The Order of the Crutch

One of my Aunt married a Muslim and obviously converted due to the very reason. I was invited to this wedding of her son and believe me, i was excited like hell. I’ve never been to a Muslim wedding before and this was my first time. I aspired to acquaint myself with my aunts in laws, get to know them more and hang out with them more since i’ve never done that all of these years during my childhood and i decided its time to set the record straight.

Coming from a typical Hindu Brahmin family, although there was not any opposition to this wedding of my aunt to her muslim boyfriend in a way the family ties were kind of loosened and broken and none of us family guys really kept in touch with her and i felt this was my chance to set it straight. Of course when she comes over to family occasions at our house there is always a distance because of the difference in cultural aspects such as language, behavior and perspectives. I frankly did not like this much but never did much to change things until now.

I pack my gear and im 2 hours early for the wedding and im thinking im gonna have a great time. Little did i know that i was going to be the biggest fool of all times sitting here like duck to witness sexism, male chauvinism and trade in the name of a wedding go on right in front of my eyes while i could not find the nerve to say nothing or do nothing in the situation.

The wedding hall was very small and all the men were lodged in the ground floor where the wedding ceremony took place and guess what? All the women were debarred from staying downstairs and sent to the first floor, including the Bride whom i never got to meet in this entire agenda of the wedding. The grooms father paid a sum of "13 grams of gold" and purchased the bride for his son, the groom. The agreement or the contract of the wedding was signed and everybody went to dig into the food like it was nobody’s business.

I ask this guy who looked like a politician, about the bride and he said that the wedding was over and the bride will be seeing the guests in the evening at the reception where she will be together with the groom. It strikes me as the most inhumane and barbaric act of sexism on a woman, in the 21st century that based on some book a pedophile wrote 100′s of years back you don’t even look at the fact that there is someone important uninvited into the wedding, let me correct that. "Her Wedding", the bride!

While being repeatedly preached about the importance of gender equality in an Anglo Indian school for 12 years, running around a 2 day occasion of the bride and groom doing various religious stuff at a Hindu wedding and the mutual consent at a Christian Anglo Indian weddings that i’ve been to i frankly find not having a person who is getting married not to be during the wedding process so unacceptable and sadistic in nature.

Today while i finally mustered up the courage to post these pictures and write these words from my head, i admit that im afraid of such people. The world Islamaphobia as i realize is not some cooked up stuff by the liberals, it exists very well in real life and there is ample evidence for it and i feel it first hand.

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