young indians are keeping it real

Posted by dana at 7:27 am on Monday, June 22nd, 2009.

My sister sent me an interesting email this morning letting me know that one of her colleagues in India just got engaged. I was really happy for the random guy, but so what, right? Well, it turns out he recently met the bride-to-be through a top Indian matrimony site BharatMatrimony.com.

Rated a top 15 site and one of the top 50 companies in India with a record number of documented marriages online, BharatMatrimony has been around since 1997. The site allows users to screen by age, gender, religion (e.g. Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Sikh, Buddhist), caste (e.g. Ahom, Brahmin, Intercaste, Kalita), subcaste, occupation (e.g. Doctor, Accountant, Lawyer, Engineer, Teacher) and location (by city and country). Profiles not only include users' photos and estimated heights but also links to their horoscopes.

My sister's colleague used the site to screen for a potential mate based on the criteria above, but that was only the preliminary measure he took. He then had their natal information run. Only when it was determined that their synastry was good did their families agree to make contact. At that point, they did another reading to double-check before he actually met the girl, spoke to her and agreed to marry her in short order. After all, the signs were all pointing them that way.

It seems that even the most progressive and practical twenty-something year-olds in India–those who have abandoned the practice of formally arranged marriages–are still staying true to their roots by consulting astrological charts and relying upon matchmaking services that use a lot of the same criteria as their age-old predecessors. Only difference is that this time, the services are readily available both on and offline. Although astrological synastry remains the true deciding factor for Indians tying the knot, the process of checking synastries has not been automated and rolled into sites like Bharat. To all you young singles in India and the US, Moonit is just a mouse click away!