“There is no jewel like a woman,” says a Sanskrit proverb. Vedas, Puranas, Upanishads glorify gender equality and diversity. But modern India is a bit regressive.
Hi,
My first encounter with the concept of "rejecting girls without seeing them" was when I binge-watched the "Saraswatichandra Series" which was directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali and telecasted on Starplus channel. There was an episode where Saraswatichandra a male protagonist rejects Kumudsundari a female protagonist without seeing her. Later he eventually falls in love with her. That's the way the 'Saraswatichandra Series' story goes around. According to the series, firstly Saraswatichandra wanted to abandon the materialistic life that's why he automatically rejected Kumudsundari without seeing her in person. That episode was not authentic enough to add some sense and adds a question that 'Couldn't he do these two activities together? Couldn't he live two lives together? The 'Saraswatichandra Series' was inspired by Gujarati novelist Govardhan Ram Tripathi highly famous novel "Saraswatichandradra" which doesn't mention the idea of 'Saraswatichandra rejected Kumudsundari without seeing her in person' but Tripathi's story also tells us that he abandoned Kumudsundari on the day when the marriage was fixed for his aesthetic practices and Kumudsundari was married to Paramdhan later. That means Saraswatichandra didn't automatically reject her without seeing her. Thus series provokes the inkling that it's civil to reject a girl without seeing her looks and intellectual ability or something unique. And the novel stimulated the impression that's it's okay for the groom to leave his bride during the marriage ceremony to whom he is going to be married for his aesthetic penance practices.
There are no blogs written on S. R. Rana. Only his website had information. I want to take this initiative to write a piece. So here it is. I hope you enjoy reading it further as I enjoyed narrating it about him.