COUSIN MARRIAGE in South India. Why? 

Thinking about marrying cousins in our Assamese culture (Assam) is a sin.. It's a nightmare.. We treat cousins as our real brothers and sisters..

I am from West Bengal and here in Hindu family a brother or uncle is regarded as a' second father' and girls respect them as well and men also take care of them 😊 to think about marrying them is nothing but a nightmare and it's also ruined the beautiful relationship among cousins. We celebrate Bhai duj , Rakhsabandhan with love and respect with all cousins.

I'm a kerala Christian. We consider cousins as our siblings. While studying in Chennai i had a classmate whose parents were uncle and niece. Though their marriage was happy, my classmate said she will never marry her relative. I think in current generation nobody wants to marry relatives.

In Telugu states your father's brother's daughter is SISTER to you..but you can marry your father's sister's daughter...same for mother. Your mother's sister's daughter is SISTER to you but you can marry your mother's brother's daughter In short, you can marry your parent's opposite gender sibling's daughter/son

Mohak chooses less controversial issues and chooses more issues which we really need to know deeply that's why I like Mohak's channel. Thank you very much for bringing such videos continuously.

When recessive genes are mixed, the concentration of it increases therefore the chances of a recessive diseases also increases

I am from Karnataka and I can speak for almost all people who live in northern part of Karnataka. This practice used to be common till my parents' time but has reduced significantly these days. Main cause to stop the practice was that we as a society saw some health problems in children born out of such marriages. Not in all children but in few cases. To clarify more on what's cross cousin is. They could may their Mama's or Atte/Buwa's kids. Marrying Kaka/Chikkappa/Chacha's or Chikkamma/chikki/mausi's kids was strictly prohibited, no one even thought about it. I have not seen a single such case in my entire life. As of marrying ones niece: back in days people used to have lots of kids. So imagine a case where the eldest offspring was a girl and youngest offspring say 7th or 8th child was a boy. Now obviously there's a huge age difference between these 2 Sister and Brother. Now, it was very common that the girls used to get married in early ages. You can imagine this bride's youngest brother running around in her marriage in shorts with runny nose 😀 This sister used give birth to children very early. So now this Eldest sister's daughters and her youngest brothers were of same age and compatible for marriage from the age perspective. As you married off your elder sister to a different man outside your family, her lineage became totally different. (her kids Gotra would be different than yours). Hence marriages were allowed. Nowadays these practices exists close to none.

A fun fact : Arjun and Subhadra were cousins. Arjuna's mom and Subhadra's dad were siblings. In South India the cousin you can marry has to be between bua and mama 's kids. However, the numbers have greatly reduced due to biological defects such marriages can cause.

South indian movies kinda glorify cousin marriage, awareness is indeed important. Thank you for emphasizing.

In Manipur we never thought of such things just even in once lifetime,It's a sin in our culture to marry someone to whom we share our direct blood line, like cousins from uncle ,aunts etc

I belong to a tribe in Assam. In my tribe, there are lots of restrictions regarding marriage. You cannot marry if both the bride and spouse have same title( even though they are not related in any sort), and many more complicated rules, cousins are treated as brothers and sisters. It's incredible that our ancestors have adopted those rules to prevent biological disorders of the offerings from the ancient times when there were no education system at all. Because of this practice we hardly see any physical abnormalties in our tribe.

Main reasons for cousin marriage 1. When parents were not able to get their daughter married by giving dowry. 2. They used to feel it is safe for their daughter to be in relatives house . But they are decreasing now. And one more thing these marriages are not with maternal aunt's or paternal uncle's offsprings as they are also called as brothers but with maternal uncle's or paternal aunt's offsprings as they are called with some other relation (in English everyone is called as cousin like chachi,bua,maami ,maama,chacha here everyone is aunt and uncle)

I watched a documentary on this topic years ago... People don't usually talk about this, and most are unaware of the biological side of the story... I'm glad you are bringing light to this topic and educating people about this... Kudos to you !

