Updated 10:54 IST | Thursday, February 09, 2012
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Paper marriage a ticket to Australia in Punjab
Satinder Bains
Tuesday, 14 July 2009
The personal advertisements dotted through Punjabi newspaper classifieds are as brazen as they are impossible to misinterpret. Headed "Paper Marriage", they call for expressions of interest from girls who achieved good scores in the International English Language Test System exam and who are willing to study a course in Australia that leads to permanent residency for her and her sham husband.
All expenses will be paid and the marriage dissolved after permanent residency is secured.
Through an interpreter, The Australian called one number to verify the demand. The advertiser was indeed looking for an IELTS-qualified marriage candidate, but the original vacancy had been filled. They were no longer looking for a girl who had passed her IELTS, but a boy.
The Australian rang another number and was told that a 32-year-old man from a backward caste, who had worked illegally in Britain for nine years, was looking for a girl who had passed the IELTS test to be his ticket to Australia. She would study; he would work. No dowry was required from her family and all expenses would be paid for study in a field of her choice.
While such arrangements can prove costly for the groom's family -- $40,000 or more in agent fees, wedding and study costs, interests on loans and airfares -- for many couples the deal is mutually beneficial.
The division of family landholdings and wealth between successive generations has fuelled a desire verging on obsession among Punjabis to seek fortune on foreign shores.
While Punjab is among India's most conservative states, where a girl can be killed for having an affair, the inability of many parents to raise a dowry for their daughters means many are willing to marry them off -- even into sham marriages.
In cities across Punjab, streets are littered with signs advertising IELTS trainers, as well as education, immigration and travel agents, all offering an easy path to a better future abroad.
A journalist in Ludhiana told The Australian: "People will do anything in Punjab to go abroad because they see it as an honour, even if it means selling their ancestral lands and putting their lives at risk."
A third phone call is made to Gray Matters, an agency that advertises services in IELTS scholarship tests, permanent immigration, student visas and contract marriages. A woman advises that a contract marriage will cost 6 lakh ($15,722) to arrange and will involve a court wedding at a magistrate's office.
The Australian tracked Gray Matters to the third floor of a dingy building on a main road in the industrial city of Nawanshahr in Punjab's rural heartland, to find a one-stop shop selling life insurance policies, kitchen appliances, Amway and immigration services.
One Punjabi lawyer, who boasts of being able to help even students who have been knocked back for a visa, told The Australian: "If you can find a girl (who has passed the IELTS test), you can go anywhere. That's very easy. Then both the husband and wife will go."
The Australian high commission in Delhi has asked agents to conduct separate interviews to catch out sham spouses and check marriage documents and photographs. But many are still slipping through the cracks.
Courtesy-The Australian
All expenses will be paid and the marriage dissolved after permanent residency is secured.
Through an interpreter, The Australian called one number to verify the demand. The advertiser was indeed looking for an IELTS-qualified marriage candidate, but the original vacancy had been filled. They were no longer looking for a girl who had passed her IELTS, but a boy.
The Australian rang another number and was told that a 32-year-old man from a backward caste, who had worked illegally in Britain for nine years, was looking for a girl who had passed the IELTS test to be his ticket to Australia. She would study; he would work. No dowry was required from her family and all expenses would be paid for study in a field of her choice.
While such arrangements can prove costly for the groom's family -- $40,000 or more in agent fees, wedding and study costs, interests on loans and airfares -- for many couples the deal is mutually beneficial.
The division of family landholdings and wealth between successive generations has fuelled a desire verging on obsession among Punjabis to seek fortune on foreign shores.
While Punjab is among India's most conservative states, where a girl can be killed for having an affair, the inability of many parents to raise a dowry for their daughters means many are willing to marry them off -- even into sham marriages.
In cities across Punjab, streets are littered with signs advertising IELTS trainers, as well as education, immigration and travel agents, all offering an easy path to a better future abroad.
A journalist in Ludhiana told The Australian: "People will do anything in Punjab to go abroad because they see it as an honour, even if it means selling their ancestral lands and putting their lives at risk."
A third phone call is made to Gray Matters, an agency that advertises services in IELTS scholarship tests, permanent immigration, student visas and contract marriages. A woman advises that a contract marriage will cost 6 lakh ($15,722) to arrange and will involve a court wedding at a magistrate's office.
The Australian tracked Gray Matters to the third floor of a dingy building on a main road in the industrial city of Nawanshahr in Punjab's rural heartland, to find a one-stop shop selling life insurance policies, kitchen appliances, Amway and immigration services.
One Punjabi lawyer, who boasts of being able to help even students who have been knocked back for a visa, told The Australian: "If you can find a girl (who has passed the IELTS test), you can go anywhere. That's very easy. Then both the husband and wife will go."
The Australian high commission in Delhi has asked agents to conduct separate interviews to catch out sham spouses and check marriage documents and photographs. But many are still slipping through the cracks.
Courtesy-The Australian
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