Marital Jihad

Obviously faith plays a very important part in many people’s lives and one can never discount the value of someone else’s beliefs. The devout across diverse religions believe that they are genuinely saving the soul of a heathen or infidel by converting them to the right path.

These days in cosmopolitan cities, it is often the enormous pressure that families feel from within their own community that compels them to ask an outsider marrying their child to convert to their religion. The stigma and betrayal of the clan by allowing your child to marry an outsider is effectively nullified by making his or her future partner a member of your
own faith.

Most religions willingly accept, even encourage converts so their tribe may thrive. Only Zorastrianism forbids religious conversion and, recently, a few dustoors have been ostracised for officiating at weddings where Parsis have married parjaats or outsiders.

I have been amazed at the number of weddings I have been recently invited to where either the bride or groom has converted to the religion of the spouse. It’s not just a Sikh girl, who has converted to Islam, but also a Punjabi munda, who has embraced Buddhism. A Parsi chokri has converted to

Hinduism and a Tamil Iyer boy has accepted Jesus Christ as his new lord and saviour.

These four couples happen to be highly educated and intelligent with secular belief systems. Their sole reason for converting was to appease the family members of their spouses. They feel no great affinity for the religion they have just embraced and some are already disenchanted by the tenets of their new faith. It is highly unlikely that any of them will become religious zealots or be moved by the legendary fervour of the freshly converted.

This, perhaps, is the true secularism of new India. Willingly relinquish the faith you were born into if it means making your soulmate’s family happy. Simply live and let live. And may all dogma, decrees and doctrines be damned.
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