0:52 In Maharashtra also ( Not in all regions of Maharashtra) Marrying your mama ki ladki is normal. And some people don't appreciate this including me.. relative starts teasing boy with his mama chi mulgi from childhood . This is very normalise in my region. But things are changing now

As a Nepali we consider everyone as our family members as our brothers & sisters...we can't even think about marring our cousin or relatives ...even same gotra me vi sadi nai hota ..7 pusta dekhna parta he sadi k Liye ...❤️🕉️🇳🇵

I'm from andhra and yes it happens with limitations, the daughters and sons of same sexes are seen as sisters and brothers while opposite sexes are seen as potential marriage partners, I never understood the logic behind it and left it thinking it's just part of the culture.

I am from south India, and I have so many relatives who have done cousin marriage..

In the South, people consider atthai(mami)/mama's daughter/son consider for marriage.. not chitthi/chittappa(maasi/kaka) 's daughter/son, they are brothers n sisters

I'm from Kerala. Cousin marriages are almost non existent to the point I've never even heard of one happening. The first time i heard about this being in practise in the South was when some guy on the internet called me a cousin lover in an attempt to ridicule me.😂

Being a Jain in our culture we have something called "Saka" which means we are restricted to not marrying the ones who share the surname of both my mother's side and father's side family. Its believed that this practice avoids pre-mature baby deaths, diseases, genetic problems, and various health issues to an extent.

As a biologist and someone who learned genetics and cells, I want to say that it's not good for health and is the main reason behind many genetic diseases almost 10%.

As a north Indian hindu : we avoid three surnames or gotra ,i.e, Own surname, mother surname and grandmother surname...we also avoid maternal grandmother surname but now a days we just consider 3 surnames mostly....even villages who share boundaries also get avoided to marriage Note: please avoid my English 😅

Almost 3-4 years ago I was watching with my sister a South movie (dubbed in hindi).In which I realised that marrying with cousin in South is common.While watching movies suddenly my sister asked me didi if it is possible then how can a girl feeling safe in her home. I mean in our house my father's sister's son,or father's brother's son is like my own brother . Even whole villages children are brother and sister.

I'm a child born from a Consanguine marriage. My family in Kerala actually don't appreciate such a marriage, but in my case, parents fell in love with each other. I never knew much about the negative aspects of Consanguine marriages, so few years back I had fallen in love with my cousin as well, and we were in a relationship for almost a year. That is when I learnt about this and shared the information with her as well. I realised how lucky I was to be born without any abnormalities, and we mutually got out of the relationship. We were in love when we broke up. But we did it, only to avoid the risk of spoiling a child's life and also for a happier future. More people in South India should be educated about the problems of Consanguine marriages.

Though its very common in Muslim culture, my grandfather was dead against cousin marriage mainly because of possibility of biological disorder also it was weird for him that the kids who grew up considering each other as brothers and sisters should see each other as potential spouses.

I'm from Andhra Pradesh and I've personally experienced this issue. My paternal aunt considered me as a 'perfect bride' for her son and even my cousin was perfectly fine with the idea of marrying me (I'm seven years younger than him). They even proposed the match to my father. I was horrified because I always called my cousin 'elder brother' and to learn that he did have a romantic interest in me, when all while I considered him a sibling, sickened me to the core. My father rejected it without second thoughts as he was against cousin marriages having learnt in his late twenties about 'incest' and the resulting genetic problems in the later generations. Yay to father! My aunt was upset when my father rejected her and she even had the gall to say to my father "If you marry her into our household we'll take care of her. Since I'm her aunt, you can rest the fear that she might suffer under her in-laws. Also, the dowry will remain in our family without going to nameless outsiders." My father simply said "Bold of you to assume that I'll be offering any form of dowry," and the argument quickly escalated and the relations naturally strained after that. Even today my father and aunt barely spare a polite greeting at family gatherings. And me being awkward, I just turn opposite whenever I spot my aunt or cousin. I was the lucky case but my classmate from University was married to her cousin right after graduation. Cousin marriages are a common occurance in South India and regarded as normal and 'part of the tradition.' I'm glad that this issue is being spoken of. Edit: Incest is a common issue across religions and the people who practice this 'tradition' aren't even aware that cousin marriages come under incest. You see not all cousins can marry. I'm a Hindu and I can marry my paternal aunt's son and also marry my maternal uncle's son--these fellas are not technically adressed as brothers, they have a separate form of address so as to prevent any awkwardness later on if I marry them ( though my dad instructed me to call them as brothers from early age)but I cannot marry my maternal aunt's son or my paternal uncles's son(they are considered as brothers). I don't know if it's true but my mother said that the opposite applies for muslims. So, it's like everyone have their own rules for acceptable incest.

