Reviewed by:
Dr. Shivendu Kumar Rai
Assistant
Professor,
Department of Mass Communication,
Galgotias University
The researcher started the research article with a general note by explaining the conduct of marriage in India. In this article, he endeavored to establish different causes of involuntary-delay in the marriage of daughters, especially in rural India. With this, he also attempted to analyze the concept of marriage in the Hindu religion.
This
article has majorly focused on the articulation of customs of marriage in the
social culture and the implication of delay or non-marriage in the context of
rural India. For this, the researcher has utilized qualitative research design
and mentioned personal experiences related to the marriage system and its’
delay which helps in the presentation of different ways and means for
understanding the issue.
In
the introductory part of the article, the researcher has tried to contextualize
the research problem by discussing the concept of Hinduism in the Indian
culture. He rightly described the Hinduism as a complex structure which based
on the rituals, practices, beliefs and exemplary patterns. He also related the
idea of Hinduism with the caste system of India. Further, he also pointed out
‘Family’ as a key aspect of Indians daily life which helps in the socialization
process of children in the family. It is the process of socialization in the
Indian family which determines the duties and responsibilities of son and
daughter in the family.
The
leadership and decision-maker position of the family is given to the
grandfather and grand-mother fulfills the responsibility of managing the family
members. She acts as bridge among the family members and creates nodes between
them. Further, he discussed the four different levels of the Hindu joint
family. Such as a “household; traditional Indian extended
family society ‘joint family’ has been a social reality. The Indian family can
be identified as the extended family, which is not a family as in sociological
literature but as the household; as grouping of households constituting a
property-group; as a still wider grouping of households incorporating the
coparcenary which defines the outer limits for allodial and obligatory ritual
purposes; as an all-encompassing dispersed grouping defined genealogically
rather in terms of active interaction.”
The
researcher has further explained the research methodology opted for conducting
this research as per the aim of the research i.e to understand the causes
leading to involuntary delay or non-marriage of daughters and the concerns that
arise due to it in the rural Indian context. The researcher has opted for focus
group discussion as a data collection tool. The data was collected from
Begunkudor and Chatambari, two rural places from the state of West Bengal,
India. The researcher has given the justification for choosing the research area
but it is not significant enough as no scientific reason has pointed out. With
this, the researcher has also conducted in-depth interviews which helped in the
establishments of comments. But, he conducted the group discussion and in-depth
interviews with the parents only and not included the daughter or son of the
family. So, the result showcases only the opinion of elder people of rural
india.
The
researcher has rightly chosen the process of data analysis by codifying all the
transcription of collected data. But, the analysis part of the research article
missed out the theoretical or conceptual framework which important for
analyzing any kind of data and its’ importance increases especially in the
qualitative research.
In
the finding section, the researcher has discussed about the five major causes
of late or delayed marriages in rural India. The first cause pointed out by the
researcher is “Mis-match in preferences”. Under this section, he tried to cater
the problem of finding a desirable groom for her daughter. It is but obvious
that every parent wants the best husband for her daughter. That’s why they set
some preferences for their daughter and finding the desirable groom became a
challenge for them which end up with a late or delayed marriage.
The
second cause which researcher has pointed out is ‘inability to fulfill the
dowry demands’. It was understood that due to the poor economic or financial
condition, some of the parents were not in a position to fulfill the dowry
demands leading to non-marriage of their daughter. ‘Looks of the girl’ has
taken as a third cause of the late marriage. It was understood that looks of
the girl played a crucial role in getting them married at the right age (i.e.,
for an unattractive girl, her parents had no option but to pay a higher amount
of dowry and/or compromise with their desirable choice during groom selection).
However, in the case of beautiful girls, their parents were in a better
position to find a groom of their choice.
Disease
associated with a family was noted to be the next cause leading to delay or
non-marriage of a girl in rural India. It was found that those girls whose
family was perceived to be having a history of some disease, their parents had
a very tough time in getting their daughter married.
“Violation
of social norms” like going for an inter-caste marriage by any of the family
member was found to be the last cause leading to non-marriage of adult children
of that family. “Reduction in social status” was understood to be the first
concern that bothered the parents of the family. It was found that those
parents who were not able to get their daughter married at the right age, were
looked down upon by the societal members. Safety and security has taken as a
next cause by the researcher. Behind this, the family members commented that if
the girl will be unmarried then who will protect her in her late age.
Further
in the discussion the researcher has pointed out that a kind of a label was
associated to an unmarried girl that was viewed negatively. Exploration of the
causes of delay or non-marriage of young girls reveals that most of them are
related to the prevailing customs, beliefs, and cultural practices while others
are related to socioeconomic condition as well as a mismatch in personal
preferences in mate selection. Further, this research highlights the
psychological phenomena that the family members (specifically parents of the
unmarried girl), and the girl herself has to go through in case of not getting
married at the right age. These and other findings suggest that generating
greater insights into the understudied areas of Indian social culture is
important for both the development of knowledge regarding life in rural India
and understanding the prevailing sociocultural practices.
At
the end, the researcher has also mentioned about the limitation and future
aspect of the research which help the fellow researcher to conduct such more
studies. The intention in this article was to highlight the causes that lead to
delay or non-marriage of daughters and the concerns relating to the same in the
Indian sociocultural context which is rightly presented by the researcher in
this article but he can also include other section of the society for
collecting the data and may analyzed the collected data as per different
socio-cultural theory spectrum. So, the present results contribute not only
valuable insights into Indian marriages, but also provide a tentative starting
point toward the greater understanding of social culture practices prevailing
in India.
