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Hinduism

17 October 2023

7 min read

Re-defining marriage: how India slowly changed its mind

As India sought independence a long struggle to re-define marriage was culminating. Rahil Patel tells the story of the Hindu Marriage Act and its Christian influences.

Rahil Patel

Rahil is a former Hindu monk, and author of Found By Love. He is a Tutor and Speaker at the Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics.

A close-up of a bride groom holding the brides hand. Her hand is henna tattooed and bears gold rings and bracelets.

Bride and Groom hold hands during a Hindu wedding.

Photo by Jayesh Jalodara on Unsplash.

During the last few months of the United Kingdom’s 200 year rule in India, the British Government in London wanted to establish its last legacy on a majority Hindu land. Britain had shaped the Indian Subcontinent not only through the establishment of democratic institutions, free press, nationwide infrastructure, a robust stock market and so on but with radical social reforms that brought well-needed equality, dignity and fairness at every level across The Raj’s 300 million citizens. This seminal legacy was the sanctity of the Christian marriage. One husband, one wife. However, it was not the colonial administrators who delivered the legacy, but Indian campaigners, reformers and lawyers. This is their story.

The idea of one husband, one wife was cautiously presented to the lawyer turned activist Mohandas Gandhi in 1946 which the Mahatma turned down vehemently and bluntly told the British not to interfere in this area. The British were always careful when suggesting social and cultural change and so they recoiled without any further pressure. But this attitude surprised many as Gandhi was significantly influenced by the Christian faith to the point where he not only believed that the Sermon on the Mount was a profound spiritual document but the greatest political document of all time.

Heroes and husbands

It was seen as a sign of power and status to have more than one wife in Indian society and likewise for a woman to have many husbands was a sign of strength and not submission. This wasn’t at the princely or aristocratic level alone but the merchant caste and village leaders as well. Why? It was a practice that followed in the footsteps of two powerful incarnations of God in the Hindu world. Ram and Krishna.

There are two great epics in Hindu culture which are etched into the minds of most of the one billion Hindus across the globe.

The first being the Ramayana scripture which was written across a span of 400 years between 200 BC and 200 AD. In this popular story (inspired by the Iliad) the incarnation of the Supreme Brahman is Lord Rama. He incarnates as a righteous king and is married to Sita and defeats the evil king Ravana (which is the central theme of celebration for Hindus during Diwali).There are approximately 300 versions of the Ramayana and some state that this much admired king had 8,000 wives including Sita.

The other great epic is the Mahabharata scripture which was written over a period of 800 years between 400 BC and 400 AD (which inspired the Latin poem Aeneid by Virgil). The Mahabharata contains two very important aspects of Hindu culture. The first is the Bhagvad Gita scripture within its battle riddled story (which the father of the atomic bomb J.R Oppenheimer quotes after seeing the impact of the bomb, “I am become death destroyer of the worlds...”) and the other is the most prominent and pivotal incarnation of the Supreme Brahman in the Hindu world whose name is Krishna. Krishna had 16,108 wives. Draupadi is a strong and feisty woman in the same story who has five husbands.

The influence starts

So where does the battle for the Christian marriage in the Indian story begin? With 19th century social reformers.

Ishwar Chandra Vidya Sagar was born into an Orthodox Hindu family in Bengal (Eastern India). He was raised as a devout orthodox Hindu but was later in life influenced by the eminent organisation, Brahmo Samaj. Much of the way in which Hindus practice their faith today both individually and as a community is largely due to the influence of the Brahmo Samaj in the 18th and 19th century. It was established by another famous Bengali, Raja Ram Mohun Roy who is known today as ‘The Father of the Indian Renaissance.' Roy believed firmly in his heart that in order to transform Indian society one needs to transform Hinduism, and to transform Hinduism for the better one needs Christian doctrine and practices at the heart of the Hindu framework. He campaigned against Sati (the burning of a widow on the funeral pyre of her husband) and fought for women’s rights in general. The Christian idea that all were made in the image of God (and equal) was engraved deeply into his worldview.

Ishwar Chandra saw from Roy’s perspective the need and power in emancipating women in Indian society. He began to pushback and campaign against deeply entrenched Hindu customs which wasn’t easy. After great efforts his vigorous campaign to allow widows to remarry was signed into law (The Hindu Widow’s Remarriage Act, 1856).

But pushing into law the Christian sanctity of monogamy was far beyond his reach.

It was the ardent social reformer and critic of the Christian faith Keshub Chandra Sen who would later get the ball rolling in a significant way. Born in Bengal to a devout Hindu family as well.

Keshub publicly criticised the Christian faith in his early years until he came across a book written by the French diplomat and political scientist Alexis de Tocqueville. Alexis had spent some time in America studying American democracy and his work, Democracy in America was published in 1835. Towards the end of the second volume Tocqueville states that the growth and strength of America’s democracy stems largely from the sanctity of the Christian marriage.