I'm Sindhi and we treat our cousin brothers and sisters as our own siblings. Our uncle and aunt are like our second parents. We can't even think about having romantic feelings lol. The minute we see our cousin even the ones that lived abroad and visited after many years, we feel no attraction lol. Its weird, its like we get a smell from the cousin that automatically turns us off sexually. Can't imagine having sex with someone we don't feel any attraction for.

Every Muslim community is not the same...Thinking about marrying cousins in our Local Assamese muslim culture (Assam) is a sin.. It's a nightmare.. We treat cousins as our real brothers and sisters...

Finally someone is talking about this issue. As a south Indian who grew up in middle east, I find it very weird to see my family chart. Btw, you are putting effort in your videos. May you reach 1M soon and grow beyond that.♥♥

The uncle- niece union/marriage makes me sick in the gut !! For that matter even marrying a cousin is beyond my comprehension.

Muslims mama bhange ya chacha se shadi karna bahut bda paap manta h Muslims aisa kabhi nhi karta

You have given examples and history of this topic based on Kerala and it's premises. But as per the statistics, Kerala has the less no of such marriages compared to other states. In Kerala It used to happen in the past. But it's very very rare nowadays in Kerala.

I am from Tamilnadu. Yes marrying cousins and close relatives is common in South India. In olden days the idea was to keep the property within the family. That is why such marriages were conducted and accepted. Even though it was and is a disaster genetically. As of now it has come down to a great extent in urban areas but in the rural belt it still persists. The biological implications of it for the children born out of such marriages is grave. Education and repeated reinforcement is the only way the society will give up such a practise. Any social change takes years. There will be a lot of resistance too from the conservative elements.

This concept of 'cousin marriages' have always irked me growing up. And it also made talking with cousins a wierd/stereotypical one as against talking with siblings from father's brothers/mother's sisters. You always have a sense that you can't mingle with your cousins freely. Because if you do, society will think that you are interested with them. Even parents think so. Being from South India, I like the North Indian perspective of these marriages and I want to consider my cousin as a sibling and want to mingle with them freely during family unions.

As a South Indian marrying cousin is disgusting

Being from Maharashtra, cousin marriages are very much prevalent here....with even tv serials promoting them ...and like in southern india, even we cant marry same gender sibling's son/daughter but can marry opposite gender's son/daughter...Moreover, even we follow the GOTRA system....

That’s what I thought too that genetics being mixed will lead to genetic disorders. Thanks for covering that. It felt weird when I first started watching South Indians movies and saw that marriage between cousins and I thought i misunderstood something in the movie

Being a Himachali..I never knew about cousin marriages but when I came to know ,I was really shocked cuz my cousins are like real brother's and sisters to me and their parents are like my parents.

Almost all culture follows cousin Marriages not just South india!!

Mohak, what a explanation about this serious issues in Indian society, every side you explain very well. Before, I don't know much more about consanguineous marriage now I totally understand what is. I appreciate your work what you doing for Indian society.

My own father and mother are cousins from the mother side and got married just because my mother had a government job :) and from my childhood I've seen a hell of fights between them that my and my siblings' mental well being is far from okay. I am highly prone to diseases and frequently on meds. I've found this cousins and uncle-niece marriage concept utterly disgusting from what I've experienced. People need to be educated about this and just stop being married for these sick reasons!! Or just stop being married!! There's a lot more in life than marriage, trust me.

Such a great work in research and editing! 🔥

Best RU-vid channel.... thanks Mohak for enrich us.

In Maharashtra, marriage with mama's daughter is very comman since old times. In fact, one of the son in law of Bal gangadhar tilak (freedom fighter) was his own nephew. Also the third chhatrapati Rajaram raje bhonsle were married to Maharani Tarabai, who was the daughter of his mama Hambirrao Mohite. The same way Pradyumna- son of bhagwan krishna married to the daughter of his mama rukmi, as per the bhagwatam. There are so many examples like arjuna- subhadra, krishna-mitravinda, etc.

