Love Marriage V/s Arranged Marriage

Love Marriage V/s Arranged Marriage....

When I first read about this contest, thoughts & counter logic started oozing my mind, but as I sat down to jot down those thoughts it was all muzzled up and confusing. I felt that the reason behind it is because of my neutral views about the subject.

As per my opinion, both types of marriages carry their own baggage. We cannot generalize them under any particular category and measure their success quotient by applying single formula to all these marriages.

I have seen carefully chosen & perfectly matched arranged alliances going haywire and also passionately loving couple getting married after almost 7 years of ‘knowing each other’ and then filing for divorce after couple of years, following a series of ugly incidents.

My idea of marriage includes few important components without which whatever might have been the path of marriage – love or arranged, it is bound to show up cracks……..which either the couple try to fill up with compromise or just let it be there to widen and eventually break up.

First and foremost thing is ‘Mutual Respect’. Yes, if the partners lack the respect then it obviously reflects in their behavior which ends up in hurt sentiments & chipped ego. Be it a Love Marriage (LM) or Arranged Marriage (AM) if the ‘Mutual Respect’ is missing then partners end up fighting with each other hurling sarcastic & irrelevant remarks on each other.

The next is ‘Understanding’. This factor requires lots of maturity from both the partners. Sometimes you just have to understand the emotions & behavior of each other and their respective circumstances to flow freely through this river of marriage.

Another key factor is ‘Expectations’. This develops on the platform of an individual’s upbringing, thoughtprocess & mentality. Wrong or unrealistic expectations kill the marriage – be it LM or AM. One of my ex-colleague boasted about his passionate love story and was always showing off his intense love for his partner. The girl was a MBA & was working in a MNC. She came from a liberal family. Boy was quite aware of her & her family’s contemporary views but the moment they got married he expected her to become docile daughter-in-law who never opens her mouth in front of her in-laws, not even for eating food ( forget about expressing opinions)!!!

Then there are other factors like ‘care’, ‘love’, ‘concern’ & 'attachment'. Many would be surprised with this fact that I have not given ‘love’ that much of importance in the hierarchy. It is because I believe that over a period of time in any healthy relationship these factors develop & grows eventually.

Then there are so many stereotypes attached to both LM & AM.

Some people say that Love marriages fall apart easily because of lack of social security. But that is quite a hideous statement. It is all between the chemistry of partners which takes the situation in its desired direction – positive or negative. So, even if there is an arranged marriage and the tuning is loose, it might go ashtray.

Sometimes, parents & family members take it personally on their ego if the children want to marry their choice of partner. They just cannot accept to let the ‘control' go out of their hands. Bu they just forget that if a person is old enough to vote & elect a government then why he/she can’t chose their life partner. One of my neighbors who is searching an alliance for her son want her DIL to be less educated & very average looking ( yes, she mentioned these eligibility criteria)!!! The reason of her choice is that then the girl would lack in confidence & never dare to speak back to her husband & in-laws. I really feel pity for the would -be DIL who would be brought in the chess game of the house politics as a pawn by the queen bee who loves to reign the house!!!

My personal opinion also negates this concept of love in the whole affair of ‘love marriage’. I feel that unless & until you stay with a person & share the same house you are not able to understand the actual person to a large extent. Everybody presents their best face forward when they meet their heartthrobs or fiancée. So, even if the AM advocates shout about the liberal courtship allowed nowadays before any AM or the LM supporters vouch on their years of ‘seeing each other’, it remains incomplete & veiled till the time both the partners stay with each other to observe & absorb habits, behavior & way of living.

So here I see that I am back to square one where I started this post. It may sound like some rant but I cannot help it much. I mentioned earlier that I have quite mixed opinion about this topic.

This post is my entry for the Love Marriage or Arranged Marriage on Indiblogger.