Say no to dowry

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How many times have you heard boy’s parents saying, “We do not want anything but you should give something to your daughter since it will help the couple to start a family”. Take a pause and reread the statement, it reflects a very subtle way of asking for dowry. It is one of the statements that you would have heard and there are many more. Before I move ahead I would like to present a few facts of the Indian weddings. Firstly, it is not a wedding of a couple but two families. If one family member does not get along with the other it becomes couple’s problem for rest of the life. Now it is entirely up to the couple how they deal with the situation. Secondly, it is an opportunity for the boy’s family to exaggerate how much they got from the girl’s side in the form of gifts for their family members etc. Lastly, how precious is their son and the girl has got the best soul mate. One of the worst incidents that I have witnessed is my cousins wedding who was MD during his wedding. A well educated doctor accepted a fully furnished home with a car as a dowry covered with a sugar coated statement as I mentioned at the starting. Is marriage not about starting a family on your own? If you get everything on a plate what is left to be done in life. Is it not about working collectively going through ups and downs of life? Please do not cripple the young ones by providing them for which they should be working. One of the principles that I have stuck to in my life is not to take dowry. I stood by it when I got married since I said it on the face even before anyone brought it up. Saying that it does have implications, you will face a lot of resistance. And the effects are long term. But at the end you will have the satisfaction of doing a right thing. I always had faith that I have 2 hands and a brain to earn bread for the family. After 4 years we are a happy family. We have enough wealth to live our life happily. Every morning we wake up with a satisfaction that we do not owe any materialistic thing to any one. We work every day to make our life better.