Reading this powerful argument transformed the understanding of Christianity for Keshub Chandra Sen. It was also a popular question amongst Indian social and political reformers of the time as to why and how a tiny island and a few thousand British civil servants managed such a vast subcontinent. “What is their spiritual gift?” was the running question and Keshub realised it was the nature of a family based on Christian beliefs.

He followed in the footsteps of Roy and as one of the most influential thinkers of his time campaigned to introduce Christian doctrine and ideas into Hinduism. After all his painful efforts he managed to pass the Special Marriage Act in 1869 for those who were members of the reformed Hindu organisation Brahmo Samaj but failed to introduce it into law across the wider Hindu population due to immense push back from the Orthodox high caste Hindu Brahmins.

But this idea of a Christian marriage and the strength it can bring to a society stayed very much alive in the Indian intelligentsia for years.

A constitutional approach falters

It was the brilliant economist, social reformer and political leader, Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar who finally took one husband, one wife across the finishing line.

Ambedkar studied at the London School of Economics (where a bust of him can still be seen in the Atrium of the Old Building). With his incredibly well-furnished mind he knew the pitfalls of Hinduism when it came to democracy. He believed they were not compatible due to the unfair and rigid caste system and so, later on, when as a lawyer, Ambedkar was assigned the crafting of the Indian constitution he ensured it was embedded with Christian principles of equality.

It was during this time in the 1940s that Bhimrao came across the masterful work of Joseph Unwin Sex and Culture which reveals the importance of sexual restraint and its profound impact on society. Unwin’s work made an impression on Ambedkar and revealed to him the weakening hole within the Indian marriage.

Ambedkar was in tune with the likes of Keshub Chandra Sen whilst equally unraveling the flaws of Gandhian politics and economics using his razor sharp intellect . Although he took Buddhism as his faith he introduced the Christian idea of marriage to India’s first Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru in 1948 whilst drafting the final articles of the Indian constitution. He told Nehru that it was vital to put into law the idea of one husband and one wife. Again, the Constituent Assembly rejected the idea without a second thought. So, Nehru told Ambedkar to leave the idea for a while and get the constitution passed as it was. Then, after the new Indian government was formed they could bring the idea back to the cabinet. This battle took a very long time…

Tenacity triumphs

In 1952 the ruling party of the newly formed India, along with India’s first President Dr. Rajendra Prasad, tore the proposal apart once again. Nehru threatened to resign if the party did not pass the Christian idea of marriage but the cabinet called his bluff. Nehru knew that even if his party passed the law the President would not sign on it and so he gave up all hope. Ambedkar by now was furious and fed up with his friends and so he applied his brilliant mind and tenacity to writing articles in the Indian press attacking the ruling party and his friend the Prime Minister - with incredible style, substance and affect.

Ambedkar had a significant amount of social and political clout across the aisle, and with the general public, so eventually after years of pushing, pressing and penning his arguments the Hindu Marriage Act was passed in 1955. At last, the biblical idea of one husband and one wife came into law after a battle that took over 100 years.

Growing up in England and that in an Orthodox Hindu family I often heard my parents complain about the divorce rates in western societies. Divorce is not condoned in any Hindu scripture as per my reading over 20 years as a Hindu monk and yet the sanctity of marriage in Hindu communities in the west is still fairly strong in comparison to most other communities. It’s helpful to remember the roots of that strength.

Review

Art

Community

Culture

12 March 2025

5 min read

Ceremony's superpower is on show at Berwick Parade

Reinventing historic touchpoints between faith and community.

Susan Gray

Susan is a writer specialising in visual arts and contributes to Art Quarterly, The Tablet, Church Times and Discover Britain.

A projected image of a person dressed as a mermaid being pushed on a trolley falls on the wall and windows of an old barracks.

The Maltings (Berwick) Trust, Jennifer Charlton Photography.

Watch the parade

Ceremony is beating a retreat. Although wheeled out for major life events: naming newborns, marriage and bidding last goodbyes, and for grand state and civic occasions, standing on ceremony is frowned upon in day-to-day life. Ritual is treated warily, in case it creates an ‘us and them’ chasm between participants, seen as elite, and spectators, presumed to be condemned to disempowering passivity.

But what if, far from alienating people, the power of ritual, ceremony and spectacle could be a force for engagement? The church and military both have a history of creating, reinventing and refreshing rituals to meet changing social needs. The army chaplaincy is an invention of the late eighteeneeth century, responding to the move towards more settled communities of soldiers, requiring spiritual support. Drumhead altars, a centrepiece of November’s Festival of Remembrance, have origins going back into the mists of time, but quite how far back it is hard to say with certainty.

Processions and festivities for holy days are more apparent in Catholic countries, with Seville’s Semana Santa parades springing to mind, but well -dressing, May Queens, harvest festivals and Remembrance Sunday reveal a continued desire for entwining of church and community rituals, across faith traditions.

