Chapter 5 India 185is paid to the prestige of the family the daughter is given to than to the boy him-
self and whether the two will be happily married. The negotiations will include
coming to terms over dowry. Daughters do not inherit wealth when their
fathers die but receive their share at marriage, which is transferred to their hus-
bands’ families. As India continues to prosper with economic development, the
dowry system has intensified. Dowry generally includes a cash payment, elab-
orate gifts to the son-in-law, and clothing and jewelry to bedeck the bride. Cash
payments have become astronomical in recent years. The bride’s father may be
required to pay several lakhs of rupees^2 in cash and gifts, which frequently
include refrigerators, motor scooters, automobiles, televisions, or four years’
university tuition for the groom.
When a girl marries, her life is transformed. She moves to a strange house
in a strange village to begin life with a man she did not meet until her wedding.
This transition is both fearful and romanticized, for Indians are socialized toThese are Brahman women in a very conservative village in the northern state of Bihar. You can
tell a great deal about the social status of these women by their clothing. At the center is a young
bride-to-be, led by her mother and grandmother in a prewedding ceremony. The mother and
grandmother have their heads covered, because they are in their husbands’ village. From her
white sari you know the grandmother is a widow. Far in the back are other widows in white,
who are inauspicious and stay on the periphery so as not to bring bad luck. The younger girls
with uncovered heads are in their fathers’ village; when they go to their husbands’ houses, they
must cover their heads. A married sister of the bride (with a baby in her arms) has come home to
her father’s village for her sister’s wedding, so she, too, can have her head uncovered.