Only wedding woes and not many vows across LoC

It is a pattern since ages: As and when  India-Pakistan decide to talk to resolve their issues, the divided families (as a result of the Partition across the LoC) pray to god that talks reach a conclusion. Talks or no talks, they always wish for cordial bilateral ties between the two neighbours because they are still keen to find brides and grooms across the border.

 

 Despite hardships and difficulties, divided families love to find brides and grooms for their children from across the border. If we talk about the current scenario, the number of cross-border marriages has touched a new low due to series of issues. It is no secret that as getting citizenship for both Indians and Pakistanis in each other’s country is a huge task,  it does  deter many from marrying across the border. Arguably, it deters even the divided families (read Mohajirs) to find a match for their children in either India or Pakistan.

 

Even before tennis sensation Sania Mirza and Shoaib Malik, many celebrities like ace Indian woman golfer Nonita Lal Quershi got married to Faisal Quershi, another very fine golfer and businessman from Pakistan. And remember the nikah and later  divorce of Reena Roy with handsome Pakistani cricketer Mohsin Khan in 1983. Writer and activist, Sadia Dehalvi also married a Pakistani banker.

 

 As recently as couple of months ago, a big cross-border wedding took place in Jaipur. While the bride was an Indian, the groom hailed from Pakistan. Kunwar Karni Singh Sodha of Amarkot district of Sindh in Pakistan tied the knot with Padmini Rathore of Kanota royal family of Jaipur district of Rajasthan. A large number of guests from both India and Pakistan blessed Kunwar Karni Singh Sodha and Padmini Rathore as the couple exchanged wedding vows at a heritage hotel. What made this wedding special was that 31 people had gone to Pakistan from Jaipur for the engagement ceremony where even the tikka ceremony took place which is seen as a rare occasion in Pakistan.The family of the groom has an impressive legacy. The family had given refuge to Akbar's father, Humayun, and his wife in Amarkot (now Umerkot in Pakistan's Sindh province) as he fled to the desert region after being defeated by Sher Shah Suri in 1540.

 

The number of such LoC marriages declines when acrimony between the two neighbours gets heightened. And in normal times, cross-border marriages outnumber infiltrations from the other side of the border. Perhaps not many are aware of the fact that even after the horrendous Mumbai attack of 26/11, the cross-border marriages between Indian boys and Pakistani girls or vice-versa were still taking place. The divided Muslim families of cities like Delhi, Lucknow, Bhopal, Rampur, Mordabad, Aligarh, Amroha, Ujjain and other places still don’t mind marrying across the border.

 

As marriages between cousins are very much permitted in Islam, the divided families  happily marry their kids. Such marriages were very common as recently as a couple of years ago. Later, their number dipped as travelling across the border as well as getting citizenship for Indian and Pakistani citizens became very difficult.

 

 When the scion of the Bhopal royal family, Shahryar Khan,  an ex-Pakistani Foreign Secretary and  president of the Pakistan Cricket Board married his son, Ali to a girl from Bhopal a few years ago  many eyebrows were raised. Many people in Pakistan questioned his wisdom in finding a match for his son in India. Some people even said rather sarcastically that as he did not find any suitable girl for Ali in Pakistan, hence he married his son in Bhopal. Dismissing all such criticism with contempt, Khan said that as he hails from Bhopal, so naturally finding a bahu from Bhopal was his first priority.

 

Those who question the wisdom of Khan should know that these people are doing yeoman service in their own way in order to cement the relations between the two ‘enemies’. 

 

There are other reasons for dwindling LoC weddings as well such as the declining population of those elders who were divided across the border in the wake of Partition. Till they were alive they used to ensure that their kids marry in Pakistan and vice versa. As the number of those people diminished, the frequency of such marriages too came down. Another reason is that the governments in both Delhi and Islamabad are very choosy in granting citizenship to the nationals of these two countries. That is a major reason for people avoiding matrimonial alliances across the border. Only the rich and the famous manage to get citizenship, while the others suffer. They have to grease the palms of officials from both sides to extend their visa.

 

 Altaf Hussain, a London-based head of MQM, told this writer in 2004 in the capital that mohajirs love to marry their kids either in India or within themselves. They do not marry among non-mohajirs at all. While we live in Pakistan, we feel close to Aligarh, Delhi, Agra and Lucknow than to the people of NWFP, Punjab in Pakistan and Baluchistan. My family migrated to Pakistan from Agra. My father was  working for the Railways. We cannot erase the memories of Agra or UP and snap ties with our blood relations. This is the feeling of all those who have relatives across the border. And naturally they marry their kids as and when they find suitable matches in their families.

 

Oldtimers say that till the early 1990s, hundreds of cross-border marriages used to take place. Meanwhile, any LoC wedding  proves a point that  despite several vexed, unresolved issues between India-Pakistan, blood is thicker than water.