Life and Marriage- Love is wrong, parents are right?

Life and Marriage are similar in many ways. A) there are no guarantees in either. B)  there are no fixed rules for living a good life or a ‘making’ a good marriage that applies to all people. Then there’s the bit about both life and marriages throwing up surprises. Sometimes,  nasty ones. It started two weeks back with an email from a reader in the US and as one was looking through  the contents a colleague announced, “Someone left a strange comment on one of the tech stories” and ‘pinged’ me the comment. It was disturbing.

“Hi, I am from Bangalore and have been in love with a girl from Mysore for the last two years. She is a Punjabi and her parents are forcefully trying to marry her off to another man. I spoke to her father about letting us marry; he has refused and threatens murder. She is ready to leave her family and marry me but we are scared: What if her father kills us?” Even as one thought of possible suggestions for the distraught couple, a recently heartbroken friend called.