(This review contains spoilers)
My review: 9/10
The Wedding Wallah is the third installment of the Marriage Bureau for Rich People Series. This series is an excellent insight into the age old customs of India which sit alongside modern India.
The novel takes a more serious turn than the first two. It unclosets gay people in India, and explores the issue of their ‘forced’ marriage. Dilawar is a young gay man from an aristocratic background who is being persuaded to marry the widowed Pari. At the end of the novel, Diliawar finally asserts his autonomy and breaks of the engagement, thereby giving Pari and him a dignified outcome.
The Many Conditions of Love, the second novel, depicted the suicide of Mr Naidu who had became indebted to a fertiliser company. In The Wedding Wallah, the demands of the Naxalites, a communist guerrilla operating in South India, is also compelling, and continues with the social conscience of the series by highlighting the abject poverty of rural India. This is poignant at a time when we are surrounded by media regarding India’s burgeoning status as a world economy.
Though Zama highlights the violence of the Naxalites, there is a strong sense that the greedy landowner receives his come-uppance when he is forced to absolve the “debt” of his servant who was bonded into labour. Zama suggests that despite the use of violent tactics, the Naxalites’ cause is a noble one.
There are moments in the novel which play like an over-blown Bollywood romance. The scene of Pari and Rehman on the roof top was particularly quite cinematic. Likewise, the scenes of Aruna and Ramanujam escaping in the forest were quite thrilling. These scenes add texture and drama to the novel.
There is something for everyone in this novel. Zama has once again shown he can weave light-heartedness and humour alongside more serious issues such as gay rights, poverty and violence in modern India.