I am from Kolkata, when I was in class 7-8 my tuition teacher told my mother that her father and her late mother were cousin. We couldn't care less because we knew that in muslim community it is allowed to marry first cousin. However her younger sister whose age was around 17-18 years was deformed and had a brain of 2-3 year old child, she couldn't even walk instead she would slither, she couldn't alarm her sister whenever she wanted to defecate or urinate and she couldn't even speak. I felt sorry for her and always questioned why would god make her like this. But recently few years ago i realised that her condition could have been due to her parents' cousin marriage. I haven't communicated with my teacher since I cleared class 8 and its been more than 10 years. I hope her sister is surviving.

*Once again - Mohak is the Aayushmann Khurrana of RU-vid* ! His topics are just on the next level👏

I saw this type of marriages in many More south Indian movies

Just a small correction sir🙏🏻 title should be "INDIA's southern region..." NOT "south india...." bcuz india haven't bifurcated like north korea.. south korea.

Actually In Our Religion we consider our Siblings or "Rishtedar's children" as our Brothers and Sisters..

I am from Tamil Nadu. I have seen two videos of yours. It's really good and it's not biased. It's a healthy way. Appreciate you

I love your videos. HIGHLY INFORMATIVE.

I am a Bengali Hindu and in our Bengali Hindu society no one can think of marriage between such brothers and sisters, I have been thinking for so long that it is only among Muslims. Cousins ​​are like your sister, so treat them like your own sister

Living in USA and growing up with mostly Telugu family friends, I did finally get to know about this. Kudos to you sir for bringing this topic up!

Cross cousin marriages found in Mahabharatha too ! What’s the problem in it!

I am a South Indian and this practice was always discouraged as our family was educated and also many of them had settled in North for generations ,so no evidence of cousin marriages in our family.

I am a Gujarati married to a Kannadiga. My husband's brother married some sort of cousin (not aware of the exact relation) and when I first realized this, I was shocked. For me, all cousins are brothers, so I didnt understand how this could happen. Slowly I learnt that this is common in South India. My husband's brother has a son now who is 11 years old and my daughter is 6 years old. I can see so many health and a bit of mental issues in my bro in law's (BIL) son. It's sad to see the physical suffering of the child. And there are quite some mentally challenged children in my husband's family. More than the amount you would see otherwise in families. And I have come to realize its due to these cousin marriages. I once spoke to my husband about it, but he just brushed it aside. He was either embarrassed or didnt like what he was hearing. With science so advanced and evidence available that such marriages can and will lead to genetic issues in the progeny, I dont understand why people still follow this tradition? My heart breaks for my nephew who will always suffer health issues due to a mistake made for traditions' sake. And the cherry on top is, while nephew celebrates rakhi with my daughter, he does not with his bua's daughter cause she is a potential bride for him. My mind is just f u c k e d!!!!

My cousin wanted to marry her cousin from her mother's side and a friend of mine married her cousin. Believe me, there were talks. Thankfully, my maternal grandfather was against cousin marriages. Everybody forgets about complications while discussing marriages between cousins even educated folks🤷🏽‍♀️

I am a Malayalee, I was in love with my cousin. In my family there are many people who married their cousins

We Bengalees can’t even think about marrying family.

My parents are first cousins. Because of this, my brother was born with poor eyesight and asthma. It’s wrong to marry your cousin. It leads to many disorders.

Term "inbreeding depression" is often used for the reduced biological and reproductive health of a person who is born of cousin marriage. It is very important to marry out of family as it's necessary for gene variation(evolution).

What ? cousin marriage, I never heard this before,Thinking of cousin marriage is a sin here in Assam,my native land.I am proud to be an Assamese.

In Maharashtra,boy marries maternal uncle's daughter and that is common also shown in most of the Marathi film

I am from Kerala Brahmin community and we consider our paternal and maternal cousins as brothers and sisters. We don't marry our cousins. However, I have seen people who are second cousins getting married in rare occurrences. Or even third cousins. Also, cousin marriages are rare in Kerala nowadays in all the communities due to the more number of educated people.

Hi Mohak, I am a Tamizhan. I want you to know that unlike what is said in this video , Gotra system exists in south India too. It is the gotra system that prevents parallel cousin marriages. If you see parallel cosuins will always have same gotra & cross cousins will belong to different gotras. The same gotra system also prevents a male from marrying his bhathiji wheareas one can marry his bhanji as she would be obviously from a different gotra. Hope i could make it clear to you !!

