Having met the groom at gate, parents of the bride conduct him to newly married. The groom and the bride exchange flower garlands. Thus also there is a wedding ceremony. After a supper a newly-married couple goes to a small temple under the name "vedi". This temple is built from five bamboo sticks covered with an awning. A fire burns in its centre. One end of a dress of the bride is adhered to a belt of the groom. It means their union and attachment to each other. Newly-married couple sits down near fire. Then they should rise, join hands and bypass round fire seven times. Here now they are already spouses.
Then the pair comes back into the bride's house. The young husband goes to bed in a separate room under jokes and humorous catchphrases. And the wife remains in the maidenly bedroom. Relatives of the husband go to spend the night to their home. In the morning the young wife dressed in the same wedding dress, goes to the house of her husband. Now the young wife will come to the parents' house only in a month to visit them.
In many areas of Southern India betrothal ceremony is absent. Parents of the groom and the bride don't hasten to declare the wedding day. First of all they study pair horoscopes. If star outlines coincide, parents of the bride shall invite the future relatives to shows. At last solemn preparations begin. All relatives of the bride gather four days prior to wedding. In a court yard of her house there is a special canopy which is called pandal. It is decorated with flowers, garlands from cocoes and bananas, multi-colored fires. In the center of pandal the big bowl is established, filled with rice to edges. Over it the flower of a coconut palm tree lies. It all together symbolizes happiness. Fires are lit round a bowl. However ceremony begins not in pandal, but in a temple. Only the bride is present on it.
The bride goes to a temple at half past six a.m. There the bride throws four coconuts on a floor, distributes alms to poor men, and then comes back home. Only the father and the uncle of the bride meet the groom. It means that the future son-in-law and the brother-in-law have become related. The groom passes in pandal and sits down near a bowl with fig. The bride appears accompanied by mother, relatives and friends. The groom rises, and the bride slowly puts on to his neck a flower garland and receives from the future husband same. All occurs under sounds of a wedding melody. Then a newly-married couple exchanges rings, and the groom gives to the bride a gold chain which she will carry since then for the rest of the natural. Women in the south don't paint a hair parting and don't put a marriage sign on a forehead. The gold chain serves for them as such sign. This is a bad omen to remove it.
In the evening a newly-married couple goes to the room taken away for them where the husband receives a glass with milk and stays alone, and the young wife goes to visitors. The celebratory supper begins. After it all visitors from the groom leave home, and the bride comes back in a room to the husband. Next morning he takes away her in a honeymoon trip.
At all distinction of wedding ceremonies in different states and country corners there is also the general. Words of a solemn oath which is said by the young man and the girl are very similar everywhere. Oath words are that: “We swear to be together both in a grief, and in happiness till that day when the death will separate us”.
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