Story Brunch
Society has been changing faster than ever, thanks to changing economic pattern, increased geographic mobility, women’s increased participation in higher education and labor force and omnipresent social media. The marriage scenario in India has also been undergoing drastic changes as a consequence. Not long back arranged same-caste marriages were a norm, while love marriages suffered social stigma. Now its not the case and even parents actively support choice of life partner outside the traditional domain of caste structure.
In popular media,same-caste arranged marriages are portrayed as evil and regressive practice,not suitable for modern societies.
But is the portrayal justified? Lets delve deeper to understand the dynamics of same-caste marriages.
In the western world since long,and recently in India too,many youth have shifted to love marriages,many of which are inter-caste. Class of western society can be extrapolated to be caste of Indian social structure,since ancient times. Only difference is that class is mainly an economic hierarchy and caste is a socio-cultural hierarchy.
Most of the love marriages happening in the west and in India today are within a ‘class’. For example, a software engineer marries a software engineer or someone from similar economic strata,a bureaucrat marries a fellow bureaucrat. There might be few exceptions,but then they have always existed.
Basically everyone is choosing a fixed category to marry within,and that category is mostly economic.
Now,won’t it be better if the criteria of category were increased for a better adjustment post marriage?
It’s better if we broaden the factors we consider while choosing spouse. Economic status should be the last, similarity of social , cultural and education should be priority.This similarity has generally been found within castes in India since historical times.
When a family goes for arranged marriage, caste factor gives the biggest hint of this similarity, if both belong to same caste, high chances of similarity on many factors,and hence better chances of compatibility in marital life.
Why don’t people have problem with within class marriage but have issues with more broad based similarity finding criteria called caste.Many opine that it’s a better system than focusing solely on class while looking for a match. It considers more parameters for similarity and hence a successful marriage.
