In India, the battle to love and the fundamental right to making a family

I attended a beautiful church wedding in Mumbai’s Bandra neighbourhood with music and dance, a white wedding gown and a three-tiered cake. The bride, a Marathi woman from an Other Backward Classes, was marrying a Goan Catholic man who was her classmate in college. She was an accomplished woman and practising chartered accountant.

Watching everyone dance and sip wine, I was delighted and intrigued. “How did you accept her choice so easily?” I asked her parents. “You have never met Christians before! Did you not worry?”

They responded, “What is the point of raising children to be independent and intelligent, if you cannot trust their decisions? By being negative, you will just lose your children. We are not that stupid.”

Sadly, many parents are. When my cousin and his girlfriend declared their intent to marry, her father was very upset. “You have so many male friends, why do you choose to marry this Muslim guy?” he said. “That other fellow – surname Kamath – he could be as good surely!”

She was a beloved daughter till then; beautiful, intelligent and successful, she was the apple of the eye of her parents. For her choice of a partner, she had to leave her home, go stay with...

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