Nagendra Sharma
Would you believe that a Newar girl never becomes a widow? I would not either…
I was once invited to a Newar girl’s “Betrothal to the Bael” ceremony. But it turned out to be a joint betrothal, not of one, but of several maidens of that Newar village-an exercise that could be described as a community wedding.
There was the usual Yagna ceremony, reminiscent of a full-fledged Hindu marriage, and as holy; but with this difference-here the grooms were not humans but the otherwise bael-fruits.
The major part of the rituals were over by the time I reached the scene. I could however see the altar laden with the usual paraphernalia of a Hindu puja, with puffs of smoke rising reluctantly from the half-burnt embers of the holy-fire and the priests sipping their post-ritual tea.
Four bashful young Newar maidens, their ages varying between eight to twelve, squatted cross-legged on raadi carpets spread around the improvised altar, with veils drawn down their faces, genuine bride-style. Their bridal attires were a riot of color and golden ornaments dangled all over their tiny persons, with gold sirbandi atop their head, ear-rings apparently too heavy for their soft ear-lobes, necklaces that could do justice only to their mothers, and bangles of glass and gold. Whoever had sprinkled vermillion on the parting of their hairs had made a liberal job of it too.
Four fat bael-fruits-the bridegrooms of the occasion-lay on small wooden pedestals, one in front of each “bride”. Practically covered with vermillion, multicolored flowers and holy offerings, those inanimate grooms, silent and indifferent to the whole affair, seemed to be mocking at all the young men of the locality who had gathered there and were stealing furtive glances at the charming little brides of the baels.
The betrothal with the bael, though akin more to a coming-of-age ceremony in the life of a Newar girl, is held in greater esteem and solemnized more seriously that her marriage itself. For this, according to many, is the “true” marriage of the Newar maidens and the baels their real husbands. Should a Newar girl, thus betrothed to the bael, decide to take a human husband later in life, as most of them do, this ceremony, or that matter the bael-fruit, would not of course stand in her way. To the contrary, the preservation of the bael-fruit, her “first, real and permanent husband”, could mean a permanent guarantee against possible widow-hood and, should such an eventuality come by, protect her right of re-marrying again and again and…..again.
Writes Mr. Dor Bahadur Bista in his “People of Nepal”: “Many Newars-especially Buddhist ones-do not consider marriage as a particularly sacred or unbreakable union or relationship. It is looked upon from a matter of fact point of view.
“A majority of the Newars observe this symbolically arranged marriage of their daughters with a bael-fruit before they ever marry a man. And since it is the general belief of the Hindu and Buddhist Newar communities that a proper marriage with full rites can be held only once in a life time, her subsequent marriages, if any, are considered of only secondary importance. Although a Newar girl marries a boy later on with almost full ritual, she retains her marital status with the bael-fruit. So a woman can, if she wishes, break her marriage with her husband by giving the gift of areca nuts she received during the wedding back to him or by putting the areca nuts beside his dead body in the event of his death. The wife, by this fact, becomes free to enter into another marital union and also escapes the obligation of mourning the death of her husband”.
But the Newar husband, pity him, enjoys no such freedom to break away from the matrimonial bondage thus easily!
While, therefore, one is tempted to take one’s hats off in admiration of the Newar ingenuity in inventing this unique institution as a safeguard to the social freedom of their female-folk, one wonders what prompted the precursors of this community to invent another institution which, though equally unique in itself, restrains the Newar grooms, except in certain cases, from going to the bride’s house to complete the formalities of his own marriage. Only the procession leaves for the bridal residence and returns home the next day with the wife-to-be. And there, as the bride and groom sit for the first time together to partake ritual food off a common plate, the wedding is considered solemnized.
[Late Nagendra Sharma was a journalist and folklorist.]