Are Big Fat Indian weddings waste of money?

I completely agree. Huge weddings are a colossal and unforgivable waste of money. 

People waste food. The decorations are not environmentally friendly. Most of the people called are there either for formality or because they love to criticize other people.

At such big weddings, many people drink too much and die of strokes or heart attacks - just like my family friend who passed away on the 10th of this month.

I believe that only very close relatives and friends should be called. They are the real society of the couple anyway. The rest can look at the wedding pictures on Facebook. 

All this is because of the Indian mentality of "taking" a party from the people (family) who is enjoying. And further, people say that the more successful you are, the more you have to spend on these kinds of occasions so that all those who have the "evil eye" will be better disposed toward them.

This proves that a lot of Indians have the "evil eye" for other people. That is why every person is scared about the other person's "evil eye". :) :) :)

Yes, they are. