A wedding in India is often viewed as a celebration of the union of two individuals, families, love and continuity. It is often presented through photos, rituals and collective expression of joy. However, beneath the surface lies another side of the truth that continues to decide the fate of many marriages: the expectation of a financial exchange, often labelled as “gifts” or “custom”, which is mandatory between the families.
This contrast becomes more evident when it is put against the social history and legal aspects of dowry in India. According to the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961, Dowry is prohibited under all conditions of social practices and is further addressed through legal provisions related to cruelty and harassment in marriage. Textbooks, public discussions and media have often framed dowry as something which is not only illegitimate but also harmful to everyone. Yet despite many efforts, it continues to be practised across communities and regions as part of an obligatory exchange custom.
This reality raises a significant question of why a practice that is legally forbidden and socially condemned continues to persist in marriages in today’s contemporary India.
A Systematic Cultural Practice
Part of the answer to the question of whether dowry is still prevalent lies in how it is commonly misframed in public discourse. It is often put around either as an “obsolete ritual” which is fading with rapid urbanisation and modernisation, or reduced to a few, isolated incidents of criminal violence. Both framings overlook its structural nature. In reality, dowry is not just a cultural practice or series of individual crimes; it is a gendered economic system that is placed in marriages and is shaped by class, caste and unequal access to financial autonomy.
In this context, marriage is not only a personal union but also an institutionalised social fabric. It includes families, social status, economic exchange and public image. Within such a system, financial negotiations become normalised, especially when they create unequal power dynamics between relations. Women, specifically, hold constrained positions where marriage is tied to family honour, financial stability and social reputation.
Pop and cinema culture reflect this contrast in essential ways. Films such as Daawat-e-Ishq (2014) bring dowry into mainstream discussion by spotlighting it as a social issue in which transactional negotiations often dominate marriage conversations and as something on which action needs to be taken. The film analyses how economic expectations are normalised through the language of rituals and social reputation, making the practice of dowry visible to a wider audience.
However, its resolution demonstrates a broader limitation in cultural portrayal. The issue is resolved through character transformation and typical romantic closure. Dowry becomes the basis for an individual’s moral values rather than power, coupled with less engagement with law enforcement or accountability, reflecting upon the tendency to present systemic violence and abuse as isolated incidents rather than questioning its structured origins.
A Gendered and Intersectional Institution
The prevalence of dowry cannot be explained through issue awareness alone. In various cases, individuals who participate or comply with dowry-related expectations already know that the practice is illegal and socially forbidden. The issue lies not in a lack of educational awareness but rather in systemic barriers.
Dowry still persists because it has become rooted in the intersecting systems of gender, caste, class, and relationships. Marriages in India function as institutions in which families discuss resources, reputation-based status, and alliances. In this structure, women often have to deal with reduced agency where marriage is closely connected to financial dependence and the legitimacy of the relationship.
An economic research article reveals that dowry hasn’t diminished with increased levels of education or modernisation. Instead, it has become adapted in Indian marriages. In many cases, it shows up in the form of “obligatory” gifts, lavish weddings, property and asset transfers, or expected contributions that replicate the idea of compliance with the transactional exchange. This adaptability allowed dowry to prevail even in contexts where it is viewed as an extremely perilous practice by the general public.
Moreover, dowry is influenced by social stability, caste and class communities. In such situations, it becomes part of the competition for higher status, luxury, and wealth, presenting marital conversations as symbols of capital exchange, making financial expectations seem normal while concealing structural inequality. These systems not only determine how dowry is exchanged but also how it is discussed, justified or concealed. This makes dowry not just a gendered issue but also an intersectional one where various forms of social affluence come together in the institution of marriage.
The Legal and Lived Gap
There are several legal resources to address the issue of dowry, but their implementation remains inconsistent. While the Dowry Prohibition Act criminalises the custom and related provisions that address mental and physical harassment, along with domestic cruelty, the enforcement remains uneven. According to the National Crime Records Bureau data, around 16 women are killed due to dowry-related demands every day, which exhibits how the harassment and deaths due to dowry continue to be reported daily and annually and show systemic prevalence rather than individual incidents.
Additionally, the recent cases like the alleged dowry-related deaths of Twisha Sharma (Bhopal) and Deepika Nagar (Noida) in 2026 further highlight that dowry continues to take extreme forms of violence despite being an unlawful act and persistent public awareness about the practice. While the cases remain under investigation, their visibility reveals a recurring pattern in which financial constraints, marital pressure, and structural gaps intersect to create emotional complexities within the marriage.
However, these NCRB statistics present only reported cases. Several experiences of marital pressure, abuse and violence continue to remain unreported in formal systems due to fear or lack of trust in the legal and justice systems. As feminist legal scholars, Lotika Sarkar and Archana Parashar‘s works have highlighted that having legal rights and formal laws doesn’t automatically translate into access to the justice system, especially when social and systemic barriers remain intact in India.
This gap between legality and lived reality is primary towards understanding dowry as a structural barrier rather than a recognised tradition.
To conclude, dowry continues to prevail in India not because it is overlooked but because it is rooted structurally in the gendered systems that shape the path of marriages. Knowledge and awareness about the issue alone have not been sufficient to decimate it because the practice is still persistent due to the intersecting inequalities of gender, class and institutional access. Addressing dowry requires going beyond symbolic acknowledgement and towards social structural change, with legal protection and an accessible legal & justice system, and where societal norms no longer normalise financial pressurisation under the pretext of tradition or gift exchange. Until refusal to comply with dowry expectations becomes socially safe for women and their families, dowry will continue to prevail as an accepted feature of marriages in India.
