By Jitendra Dabas

Earlier this month, the Delhi government informed the Supreme Court it was working towards measures to curb lavish weddings in Delhi, measures which could help limit the number of guests. I am assuming it was pure coincidence that the order came right in the middle of a

that was making headlines not just in India but globally.

It is difficult to infer if this was a reaction to the Isha Ambani-Anand Piramal wedding, considering that government officials as well as those from the judiciary were also among the recipients of social media bytes and WhatsApp forwards relating to the said nuptials – from Salman Khan turning background dancer and Hillary Clinton dancing with Nita

to Amitabh Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai and

Khan serving food to guests. There were even fake videos of “guests” who weren’t at the wedding.

This came on the back of a slew of celebrity weddings, starting with the Virat-Anushka marriage in 2017 and including Priyanka Chopra-Nick Jonas and Deepika-Ranveer this year. Suddenly, celeb weddings are dominating the conversation like never before.

They are designer weddings — taking place at an Italian lakeside resort or in Udaipur — as much as they are multi-venue media shows, spread over many days and multiple locations, almost like big sporting events with their opening and closing ceremonies. And, for easy hashtags, they are being branded (#Virushka, #DeepVeer). These celebrity occasions and our obsession with them reveal a lot about the evolution of not only the wedding but everything else about our society.

The Big Fat Indian Wedding is not new, and neither is the idea of marriage as an event to assert one’s social standing through wealth and power. But what has changed is how we consume weddings as an event. For some time now, Indian weddings have become

. But this Bollywoodisation has evolved — from the Sooraj Barjatya idea of a wedding to a Karan Johar spectacular to, now, a Sanjay Leela

show. This desire to have a ‘fairytale’ wedding is being fueled by lifestyle channels, upscale hotels and Instagram.

The wedding has moved from being close-knit community chaos to a well-choreographed series of events. It is no more an occasion where the neighbourhood pitches in as extended family. The uncles, aunts, cousins and neighbours who once performed organisational tasks have given way to wedding planners. Today, a wedding has become an event to which you are invited to participate, where guests have to be as prepared as the hosts. And the venue has become a performance arena where everyone has to turn up ready to perform.

Even wedding rituals have transformed. Where once they were cultural/social, now they are all about consumption and enjoyment. Rituals that sanctify marriage have been relegated almost to the sidelines. Phere and Doli have taken a backseat; now, it’s all about Mehndi and the reception, because these are more consumption-friendly and interactive. In a society that lives to collect experiences, weddings have become the ultimate curated immersive experience.

And the advent of social media has added more spin to our interest in celebrity weddings. While celebs in the past would keep their marriage under wraps, today they are allowing people direct access, through their own Twitter handles and Instagram posts. Add to that guests armed with phone cameras, the new paparazzi recording videos and taking pictures, and sharing with the outside world with as much enthusiasm as they would for weddings in their own family.

While the institution of marriage faces its own challenges in changing times, the wedding as an event has gone from strength to strength. It has become not just a visible symbol of conspicuous consumption but, also, a collaborative and pleasure-seeking experience for today’s India.

(The author is chief strategy officer, McCann World Group)