Post News Network
Kendrapara, Jan 15: All arrangements were in place for the wedding. Flowers and decorations lined the walls, guests started to arrive and the priest began the wedding ceremony with chanting of prayers according to Hindu rituals. It was like any other Hindu wedding observed with all Oriya customs – the only difference being that the bride and the groom were dolls.
The unique wedding was solemnized a couple of days back at the Saraswati Sishu Vidya Mandir in Chatta of Kendrapara district, in a bid to revive the ancient tradition of doll marriages. Students, teachers, and locals all participated in the ceremony to make it a success.
Prabhakar Behera, the headmaster of the school where the marriage took place, said besides being a source of entertainment for villagers, doll marriages had an underlying message — say no to dowry.
“Doll marriages were once an integral tradition in rural areas and were a source of entertainment. They also sent out a social message of opposing the evil practice of dowry. The doll wedding was organised on the school premises in order to revive that tradition,” Behera said.
Snigdharani Mohanty, a teacher at the school and one of the key organisers of the wedding, said the ceremony took months of planning and preparation.
Schoolteachers organised a meeting a couple of months back and asked students and guardians to lend a helping hand in order to organise the ceremony. The teachers said they met with overwhelming support and soon fixed an auspicious date for the wedding, and later selected two girls studying in pre-nursery to act as the mothers of the bride and the groom.
While pre-nursery student Sushri Jasaswi Jasmin Das of Oldhi village became the mother of the bridegroom, her classmate Manisha Sahu of Chatara Chakroda village, was the mother of the bride.
According to tradition, marriage negotiations began and the groom’s family travelled from Oldhi village to the bride’s home in Chatara Chakroda to see her. Then the marriage date was finalized for January 14. Then, the bride’s family said they were very particular about not giving any sort of dowry to the groom’s family. A formal engagement ceremony then took place January 11.
Thursday, the bride’s brother went to Oldhi to invite the groom to come in a procession to their house for tying the nuptial knot. Hundreds of students came as ‘baratis’ with the bridegroom in an elaborate procession. Later, the marriage was solemnised in the presence of the local priest. A community feast and other rituals were performed as per Oriya customs, Snigdharani said.
Several schoolteachers, locals and college students attended the wedding and blessed the newlyweds and later attended a reception ceremony that was held at the school.
“In our childhood, we used to conduct doll marriages with our friends several times. But this doll wedding was unlike any other as it resembled a real wedding in all aspects. All traditions were observed,” said Rebati Sahu, an elderly woman of the village.
