Indian weddings have always meant a lot of color, sparkle, exuberance, over-the-top displays of jewelry and an extensive guest list. In the summer, huge parks are booked and massive multi-colored tents are favorites. In the winter, the gatherings move indoors where hotel ballrooms and indoor clubs are reserved. Red and white tents billowing in the wind are a common sight on Delhi streets in the summer and fall. With most Hindu weddings taking place according to astrologically auspicious dates, one can expect to attend one on any day of the month (not just weekends).

Culture in India gives prominence to a wedding as a family undertaking as opposed to a couple’s undertaking as in the West. Some stark differences between the two sides are worth a mention here. Most importantly, the family decides most of the details, including venue, date, clothes, guest list and the menu. In a majority of families, the bride and groom don’t pay for any element of the wedding. The wedding portion of the expenses is considered strictly the bride’s family’s responsibility while the groom’s side (usually) picks up the bill for the reception, which is in most cases equally rambunctious and on a grand scale.

These descriptions, however, are accurate only for weddings arranged by families. Colloquially called ‘arranged marriages,’ this long-known and long-adhered to tradition has reigned supreme for nuptials in India regardless of caste, religion or social status. As the term would suggest, the parents decide whom one will marry and carry out all the necessary formalities and decisions accordingly with the fiancé’s parents. Recently, though, this core function that parents have for long considered their cherished right is beginning to see a shift.

Today’s generation is moving away from the totalitarian decision-making processes of their parents and trying gently to infuse their own opinions and say in their marriages. With the economy, education levels and co-educational institutions on the incline, Indian society is beginning to widen its boundaries and becoming less rigid in what it finds acceptable in terms of male-female relations. While family traditions and rituals continue to dominate in issues like marriage, parents are slowly warming up to the notion of the openness of choice.

Although getting married in India has long meant such traditions as spending a fortune on the occasion, agreeing to dowry demands and the exchange of large sums of money between families, Indian society is at the moment breaking away from the old order and testing new grounds with even inter-religion and inter-caste marriages and has promise of coming a long way from its culturally conservative past. While young people are more and more assertive about their choices regarding marriage, they are also supplementing their newly-found confidence with well-paid jobs and a monetary independence that is quieting many protests.

Today, many among the current generation are marrying against their parents’ will and accepting the ensuing familial discord and diplomacy as a necessary part of their belief in their freedom to love regardless of religion, caste and societal status. Evidence of this in modern Indian society are the many tales of eloping lovers, independent marriages, and the open discussions of homosexuality which has just slowly begun to peer its head above the water.

While weddings continue to be elaborate and expansive, people are getting married at older ages, taking their time with picking a spouse and prioritizing individual stability before married dependence. Career women are becoming more common and issues common to American households of work/life balance and responsibility for children are all creeping into Indian homes. With women more career-conscious and not willing to accept stay-at-home status as was expected naturally of them till a few years ago, respect and equality of the sexes is rising as well.

Of course, it should be noted that most of this liberal progress is localized only to the cities. Social and economic oppression still remain as prominent in India’s villages and suburbs as ever--dowry continues to be practiced, daughters continue to be wed early in their childhood, the practice of birth control of any sort is nonexistent, and divorce remains an untouchable subject. Although most religions in India don’t condone divorce, none expressly prohibit it either and remains a possibility restricted only to the wealthy elite.

It can be argued that western societal mannerisms have crept into Indian society, making it rethink its traditional rites and be open to more flexibility and forward-thinking. At the same time, the majority remains deep-seated in its conservative beliefs, religious teachings and conventional wisdom of what an Indian marriage ought to be.

How much does one give in? How much does one accept? How much does one hold onto? To my Indian readers, what has your experience been? Do you see these trends as a westernization of our culture or the side-effects of progress?

Next: The Indian Dress Code has undergone a transformation-why Phillip Van Heusen works only for men in India.

Aman Singh is an editor in New York City. She aspires to be a children’s books editor and writes about India and her Indian-ness with candor. Her free moments are spent wondering when the seven continents became one huge global mass of humans. She can be reached at as1808@nyu.edu