Weddings in India are festive occasions and usually celebrated with extensive decorations, color, music, dance, outfits and rituals that depend on the community, region and religion of the bride and the groom, as well as their preferences.[1] India celebrates about 10 million weddings per year,[2] of which about 80% are Hindu weddings. Approximately 90% of marriages in India are still arranged.[3] Despite the rising popularity of love marriages, especially among younger generations, arranged marriages continue to be the predominant method for finding a marriage partner in India.[3]
A daughter's marriage can often be the most costly event in the life of an Indian family, with some estimate indicating that families spend more than six times a family's annual income on the wedding.[4] Most of these costs go towards dowries and the wedding celebration.[4] Scholars have characterized these expenditures as being strongly shaped by social norms and by desires to signal social status.[4]
... It was widely expected that the custom of "arranged marriage," so called, would decline as India modernized and as an individualistic ethos took root ... vast majority (over 90%) of marriages in all communities ... surprisingly robust ...