ushila was 28 years old when I met her in a city called Baroda in the state of Gujarat. Her marriage was to take place two weeks hence. Like most marriages in India, it was initiated through a newspaper advertisement and arranged between the two families without consulting the bride. Some families, particularly the upper-caste and well-to-do, allow the prospective mates to meet each other and refuse the match if either has strong objections. But in this case, Sushila would not meet her husband until they joined hands beside the sacred marriage fire.
Most young women in India are married long before the age of 28. In fact, Sushila's age made her a less desirable prospect. I asked her brother Manoj why his family had waited so long to find a husband for her. He told me that their father, who had recently died, wanted to keep Sushila at home as he was pleased with the way she served him, keeping his house and tending to his needs.
So the husband-to-be whose family replied to the ad was perhaps less than the ideal mate. They lived in a remote village 40 kilometres away from Baroda. The "boy" (as unmarried young men are called) tended a small provision shop with his father. Sushila did not want to leave her family and the city where she grew up, went to school and learned to speak English. Her new life would consist of bearing and raising children, cooking and cleaning. Instead of the modern tunic and pant suit that many young city women in India wear, she would wear the more traditional saris. When she went out of her house, the end of her sari must be pulled up over her head to veil her face, as she is higher caste than most others in her village.
The dowry (now illegal in India but still widely practiced) demanded by the family of the boy was approximately US$40,000 - a huge amount of money in a country where $7,000 a year is a good middle class income. The debt incurred by putting the dowry together might take Sushila's brothers 20 years to pay off. As well, a long list of goods required by the boy's family such as a refrigerator, a TV, a motorcycle, gold jewelry etc. was presented. When a woman in India marries she is no longer the responsibility of her birth family. She becomes the responsibility of her husband's family. The dowry is her family's contribution to her future upkeep.
"Dowry deaths" are still relatively common in India. "Bride burnings", often disguised as "stove bursts" are committed when the husband's family is not satisfied with the amount of dowry they manage to procure from the bride's family. By killing the wife, the husband is free to marry again and collect more dowry. The prosecution rate for dowry deaths is very low as they are difficult to prove. Only about 3% of tried cases result in guilty verdicts. Even in situations when the bride's fate is not so drastic, she can still be the victim of violence and abuse.
Sushila was not interested in her prospective husband-to-be, and she did not want to get married. I asked her brother, a young man teaching in a university and studying for his PhD., why they did not just keep her at home. Why force her to marry? He replied that it would be such a disgrace to his family if they were unable to marry her off that people would throw stones at his mother. When I asked him what his family would do if Sushila was miserable in her new role, he said that she must try to adjust and if it was really a disaster, they would bring her home. "We can only hope that they won't beat her", he said.
He went on to tell me about the mother of a friend who was beaten with a stick by her husband nearly every day of her married life. Yet she chose to remain in this misery rather than suffer the shame and dishonor of divorce.
In India, when a girl marries, she usually joins her husband at his family home with his mother, father and sometimes other brothers and their wives. Her well-being and happiness depends on how the bride's new family, and particularly her mother-in-law, treats her.
Just before I left India the year of her engagement, I visited Sushila and Manoj's family for lunch. Often in a modest Indian home, guests are received in a bedroom as there are no "living rooms" as we know them in the western world. One of the beds was littered with "cosmetic" items - soaps, shampoos, lotions, combs etc. that were part of the dowry. Sushila laughed with her brothers when discussing the upcoming wedding. Then she and I were alone for a moment when her brothers left the room. I asked her if she was looking forward to the marriage. Her hand flew to her chest and she just looked at me, eyes wide with fear, unable to speak. Before I left that day, I promised her that I would visit her in the village when I returned to India the next year.
The following January, a Canadian friend and I joined Manoj, a brother or two and assorted friends in the back of a rattletrap, canvas covered jeep and made the bumpy journey down long, narrow ro
ads through lush green fields to the tiny village where Sushila now lived. I had heard from Manoj in an earlier letter that she was happy in her new life. Finally we were to meet the people that she now called Mommy and Papa. We were greeted by a beaming Sushila who introduced her mother-in-law, an obviously hard-working woman with a radiant smile and her father-in-law, stern in his role as head of the household, but with a warm demeanor. Sushila's husband was a tall, handsome young man, simple and shy, yet generous in his welcome of the strange, foreign friends of his wife. Sushila seemed happy and confided to me that she was expecting their first baby.
I last visited the village in 2001. Sushila and her husband have two young children now. Sushila works long hard days cleaning, caring for her children and helping with food preparation. Her son, now 4, lives with them in the village and her daughter, almost 3 is being brought up at Manoj's modest family home in the city in order to teach her more "civilized" city ways. It was explained to me that the boy was not being brought up in the city as they waited too long and he had become too attached to his parents and his life in the village to disrupt him. Sushila is generally contented with her life, considering the choices that were available to her and the potential for difficulties. She loves her frequent visits to her family home in the city which is a respite of sorts. But in a private moment with me just before I left the village the last time she confided, "Sometimes I wish I could just run away from here." Sometimes I wish you could too Sushila.
Note: The story is real, all names and some details have been altered. The photographs are representational.