AHMEDABAD: When a man enters the marriage market, he faces inquiries about his house, job, and salary. But anyone looking to marry a girl from the ‘42 Gaam Patidar Samaj’ usually needs to answer one more question: “Do you or your relatives live in the US, or at least Canada?” If the answer is no, then his chances of making the match plummets.
The skewed sex ratio and ambition to get a life partner settled abroad has led to the emergence of two new trends among this sub-sect of the Patidar community which comprises of people from 42 villages in Gandhinagar and Mehsana districts. While women prefer to marry men with NRI status, the men who are already settled in the US are paying ‘dowry’ to girls settled in the US. This usually includes the expenditure incurred by the girl’s family to help her immigrate illegally.
