Pre Wedding Ceremonies: Engagement Ceremony, Ring Ceremony

Pre wedding ceremonies lasts for at least four to five days prior to the main wedding rituals. The pre wedding ceremonies are not those kinds of serious rituals; rather it’s filled with enjoyment and delight. It is believed that pre wedding rituals and customs play a crucial role since its thought as promising and a positive sign for the times coming forth. Well, pre wedding ceremonies are those ceremonies which are conducted before the wedding day and as compared to the main wedding ceremonies, a ritual of pre wedding are lengthy and goes on for days. The ceremonies of pre wedding can be broadly divided into engagement ceremony, mehendi ceremony, sangeet ceremony and Shagun ceremony.

• Engagement Ceremony: Engagement Ceremony marks the beginning of the wedding ceremonies and is normally conducted months or days before the main wedding. Usually, the time between the engagement and the main wedding ceremony given to the bride and groom is to know and understand each other better. Precisely, it can be said that it’s the probation time given to the would be bride and groom. The most significant episode in this whole chapter is the moment when the bride and the groom exchange the ring with each other in the presence of their family members and near and dear ones, signifying that from this day forth they are on the path of becoming one.

• Mehndi Ceremony: This is one of the pre wedding ceremonies wherein the bride is applied turmeric to enhance her beauty, after which a colorful mehendi is applied on her feet and hands. It is an old belief that, deeper the colors of mehendi, the more love and care she gets from her husband.

• Sangeet Ceremony: The origination of this ceremony goes back to north-India however, in the present day scenario, sangeet has become a common ceremony for every culture. Sangeet is a ceremony where the families of both the bride and groom share a common platform, singing and dancing in glory.

• Shagun Ceremony: Earlier both Shagun and chunni ceremony were two different ceremonies, performed at two different dates. However, for convenience, these days both are combined as one ceremony. First, both the family members are formally introduced to each other then “tikka” is put on the forehead of the groom by all the family members of the bride with gifts. Right after this, the chunni ceremony takes place wherein the bride is presented with a red chunni by the groom’s family with some jewelry, gifts or dresses.