D K. Srilata 3. The romantic relationship leading to 'love marriage', a self-arranged marriage that follows a period of courtship, has come to be regarded as the secular-modern alternative to the family-arranged marriage, or the 'arranged marriage', as it is popularly known. The arranged marriage is understood to be symptomatic of traditional patriarchal structures, in that it removes all freedom of choice and agency from the couples concerned, and women, we are told, are the worst sufferers under this system. Also, since 'arranged' marriages take place only between couples who belong to the same caste and commu- r]\ nity, arranged marriages are coded as non-secular, perceived as reinforcing caste, class, regional, linguistic and religious divides. Romantic relationships leading to a 'love marriage', however, are placed in binary opposition to arranged marriages, and are seen as inhabiting a secular space, a space of freedom, choice and modernity, a space, one might even say, of feminist agency. The discourse of romance and love marriage is enabled by a secular-modern disavowal of factors such as caste and community. 4. Personal Interview with Rebecca Pothan at Madras in August 1996. 5. See Mona Rai (1995). 6. Personal Interview with Rebecca Pothan at Madras in August 1996. 7. Woman's Era's also fashions a lower middle-class modernity through stories which Amita Tyagi and Patricia Uberoi aptly describe as 'post marital romances' or 'romance after marriage' stories {Manushi, 61). These stories begin by describing the problems a married couple face in their relationship. After the occurrence of some dramatic event or through the efforts of a mediator, the couple is happily reconciled and back to 'being in love'. As I have already pointed out. Woman's Era treats romantic love outside of marriage as morally suspect, as something that is not part of Good Tradition. Post-marital romance stories work by surrounding a pre-existing relationship of marriage (often family-arranged and therefore between people who belong to the same caste, class and community) with the halo of a romance, achieved towards the end of the narrative after some difficulty. The element of romance then lends a touch of modernity to the stories. However, this does not disturb the sign of Good Indianness, which, in this case, is marriage. A call to readers (specifically, parents of young men and women) inviting them to place advertisements in its matrimonial columns as well as in those of its counterpart in Hindi, Santa, perhaps best epitomizes the Woman's Era style Indian modernity: Searching for brides and grooms? The traditional priest and the family barber have become out of date and a thing of the past. Matrimonial columns in Woman's Era and Sarita provide you with an opportunity to establish contacts all over the country for brides and grooms for your sons and daughters and other relatives. Being essentially upper class magazines, Sarita and Woman's Era are widely circulated all over India among the intellectual and affluent classes... {Woman's Era 1992, p. 67). In coding the 'traditional priest' and the 'family barber' (both caste-specific occupations) as 'out of date and a thing of the past'. Woman's Era represents caste as non-modern. It proceeds then to replace caste with class; the message of the advertisement is that class rather than caste is the category that should concern one in arranging a marriage. As proof of its fitness for the task of a marriage broker. Woman's Era describes itself as an 'upper class' magazine. 8. This is also used, though in a much more dramatic fashion by Femina's other rival. Savvy which regularly features the 'Savvy woman of the month'. In fact, this strategy of presenting us with 'superwomen' is what gives Savvy its defining identity. Numbers 32-33