Arjuna married first cousin Subhadra. Arjuna's son Abhimanyu married to Sashirehka, his first cousin. Is Mahabharata mythology or history?

Main madhyapradesh se hu yha same gotra me shaadi allowed nhi hai cousin marriage to sapne me bhi nhi soch sakte

We can say that consanguineous marriages are common in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, based on the fact that the same term is used for a niece and a daughter-in-law... (Kodalu)

I remember watching a Marathi TV show called 'Home Minister' as a kid. In the show, the host travels across Maharashtra and talks to married couples about their love story and all. Many times the the couple were first cousins, as in the husband was the wife's atte bhau (Bua ka beta in marathi). They also talked about how they liked each other since their teenage, basically they romanticized cousin marriages a lot. I found it really weird. Also, in Marathi serials I've seen some married women calling their mother-in-law as aatya (bua). Maybe I'm watching too much of Zee Marathi with my aaji.

8:28 Muslim me kabhi bhi mama bhanji ke beech nikah nahin hota

Oh you bring us cool stuff i didn't know about this like this type of things even exist 💯

Sweet... Home... South India... 🎵🎶

Cousin marriage is not anything awkward in south but it is starting decline over the years

Kerala hindus used to marry cousins. The boy can call his cousin girl 'murapennu'. That is, she is the one he should marry. In old malayalam movies you can see these type of marriages or the boy running away from this marriage & marrying the girl he like😂. Also in our village there is a family where one man married two siblings. This happened years ago. He is now too old. They do this to keep wealth & properties within the family. Now it has changed. Cousin marriages are rare here.

Mohak, you are an impartial RU-vidr. Appreciate that

As a north indian from Bihar, yes! We have Gotra system . Even people who were moved to Mauritius, Trinidad and Tobago, Suriname and Java by Britishers. They used their first name in next generation surname so cousin marriage can prevent.

In North,(Jharkhand) Marrying any of the relative, even a far relative is considered as a sin or even crime especially in hindus. Relatives will treat you in a very disrespectful way. This is the culture here from 1000 years. Even muslims are following this culture partially. 👍🏼

Even Arjun married her cousin Subhadra, Arjun's mother Kunti and Subhadra's father Vasudev were siblings.

iam from hyderabad even my mother and uncle wants me to marry my uncle's daughter but iam trying to convince my parents that these marriages cause more problems to next generations and there is a marriage of my mama in may and he is marrying his uncle's daughter i have saw a lot of these type of marriages in telangana and andhra pradesh

I m from Kerala , in our State nowadays this type of marriages are very rare .In my family from past three generations as per my knowledge we haven't followed this practice.

One day I asked my father that why we have to tell the priest in the temple about our GOTRA everytime we visit? He said GOTRA is said to be a common relation from a common ancestor and two same GOTRAS should not marry amongst each other as there can be problems among their child. I half heartedly believed that becoz on one side I understood that same blood can cause some problems but was not sure what was the probability of that. Good !

Bro...I am from south India...as you said 20% marriages uncles and niece ka Hota Hai...you are right...is me shaadi mama with bhaanji hi Hota Hai...chacha with batiji nahi Hota...

Odisha me v hota he cousin marraige

You only call your cousins as Brother and sister in Indo-Aryan languages (North Indian), Dravidian languages follow a whole different kinship system where parallel cousins are referred to as brother and sister but cross cousins have special words. Also the our words of Cross-Aunt/Uncle are the same as the words for In-Laws, for example both your mother's brother and your husband's/wife's father is called mama in Telugu. Same for words for your wife's/husband's siblings and your Cross-Cousins. Coming to the weird feeling thing, it is weird to you cause you grew up calling your cousins the same word and your siblings and considered them your siblings, in the same way we are always reminded (from childhood) that our cross cousins can be our potential spouses and also our media also shows a lot of romantic stuff between Cross-Cousins so it's kinda normal for us. If you go ask a Telugu or a Tamil person what they think on marrying their parallel cousins, they'd act the same way you are acting, disgusted even by the thought of it, as we grew up with a feeling that they are our siblings and using the same words we use for our own siblings with them, infact even parallel aunt and uncles are referred with the same word as our parents but with a prefix like big and small, for example parallel uncle who is elder than your father is called pedda-nanna/bapu (big-father) and parallel uncle who is younger than your father is called chinna-nanna/bapu,Babai (small-father)

