Would you die for love????

If the kind of movies watched had any effect on what people turn out to be and believe in, Indians would be the ideal people. Honest, good humoured and very tolerant. Because the average Bollywood movie plot is girl meets guy ,they fall in love, a villain opposes but he fails and they live happily ever after. Never does evil win and murder go unpunished except when they are the viilain's goons.

But sadly that is not true. India is a harsh harsh place divided along casteist and religious lines . While we may like on screen social barrier breaking love stories no one wants to tolerate one in their background.

As an idealist, I believe in the supremacy of love. I believe in the romanticism of the idea of love as the purest emotion.


Maybe I am living in the wrong place. In fact maybe I should migrate to some idyllic liberal country where no one gives a damm what anyone else is doing!

Because to break barriers in India can be dangerous. Because this is India. A place where village panchayats sentence young lovers to death. Where parents murder their daughters and even sons in the name of family honour. Where women are seen as inherently weak who need to be protected and guarded by fathers, brothers and other male relatives. Where marrying outside the caste or community gaurantees social boycott.

And the toll only climbs higher every year. And mostly these murders go unreported , justice is never served and a travesty is called a suicide or a mystery death.

While the metros have become swanky , cosmopolitan places India for most of its part remains heart - brutal. Like an illiterate clothed in a three piece suit, appearance does not matter, the devil is always just below the surface.

Every time I hear about a love for murder I feel anguished. It is the ultimate price to pay for love, the ultimate sacrifice. And I see it daily. My morning dose of newspaper is like a dose of bitter milk. After having read it all, I wish I had not read it just to avoid the senseless pain and disillusionment.

Recently the case of the murder of Nitish Katara got over and thankfully justice was served.

Nitish Katara was a 24 year old business executive in Delhi who was murdered in the early hours of February 17, 2002, by the son of an influential Indian politician. The son of an IAS officer in the Ministry of Shipping, Nitish had recently graduated from the Institute of Management Technology, Ghaziabad. There, he had fallen in love with his classmate, Bharti Yadav, who comes from a criminal-politician family.A trial court on Wednesday found Vikas Yadav and his cousin Vishal Yadav guilty of killing Nitish.

In their own words in a recorded confession which was leaked to the media but could not be used as evidence due to a legality.
"The affair was damaging my family's reputation. I never approved of their relationship. ... Using all my strength, I hit Nitish's head with a hammer. He fainted and after a while he died. We drove one kilometre and then we threw his body onto the road.
Then we took the diesel from our car's tank, poured it on Nitish's body and we set it on fire. Then we drove to Delhi."

Such a tragic waste of life. Tragically the girl retracted her initial statement during the trial and denied being ever involved with Nitish. He died for her but in his death the idea for which he died itself became questionable.

The Yadav family never liked Bharti's liaison, and Nitish had received threats several times. However, he was an idealist, and believed in "standing up to injustice"

But lets not demonise a girl who lost the love of her life. She must have been under immense pressure. It was family after all. Still I wish instead of a life sentence, the brothers had been given the noose. And maybe as a revenge for the act inflicted on her by her family she should have snapped all ties and instead herself asked for the noose for her guilty family.

But why is it that India still cannot accept love marriages. Because love has to be celebrated. We celebrate the love of a mother for a child,love between two siblings, love between friends and so many other places. So what is so wrong about love between a guy and a girl when its not 'arranged'. Cannot society accept them.

"Agar dil mein ho zor to duniya se dushmani kar lo,
Warna jahaan maa-baap kahen wahin shaadi kar lo"

And the above line is true. To marry for love breaking across the hypocritical social lines can be fatal. Nitish Katara could have been any of us. Bright and well educated, his relationship with Bharti was nothing out of ordinary.

No one deserves to die like he did-"hit by a hammer and burnt by the roadside."

In India there is an emphasis on arranged marriages. They worked for our parents and even at 22 or however old I may be it seems I am incompetent to choose a partner. I say this. Love is finally the pursuit of happiness. As parents if the child decides to pursue happiness himself it should not be an issue. They should be happy. But parents seldom are, forever warning boys of morally loose girls and girls of being fooled by guys. Also only an idiot would deny inter-caste marriages face a lot of pressure and lets not talk about inter-religious marriages where I think all couples should be given a gold medal for bravery. They after all crossed the final lines.

So I ask my musing "Was it worth it?" Is love worth the ultimate sacrifice? Or can we simply move on throwing love in the closest dust bin when the going gets hard.

And maybe the question we all have to ask ourselves. How far can we go for love.