A generous Indian diamond trader has thrown a mass wedding for 111 fatherless brides who were too poor to hold weddings of their own.
Mahesh Savani, who is a millionaire diamond trader and property tycoon, from Surat in India’s North-West, held the mass wedding in a local school compound on Sunday afternoon.
On top of organising and paying for the wedding ceremonies, he also threw in gifts of up to 450,000 rupees (about AUD$8560) each, so the brides, who came from all castes and all religions, could start their married lives prosperously.
To date, Mr Savani, 44, has organised the weddings of 251 fatherless women, in a trend that started back in 2008 when one of his staff members died before being able to organise the weddings of two daughters.
“I was very shocked when one of my employees died just 12 days before he could marry off his two daughters. It was very difficult for the family to arrange for marriage,” he told The Times of India.
“So, I decided that I would become their foster father and marry them off. This is how it began.”
Mr Savani adds that paying for these weddings is way of giving back to society and that he considers the brides, all of whom have lost fathers, as his own daughters.
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