IT IS A TRUTH universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife, wrote Jane Austen. In India, it might be said that a single woman in possession of a degree and a high-powered job must be in want of a husband — and she will still rely on her parents to find her one.

The Austen allegory becomes more apt next month, when Bride and Prejudice, a new film by Gurinder Chadha, the director of Bend It Like Beckham, transplants the 18th-century tale to modern-day Bombay. The film is in an all-singing, all-dancing Bollywood epic, but it faithfully adheres to the plot: a lower middle-class family tries to marry its daughters to men of a higher social standing.

One big change in the dynamics of arranged marriages in India today is that young women are highly educated. Look at a matrimonial ad of 25 years ago: “Alliance sought for beautiful, fair, tall, slim Brahmin girl, 21, homely, knows cooking, sewing, knitting. Cheerful personality.” And one from last Sunday’s classifieds: “Suitable match wanted for fair, smart Khatri girl, 26, with MSc, MBA, working for multinational in senior position.”

Gone are the docile, submissive women of an earlier generation who were famous for making sacrifices and adjustments. Women in urban India are smart and feisty. They know their own minds, have careers, wear tailored suits, compete with men, drive around town, and sip chardonnay in the capital’s funky bars. These women are not going to lower their eyes modestly and accept the first guy who comes along. Their qualifications and earning capacity have tilted the power balance slightly in their favour. In Indian culture, where boys are favoured over girls, the parents of a girl were always cast in a “supplicant’s” role when seeking a match, Even now, for instance, the girl’s family must make the first move.

Veera Nayar, of Delhi, is the mother of Arti, 27, a graphic designer, and Bhavna, 25, a marketing executive. Both daughters are workaholics as well as being talented jazz and classical Indian dancers. Arti and Bhavna will be allowed to meet prospective grooms four to five times, as opposed to the prescribed one or two meetings permitted 20 or 30 years ago during which parents hovered behind the living-room door after the two had been left alone for an excruciatingly artificial tête-à-tête.

But are four or five meetings sufficient to make such a big decision? “Until you live with someone, you can never know what they’re really like, so whether you meet them twice or 200 times makes no difference,” says Anjali Kalra, who has two unmarried daughters, Pooja, 18, and Kanika, 24.

Economic independence has altered girls’ attitudes hugely. “They are harder to please now, their expectations are higher. They want equality with their husbands and expect the boy to adapt, too. Before it was the girl who had to adapt to her husband and his family,” says Mrs Nayar.

Parents complain about girls rejecting worthy candidates for frivolous reasons. “I was told about a young engineer in England who seemed fine. But my daughters said no because his parents live in Amar Colony (the Catford of Delhi). I said it didn’t matter as long as the boy was nice, but they wouldn’t hear of it,” says Mrs Nayar, sounding like an exasperated Mrs Bennet. Kumkum Kapoor also grumbles good-humouredly about her daughters — Radhika, 29, and Chandni, 25 — rejecting suitable boys out of hand. “If they don’t like someone the first time, I urge them to meet him again. First impressions can be deceptive. People can grow on you. But they refuse.” As she talks, the girls roll their eyes. They want educated, personable, good-looking men with good jobs and good incomes. Mr Right must be nice. Easy to talk to. Share similar values. There is no sign of him so far.

“We had one guy coming home with an army of relatives. He was working in Dubai and wore tight nylon trousers and a gold chain. His hair was oily. I wasn’t in the least interested. I rushed into the kitchen, where the maid was getting a big spread ready. I told her to serve only half of it because I wanted him out of here fast,” says Radhika who, like Chandni, works in advertising and the media.

Both are independent and assertive. It might strike non-Indians as odd that such women opt for arranged marriages. The reason is that arranged marriages are an immutable law of Indian life because in Eastern cultures, a family’s honour resides in a woman’s “purity” or virginity. Even a whiff of sexual misconduct, such as premarital sex or a liaison, and the family is disgraced irrevocably.

That is why a girl’s movements are controlled. She might be seen somewhere by an auntie or uncle and word will go round that she is “loose”. In Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy, tears of despair run down the face of Rupa Mehra when a relative tells her that her daughter Lata has been seen “walking with a boy along the banks of the Ganges”. What will people say!

Much worse than just being seen with a boy, she might fall in love with the wrong man or become pregnant. Meera Malhotra, a top executive with a life insurance company whose two daughters got married last year, says firmly that no girl should be seen alone with a boy at night. “Up to around 7pm is OK because the boy could be a male colleague as most girls work these days, but no later. She can be with a group of boys and girls but not alone with a boy. Her reputation and our name will be in jeopardy.” No one will want to marry her, and any girl who remains unmarried is a source of shame to parents.

(Apropos of virginity, Mira Nair’s film Monsoon Wedding fails to reflect reality when it shows the prospective bridegroom agreeing to marry the heroine after she confesses to having slept with a married man. A survey this month by India Today magazine of 11 cities showed that 72 per cent of the men expect their wives to be virgins. Asked if they would marry a woman who admitted to having had premarital sex, 77 per cent said no.)

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