Art’s ability to step into the ceremonial space and create moments of communion, as well as giving voice to underrepresented groups, has been evident since Surrealism. British Surrealist Eileen Agar’s crustacean strewn ‘Ceremonial Hat for Eating Bouillabaisse’, 1936, attracted collective gasps when she wore it in London. In Sao Paolo in 1931, Brazilian modernist Flavio de Carvalho had to be rescued by police when he walked, hatless, in the opposite direction of a Corpus Christi procession, and the crowd wanted to beat him up.

Artists can also create spectacles of togetherness and joy.

Berwick Barracks is a challenging site for community arts. The massive walls and monumental stone-grey interior of Britian’s first purpose-built barracks is reminiscent of eighteenth century experiments in prison design. Even the windows on the living quarters, confirming it is not a prison, are tiny-paned and meanly spaced, like an afterthought dotted reluctantly on the overbearing grey expanse.

But over the weekend of Berwick Parade, the barracks’ forbidding walls turned into a living portrait of the border town. Under a piercingly brilliant starlit sky – it was the night of the six planet alignment – an audience gathered in the middle of the parade ground to watch themselves, neighbours, friends and family members move across the barrack walls. Artist Matthew Rosier’s projection at x10 magnification transformed the townspeople into giants, and the forbidding military structure of Berwick Barracks into a canvas for joy and creativity.

Berwick Parade shows you can draw community from a stone, forbidding, large grey stones at that. Paraders and audience were dazzled and dignified, seeing themselves anew.

The dancing, riding and processing images were soundscaped by music from the repertoire of the Kings Own Scottish Borderers, who have their ceremonial base, and museum, at the barracks, accompanied by the Melrose and District Pipes and Drums. Positioned by the main gate, the musicians set the expectation of spectacle with the rousing music associated with marching bands, as Scotland the Brave gave way to Mairi’s Wedding, and then a medley of upbeat, om-papa outdoors tunes.

Over 30 minutes, topped by veterans of the Kings Own Scottish Borderers and tailed by hi -vis vest wearing Berwick Parade production staff carrying metal barriers, a parade including processing clergy and the Bishop of Berwick, conga-ing medics in scrubs from Berwick Hospital, brownies, boys’ and girls' football teams, civic leaders in mayoral regalia, Morris, Highland and flamenco dancers, and midlife wild swimmers, shimmied across the walls. Berwick Riders Association were filmed on small ponies, so the magnified projection would not crop the riders into headless torsos. A wheelchair user crossed the expanse of barracks wall wearing a mermaid’s tail. Everybody involved was simultaneously true to life and larger than life.

Consisting of 850 characters, some of Berwick’s residents played more than one role. “Ooh there’s Cheryl again” commented a spectator next to me, as another pageant of figures travelled across barracks’ perimeter.

Speaking to Rossier the following morning, he revealed Parade participants had been filmed in the barracks, travelling across a10 metre stage. Magnification made these sequences large enough to cover one wall of the rectangular parade ground. Editing and projection created the appearance of participants entering at one corner and disappearing around the next.

Movement filmed across short distances opened up participation in the Parade to people with mobility and health issues, in a way that physically journeying around the whole parade ground, repeated over three nights, never could.

Filmed over six bitterly cold days, choreographer Chloe Sayers had to keep participants’ spirits and energy up as they devised ways of travelling across 10 metres that represented their personality, role and creativity. Sayers specialises with creating events with the public rather than professional dancers, and says that enabling people to express themselves through movement in spaces not always thought of as welcoming, breaks down barriers and creates a sense of ownership.

Some of the funniest moments in Berwick Parade were rare breeds sheep hogging the limelight like divas, and children clowning around with policemen’s helmets and clipboards. Rosier says primary school years are a sweet spot for performance. ”I love the energy kids bring. We had all age groups, but the six- to 10-year-olds bring so much energy. They just bounce. They have no inhibitions but are good at following instructions. At 12 or 13 heads start to drop and they become more self-aware.”

Rosier drew on his Irish Catholic mother’s tradition of ceremony and celebration with food and drinking, whether for a wedding or a funeral, to make Berwick Parade a fun place to hang out - food stalls included - beyond the performance. “I want people to have a nice time and not be subservient to the thing they have come to watch.”

Berwick Parade shows you can draw community from a stone, forbidding, large grey stones at that. Paraders and audience were dazzled and dignified, seeing themselves anew.

At King Charles’ coronation, the church’s ceremonial superpower was on display to the world. And as artists demonstrate, ceremony does not have to be confined to great occasions. Churches in all traditions can draw on their legacy of historic touchpoints between faith and community, to reinvent, reinstate and refresh rituals to engage with people’s contemporary concerns and hope.

Community groups taking part in Berwick Parade.

A projection of a horse and rider against a barracks wall.

Clergy process as they are filmed for a projecton.

A projection of a parade of young people dressed theatrically against a barracks wall.

A projection of soldiers marching and carrying flags.

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