Hyderabad weddings hit by pandemic this yr too

HYDERABAD: The parents of 26-year-old Harshita, who works at a software MNC, planned to have a lavish wedding for their only daughter, with close relatives, but the pandemic has thrown a wrench in their plans.
“We waited for almost a year and fixed the muhurtam on May 14—which coincided with ‘Akshaya Tritiya’, on which day most wedding ceremonies take place (Abujh Muhurat). Now, we have been forced to postpone it to November,” said Ragunandan, a businessman and father of bride, told STOI.
“I have spent of nearly Rs 1 lakh for just printing wedding cards and invited people from both in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. I even booked an air-conditioned private travel buses to ferry people. But that has all been ruined,” Amarender Reddy, whose son BR Sharat’s is set to get married on May 29 at Madhapur.
Though there are auspicious days to perform weddings in June, July, November, and December, as luck would have it, there are 17 auspicious days for muhurthams in the month of May only, according to Ramana Deekshithulu, a senior purohit.
He says he has fixed muhurthams for nearly 20 weddings in May in Hyderabad and Secunderabad. “But now, most weddings have been postponed to November and December,” said Deekshithulu.
After the Telangana government extended the partial night lockdown till May 15, tehsildars stopped getting requisitions for permissions, altogether. “Earlier, we used to receive five to seven requisitions in a month, seeking permission, but the number has gone down to two or three,” a tehsildar in Hyderabad told TOI. “All requisitions will be forwarded to police stations concerned for final permissions, a revenue official added.
The continuous spike in Covid-19 cases, panic over the emergence of new strains of the virus and the police discouraging weddings have all played a part in weddings being postponed in the city.