Vidai (or Bidai) is a ritual performed in Indian marriages where a bride is supposed to say a final goodbye to her parental home and leave for her husband's house. The ceremony might be called with different names in different parts of India, but the intention behind the ritual is the same, to do a farewell to your father's home and announce your entry to your husband's home. It seems that it is assumed that no home is the bride's own home, she just gets passed on from one patriarch to another. It's an emotional moment with everyone crying as if someone has died, there are many hit Bollywood songs specially dedicated to this ritual. No doubt, this is a very emotional moment of life for many Indian women. I always found it odd to see people crying in the middle of a marriage ceremony that was full of joy and color until this ritual took place. I am glad to see that many brides are now questioning this ritual and going to the extent of getting rid of it, I commend their courage and support their movement to get rid of such a cringeworthy ritual.
The question is why has this ritual not been questioned so far? One of the reasons is it is so glamorized by society and the movie industry that it has become mandatory to have this ritual in every marriage video recording, even brides who don't feel like crying are made aware that they should at least display some sorrow otherwise what people will think. As I already mentioned there are hit movie songs memorizing this ritual and making it an integral part of their memory and culture, this is how it managed to survive so long.
What's wrong with it? Almost everything. If you look at marriage, the bride and groom are getting married to each other, at least now, legally, both of them have ancestral rights to the property of their ancestors. Then why only the bride has to go through this ritual? The bride and groom, both are starting their new life together, probably, on their own with minimum or no support from their parents. Then why this ritual is applied only to the bride? The time when brides started asking this question, this ritual is standing on shaky ground and its disappearance is just a matter of time. No doubt, as it does always, patriarchy and its overt and covert supporters will argue about how this is a part of our glorious past and culture, how it has some emotional or rational or even some scientific rationale behind it. They make this style of argument almost about every ritual or tradition that gets questioned, many of these arguments are either ridiculous or laughable, but it does not stop them from making it. Hopefully, girls will see through this ploy of keeping patriarchy alive through some rituals and get rid of this ritual or at least force it to become gender-neutral.
Every society and culture undergoes transformations from time to time, this is not only natural but also essential for its survival. However, such transformations are not easy, especially when they question long-standing traditions or rituals that people have followed without question for centuries. Many marriage rituals from various parts of the world have passed their expiry date and need a major overhaul. I am glad to see that change is happening and women are leading this movement of change.
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