To all Indians.. Very important question i've always wanted to know the answer 2  

i've wondered this since i was a child. and i've been fascinated by it. i hope someone lets us know too. thanks for responding. i'll keep you posted.

it is called as 'bindi' which all married women in india wear as s sign of their marraige

thank you for clearing this up for us that do not know. i've never seen it other than the color red before.

As far as meditation, I always thought it symbolized the third eye. Is this true?

I m too infavour of meditation.It really give way with speed and accuracy

that's awesome. i love the way the bindi looks. thank you for letting me know what it is called and what it means. i appreciate it greatly.

Thanks vityota, I too, had always wondered about the dot. I really think that the warding off of negative power is an aweosme idea.

Yes, thank you vityota for your very good explanation. I have wondered about it myself. I think it is so wonderful to be able to learn from each other. Thanks again.

I always thought it was something but it never occur to me that it was a sign for married woman. So instead of wearing a wedding ring, the red dot on the forehead represent the wedding ring, right?

The red dot only represents that the woman is NOT a widow, she may be married or unmarried. By the way, the Indians also use the wedding ring as a sign of being married.

very right our bindi is the sign of marriage...even when we go 2 the temple after doing our prayer the priest apply red tilak known as sindoor on our forhead..its like keeping the bad things away frm us.

Thanks for clearing things up for us here. Much appreciated.

hey thanx viyota even i m an indian and hindu bt u explained it in very good manner thanx buddy

thank you for checking out my post. i know a lot of people that are interested in the bindi. Many of us don't have a clue what it is or what it means. I too have been told many things, but didn't know whether to believe it or not because i've not asked a true Indian.

This is a great discussion. I have also wondered about the red dot, or bindi as I now know it is called. It's great that we have this forum where we can learn such things. I always thought that the bindi had some kind of religious significance, but am intrigued with the belief that it wards off evil.

Again, this is a very useful and helpful discussion. It was asked in a culturally-sensitive manner which made it clear that the user had a genuine interest and was not being discriminatory in any way. Pebbles, you can be a "role model" for us! If we would ask these things as you did, I'm sure that we would get a better understanding of many different cultures, and we would in turn help others to understand us. Maybe this would, in some small way, help to stop some of the discrimination and hatred in the world by promoting understanding and tolerance.

laurief you are so sweet. thank you very much. i didnt know i would be such a help to many and i didnt know about all the discrimination that goes on around here either. i didnt know it was that bad. one user told me that people have been discriminating against indians. i'm very glad that i could make this place a little more friendly by asking my question in a polite manner. thank you for checking it out and responding to my discussion.

I should have said thought NOT know.

thank you for letting me know what you found out. i really appreciate it.

whiteheather...seems like you got too heated by this discussion..lol

bindi is not the mark of married woman.even unmarried girl can wear bindi on her face.you see,sindhur is mark of married woman.sindhur is placed in front side by seprating the hair from middle and between middle part of hair sindhur is placed.

lol. i think all men think they know everything. i've always wanted to know about this since i was a child. thanks for reading my post and i'm glad it was of help to you

not a problem i know many people are interested in knowing this. yea it is like makeup isn't it. thanks for responding.

i thought it may have something to do with the hindu religion i just didnt know what the connection was. thank you for telling us the true name of the dot. thanks for responding.

that's so amazing to me. i love the bindi or sindur. it is very beautiful and the meanings of it are wonderful. thank you for telling me more about them and more about how they get them..

yes i've gotten many answers varying from each other. i love learning about all this too. thanks for responding. keep checking back to see what we find.