I came across what I found to be a fascinating programme on TV last Thursday, ARRANGE ME A MARRIAGE on BBC2 at 8pm.
The programme featured a single career woman Lexi Proud, a 33-year-old director of a private aviation firm who was brave enough to put herself in the hands of matchmaker Aneela Rahman to help find her a mate using traditional Asian methods. On TV!
Lexi, born in rural Northumberland, drafted in close friends and family, who had just four weeks to network on her behalf and find the up-till-now elusive potential suitor. Supervising all this is Aneela – the 39-year-old bold, no-nonsense, Glasgow-born Asian woman – who claims to be living proof that arranged marriages work.
Aneela, whose own 15-year-old happy marriage was arranged, is in little doubt as to why many singletons fail to meet their right future spouse. According to her, "Lots of people in Britain hook up in a bar or a club, but you wouldn't buy a house or car drunk, so why would you expect to find a life partner that way?"
"Then people wake up 20 years later and wonder why they haven't found someone to settle down with."
The former businesswoman has a simple solution, using some of the principles of a modern Asian arranged marriage. At the centre of Aneela’s technique is making sure the pair are matched by class, education, family background, life goals and earnings, not just chemistry.
This programme has been dubbed ‘The Blind Date for the new millennium’.
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