New Indian bill seeks to cap wedding expenditures

New Delhi - Anyone spending more than Rs500,000 on weddings will have to contribute 10 per cent on marriages of girls from poor families.

A bill in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of Indian parliament, seeks to put a limit on the number of guests to be invited and dishes to be served in weddings to check "show of wealth" and wants those spending above Rs500,000 to contribute towards marriages of poor girls.

If a family spends above Rs500,000 on a wedding, it has to contribute 10 per cent of the amount on marriages of girls from poor families, according to the bill introduced by Congress member of parliament Ranjeet Ranjan, wife of parliamentarian Pappu Yadav.

The Marriages (Compulsory Registration and Prevention of Wasteful Expenditure) Bill, 2016, may be taken up as a private member's bill in the upcoming Lok Sabha session.

The purpose of this bill is to prohibit extravagant and wasteful expenditure on marriages and to enforce simpler solemnisation, Ranjeet told PTI.

"Great importance should be assigned to the solemnisation of marriage between two individuals. But unfortunately, these days a tendency of celebrating marriages with pomp and show and spending lavishly growing in the country.

"These days, marriages are more about showing off your wealth and as a result, poor families are under tremendous social pressure to spend more. This is needed to be checked as it is not good for society at large," she said.

The bill seeks that "if any family intends to spend more than Rs5 lakh (Rs500,000) towards expenditure on marriage, such family shall declare the amount proposed to be spent in advance to the appropriate government and contribute 10 per cent of such amount in a welfare fund which shall be established by the appropriate government to assist the poor and below-poverty-line families for the marriage of their daughters".

It says that after this proposed legislation comes into force, all marriages shall be registered within 60 days of the solemnisation.

The government may fix the limit of guests and relatives and number of dishes to be served to the guests and relatives for solemnisation of marriage or for the reception held thereafter as it may deem necessary or expedient to prevent the wastage of food items, it adds.

• India