Friday, February 14, 2014

Love in the times of Telangana-Seemandhra

Sulogna Mehta,TNN | Feb 15, 2014, 04.10 AM IST

VISAKHAPATNAM: 'True love knows no reason, no boundaries, no distance. It has a sole intention of bringing people together to a time called forever.' So what if wily politicians are conspiring to play villains in the real life love stories of many couples hailing from the two regions of Seemandhra and Telangana with their bifurcation moves, the much-in-love couples in the city celebrated Valentine's Day leaving behind the division blues for the day.

Like the pyaar-kiya-toh-darna-kya attitude of final year engineering students R Geethika and D Sudhir who are going steady. While Geethika hails from Hyderabad but has been living in Vizag for the last few years due to her dad's posting, Sudhir is from the Port City. "Our parents don't know we are in a committed relationship though a few of our trusted friends and cousins are aware of it. After passing out of college, we will seek the blessings of our parents and nothing can stop us from getting married. We won't let bifurcation cast its shadow on our love as it is being carried out by politicians with vested interests. It's one language, one culture and above all, one country for us," said Sudhir, chilling out with Geethika on Beach Road.

Twenty-six-year-old Swapna Reddy from Hyderabad who got married to her 29-year-old sweetheart Kiran Kumar from Vizag, on V-Day last year. "I met Kiran when he came to Hyderabad on work. When so many inter-state, inter-culture, inter-religion, and even cross-country marriages are happening these days, who cares about Telangana and Seemandhra in the matters of the heart?" averred Swapna, currently pursuing her MBA.

Regional politics has no room in the lives of Karunakar Rao, 28, from Srikakulam and Vimala, 27, from Hyderabad who had a love marriage three years ago after years of online courtship. "We fell in love even without meeting each other. And finally jab we met, we decided to tie the knot despite objections from our families owing to our different backgrounds and castes. But we never bothered about such superficial differences. So why should we fight over Hyderabadi biryani, Telangana's garela pulusu or coastal Gongura mutton now?" quipped Karunakar, a private sector employee.

And while the families of yet-to-be-married couple V Saritha, hailing from the Port City, and Sunil from Hyderabad are a worried lot, the couple, which got engaged in December last year, are resolute. "There's no question of breaking our alliance just because of an illogical political decision. But our families are worried about fixing the wedding date, which was supposed to be sometime in the middle of this year. With elections coming up, the auspicious date now needs to be carefully selected as there's every possibility of agitations and strikes, both in Telangana and Seemandhra, over the bifurcation issue. Conducting a marriage in the midst of such chaos would be quite risky and we wonder if we would have to postpone the ceremonies till things settle down," pointed out Saritha.

However, there are some who are worried about the future of their children. Like private-sector employee T Ravi, who hails from Hyderabad. "My wife belongs to Prakasam district of coastal Andhra. We have been married for two decades and have lived in three different states but were never prepared for this kind of a disturbance in our own state. Though the bifurcation issue has not impacted our family relations in anyway because it's all a political move, we are worried about the higher education of our children as far as seats in medical and engineering colleges are concerned. The purchase of new property and its safety is also doubtful at the current juncture so we have to reconsider our investment plans carefully."

(Names of most couples have been changed on request)


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