Fascinating India - 5

Man 'marries' dog to beat curse

An Indian man has "married" a female dog, hoping the move will help atone for stoning two other dogs to death.

P Selvakumar, 33, said he had been cursed since the killings, suffering paralysis and a loss of hearing.

The wedding took place at a Hindu temple in Tamil Nadu state. The "bride" wore an orange sari with a flower garland and was fed a bun to celebrate.

Superstitious people in rural India sometimes organise weddings to animals in the hope of warding off curses.

Crowds cheered the newly-weds at the end of the ceremony in Sivaganga district, about 50km (30 miles) east of the city of Madurai.

The "bride", who is called Selvi, was led to the temple in Manamudurai wearing a sari before vows were exchanged in a traditional Hindu ceremony.


Read the full story on BBC here.

Fascinating India - 4

Never thought I would find two interesting posts for a day!

Excuse me, but there's a Boeing 737 stuck in the middle of the road

Residents of the Indian city of Mumbai (Bombay) are wondering how long it will take to remove a disused Boeing 737 that has been abandoned in a busy road. The decommissioned aircraft was being driven through the city at the weekend when the driver got lost and then abandoned the plane. The Boeing used to belong to the private company Air Sahara.

Some locals are angry that no action is being taken to move the plane. Others say it is a tourist attraction. It appears that after taking a wrong turn, the driver found himself facing a flyover that was too low for him to take the plane under. The driver has not been seen since and no-one is assuming responsibility for the 737.

Read the full story on BBC here.

Fascinating India - 3

Brother, can you spare a bride?

Villagers at a wedding in eastern India decided the groom had arrived too drunk to get married, and so the bride married the groom's more sober brother instead, police said Monday.

"The groom was drunk and had reportedly misbehaved with guests when the bride's family and local villagers chased him away," Madho Singh, a senior police officer told Reuters after Sunday's marriage in village in Bihar state's Arwal district.

Read the full story here.

Fascinating India - 2

Here is the second in the series on 'Fascinating India'.

Killing spree over electricity lines

Fifteen years and 19 murders later, electricity still eludes two villages in the lawless Indian state of Bihar.

People in Koyli and Khutaha in power-scarce Bhagalpur district have been killing each other since 1991 in a bloody war to light up their villages.

In a state where only 10% of the homes have electricity and per capita consumption is a mere 60kwh compared to the Indian average of 354kwh, electricity remains elusive for most people.

The killing spree over power in the two villages began in 1991 when district electricity officials set up a pair of cement electric poles along with a transformer in Koyli.

It was the first time since independence in 1947 that the authorities had woken up to the need of providing electricity to the area.

Incensed villagers in neighbouring Khutaha uprooted the poles and carried them away to their village at night thinking that the move would help them in getting electricity faster.

When the Koyli villagers discovered, they attacked their neighbours.

Read the full story on BBC here.