KOLKATA: Love often blooms at first sight but

marriage

has to wait. But not for this couple.

Hind Motor youth

and Sheorafuli girl

, who have been social media friends for three months, got married within hours of their first meeting at the

Puja pandal around 8 on Astami evening. Sudip, a pharmaceutical executive, went down on his knees and proposed to Pritama even as hundreds of pandal hoppers cheered them on. They tied the knot at a pandal in Hooghly’s

later that night.

Even though they have been in touch on social media, Sudip and Pritama had never met before. On Astami, when Sudip learnt Pritama was in Kolkata with her friends, he asked her to meet him. “As luck would have it, Pritama happened to be in the same pandal, where I had reached with some of my friends in the evening. We met and the ambience was such that I could not stop myself from proposing to her. She was looking gorgeous,” said Ghosal.

Pritama, who runs a boutique in Sheorafuli, said she was struck by the “innocence, simplicity and sincerity” of Sudip’s love. “I was overwhelmed. It was love at first sight. I had no hesitation in accepting his proposal,” she said.

Egged on by their friends, they decided to tie the knot that evening itself. Sudip, who had come on a bike with his friends on their two-wheelers, decided to ride back to Hind Motors with Pritama, while his friends trailed them. They reached Hind Motors at 10.30pm and headed straight to the local pandal. Sudip and Pritama exchanged garlands at the pandal around midnight, with dhaks playing in the background. “My elderly parentswere surprised,” said Ghosal.

“We are happy. We were trying to convince him to marry but he chose his own bride,” said Alpana Ghosal, Sudip’s mother.