Hitched: The Modern Woman and Arranged Marriage

If you’re an Indian woman and old enough to legally bear children, chances are that an overweight relative has asked you, while fondly stroking their pot belly, ‘When am I going to eat at your wedding?’

The modern Indian woman’s attitude to marriage―and especially to arranged marriage―is a confused one. As traditional matchmaking methods and internet chat rooms come together to build matrimonial websites, our parameters have changed, but the time-honoured practice of arranged marriage sticks.

Hitched explores in depth the considerations matrimony should involve, and the issues that can crop up at different stages of an arranged marriage. A cross-section of women―those who married young, married late, married the first man their parents parked before them, or married out of caste in an arranged setup―open up about experiences ranging from the frightening to the hilarious and the awww-inspiring.