Here in Maharashtra the most common cousin marriage is with Mama ki beti/ Bua ka beta. I have seen some cases in my relatives and family friends where the child born from such marriage is mentally weak. It is very very rare for me to find any defective child born in a non-cousin marriage

In Tollywood, I've seen a lot of romanticizing of relationships between cousins, to the point of calling a guy "baava" (it means cousin) is considered romantic. In fact, there's a movie where the main male lead starts falling in love with the female lead after she calls him "baava". Honestly, I always found that weird, and thanked my stars that my parents showed zero interest in marrying me to any of my relatives. I'm really glad there's a video about this.

there is also other big advantage in marrying first cousins which you have not mentioned that we know what is the character of a person ,is that person suitable for our daughter .Marrying strangers is big risk for girls that is why most marraiges today are failing.

I am from AP, we do have & follow gotra system as well. Marriage between parllel cousins or first cousins is NO here mostly. Don't know about rest of South India. Marriage between uncle and niece used to happen few years ago, but it has gone down a lot, i mean so much down ( some exception cases if age gap between bride & groom is low ,5 - 7 yrs max ). Marriages between second cousins & cross cousins is still happening. People now a days are exposed & having a lot of awareness, hopefully it dies down.

I'm from bihar. studied at one of south college. although I was shocked to hear that they can marry their cousins, but no more shocked. I talked my friends, and the case is like - if you're a boy - you can marry your father's sister's daughter OR mother's brother's daughter. Similarly for Girls. Fun fact is: in bihar, one of village, my brahmin friend is there, and he said they cant marry any girls of that community from that village for they all are like sisters.

How about Arjuna and subhadra? And i see most of them here in comment section misunderstood the 'cousin' thing. In South it's usually like this: if u are a boy then u can marry ur father's sister's daughter or ur mother's brother's daughter. Like wise for a girl. And we never consider this as a brother -sister relationship. Never ever. Bcoz it's different gotras. And i see most of them are asking how can u marry ur sister or brother. It's a different relationship.

Fr, it's always been cringe when some guy who likes me, insists calling himself as my bava 😭😭😭😭 (uncle in Telugu and am niece) why tf is this taken romantic it's always! been cringe to me being a south Indian myself. Like boy you're no where related to my family either what's with that wild reference. I've always been careful not to be shipped being someone's niece cause it's such a normal reference that it's seen in family movie plots as such a destined story. And they're certain kind of relatives who have this "bava-mardal" in their head all the time that's it's possible. I never liked it! Why is it so possible thing. What is with this uncle niece ref all the time.

I stay in Bangalore and have seen many such examples. When I first came to know that my friend's parents are actually cousins, I was like what!!!! 😱 Then gradually it became normal to me... It was interesting to know about it.

I'm tamilian -it truly happen and what ever he said was right

Family tree in South India is a circle

Hello I am from Kerala, and I want to say I was shocked when my dad said he wanted me to marry my cousin, he said he always thought I would marry her, needless to say I said that I would never marry anyone in my family, but the whole conversation still weirds me out to this day. He had this conversation with me 4 years ago and I am 20.

In Maharashtra Cross cousin marriage is prevalent. Mama's daughter/son and Aatyaa's (Buaa) Daughter/Son can marry.

I’m glad someone spoke about this… But Kerala wasn’t a good example as it has the lowest rates of cousins marriages compared to other southern states… Also marumakathayam was abolished in 1975!

I being muslim have seen so many cousin marriages, actually it's true. Jb bht zyada cousins marriages hoti hai toh it affects child's health

Well I'm not on side of this ritual or against but the truth is...our mind only think and decide on a way, the way we learnt or upto we're aware....bcz the fact is there are many rituals like such of which we're unaware...but we're deciding only by our own mental thoughts but maybe this is satisfied for them... So we should learn something new rather than judging their own adopted concerns...or rituals

This Gotra System of North India seems more logical and science backed. Kudos to our ancestors for always deciding things best for us.