Drought waters down wedding cheer
While ministers host lavish weddings for their children in the state, people living in drought-affected areas are minimising expenses by cutting down on rituals and ceremonies as it would put an additional burden on their meagre resources. Families in parts of drought-affected Sangli and Miraj are now following the “Yaadya mein Shaadya” dictum for weddings in order to cut costs.
According to Abdullah Raine, a resident of Miraj and employee in a factory unit at MIDC, the rising inflation and water shortage has forced most families in Miraj to have very humble weddings. “Earlier, marriages meant elaborate ceremonies in which even the poorest family used to have a ritual of preparing a ‘yaadi’ (to-do list for the marriage), wherein members of the families of the boy and girl would meet and in the presence of a society elder, prepare the yaadi. However, with water being scarce, hosting guests is a huge problem,” said Mr Raine.
According to a caterer from Miraj, earlier, wedding feast orders were placed for a minimum of 400 guests, but have now come down to 30-50 people. “People have decided to restrict celebrations to close family members only. The menu usually starts with water, which in the past, was assumed to be available at the venue. However, we are now expected to provide drinking water too,” said Zahir Kapshikar, who runs a catering service in Sangli and Miraj.
He further added that due to lack of water, people who depended on farm produce for a living are unable to make ends meet and hence, want to cut down costs. “While ministers can arrange for water and beverages for the marriages of their children, people in rural areas have to sacrifice some of the accompaniments like spices, salads, papads and so on and stick to the basic biryani,” said Mr Kapshikar.
The owner of a spice manufacturing unit in Sangli said that there was indeed a lull in orders for spices.
“Not only for Muslim weddings, but even for Maharashtrian weddings, caterers are resorting to cost-cutting. Having a long list of guests means providing them with food and water during their stay. With water being scarce, no one can afford to disappoint their guests and hence, peope are opting for simple marriages with fewer guests,” said Salman Bhojani, partner in Spectrum Foods.
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