Oh TOI, marriage breaking over dowry isn't 'heartbreaking'

The Times of India has had a history of faux pas(s) that would make any of the Page 3 celebrities, who make an appearance on the paper, redden up in shame. Their great "epic fail" moments include secret cleavage shots of celebrities, closely kept an eye out for royal upskirt moments, and even congratulated Donald Trump on his election victory by appropriating his notorious brag about sexually assaulting women. Ah yes, India's most read English daily is really classy.

The latest in TOI's smashing series of "what the hell" moments, is a small news report about the heartbreaking effects of Modi's monstrous demonetisation drive. Except that it wasn't what the headline made it look like. The story read:

A young woman's dream of marriage was dashed when the groom's family called off their eight-month-long engagement on Wednesday, two days before the wedding day, as a result of the cash-crunch due to demonetisation.

Shikha, 22, a resident of Jagatpuri, got engaged to Kunal from Noida eight months back and was set to tie the knot on November 25.

"The groom's family was demanding a high-end car, diamond jewellery and cash. We couldn't raise enough cash to fulfil their demands owing to the note ban and they called off the marriage," Tilak Raj Singh, an uncle of the bride, told IANS.

What one needs to make needs to make TOI understand is that this looks suspiciously like a dowry case and that it was probably not a bad thing that the lack of dowry made the groom's scumbag family back out from this wedding. Have you, in your yet another vintage display of harebrained reportage, forgotten that deamnding dowry is a punishbale offence under Indian Penal Code?

There may be a lot of things wrong with the Modi government's decision. And a whole of things can be blamed on demonetisation, like deaths and hunger and "minor inconvenience".

This just isn't a sob story: this is a crime story. No oh-there-goes-my-fairytale-wedding trash, please! 

The newspaper clipping blew up on the India subreddit of Reddit.com. Here are some of the more amazing responses:

Also read - Was Maneka Gandhi holding the India rape stats upside down?