. Marriage is one of the chances to expose our wealth to the world. Every one does it within their reach. Mittal did it in millions of Pounds; Average middle class do it in Lakhs of rupees. This show-off leads to exorbitant dowries among the affluent families. There is no limit on the upper side for the dowry for these families. These people create the benchmark for the wrong cause. It's simply display of their affordability and arrogance rather than love and responsibility!
Generally in the marriage market, the worth of groom is gauged by the quantum of dowry he is able to fetch. Higher qualification, higher earning potential, higher expectations on inheritance fetch more dowries for a groom. It's just like the discounted cash flow method for business valuation. Project the future revenues/profits and discount it to present value. Only difference is that it's being done mentally without the help of Excel sheets. But the principle is same. Nowadays, groom's worth should have been increased a lot. Because Gold is trading at its 25 years high and expected to continuously increase in future. The uniqueness of this market is people don't believe in the unit values. Generally the negotiation happens in multiples of tens only. For example, 60 savarans come after 50 Savarans. 51, 52, 53 don’t fit for consideration. But when they go to buy the gold for self, they talk in grams. Simple contradictions!
The next reason for existence of dowry is that the rich dad wants his rich daughter to continue her rich life style in her in-laws house. So he dumps what ever possible by him as dowry. He ensures the materialistic comfort of his daughter every where she goes. He should be a Hutch Person! So, he pays dowry. He says, its love. He says it's his responsibility! But he forgets how irresponsible he is by making his daughter lazy, inflexible in life. Some time this happens in redundancy also. For example, Already the "so-and so items" may be with the groom's family. But still the "so and so items" are wanted as dowry. Greediness hidden under obligations!
The next reason could be drawing wrong equations. If you ask any groom's father, his response will be, I did for my daughter, and so what's wrong in insisting on my son's wedding. It's like drawing equation, A + B = C. Similarly the equations are drawn from other’s marriage. For example, in a family if the elder brother had fetched a car, then it may be the customary obligation for the in-laws of younger brother also.
Sometimes I wonder, People talk of their hardships for their daughter's marriage. But when it comes to son's wedding, selective amnesia happens. They forget to say loudly that I suffered during my daughter's wedding, so I don’t want to pass the same troubles to my daughter-in-law. Don’t they see the "daughter" in "daughter-in-law?"
DHULR has a positive side also. It's considered as the help to the young couples to establish the family. But when both the bride and groom is equally investing their life time on the marriage, why the responsibility is skewed towards the bride's side. More time DHULR loses it's rationality under ego, greed, social pressure etc. Because people are irrational with customary obligations! Beyond everything DHULR paves the way for dowry abuses and harassments. May not be in their families, but in other families! The best way is to avoid DHULR also. Let us avoid DHULR!
P.s: All the views are personal but the depicted characters,the groom, father, and in-laws are not from personal experience. Nowadys I watch a lot TV dramas.
