India’s affair with arranged marriages has now officially become more superficial with this matrimonial website. IITIIMshaadi.com is a matrimonial website designed for alumni of the top 15 colleges in India, justifying the ‘IIT’ and ‘IIM’ in the title. The website, founded in 2014, also caters to alumni from top Management, Engineering, Architecture, Medicine, Mass Communication, CA/CS/ICWA/CFA, and Fashion Design universities in India.
What baffled netizens the most was the irony of CEO Taksh Gupta’s qualifications. The website states that Gupta is a Management Graduate from SP Jain School of Global Management. Regardless, he believes that ‘alumni of Premier Education Institutions deservedly desire the companionship of the ‘matching intellect’, with similar experiences and expectations, an ideology reflected in the viral Karan Johar ad. The Bollywood giant starred in an Instagram advertisement for the brand. In the video, Johar said that since we live, die, and marry only once, our life partners must be “correct”. The judge of that? The educational qualifications of a person. According to the ad, a fancy degree from the top university warrants societal progression and a lack of prejudices.
Johar goes on to say that the well-tutored seldom care about shallow criteria like age, height and caste and rely more on mental compatibility. Unfortunately, only a percentage of India’s population are accepted into these elite universities but receive maximum government funding. India’s exploitative education system values the most obedient students taking away any leverage for rebellion against the system. The system rewards the most conforming, so where does the assurance of advancement come from?
The website even verified the educational credentials before admitting potential members. They now claim to have members across 50 other countries and even senior government employees. What these members fail to acknowledge, however, is the inherent privilege that accompanies their position in the top global corporations. As India’s citizens rush to break from their financial restraints and enter the more affluent groups, websites like IITIIMshaadi.com and FAANG remain a far-away dream for most people.
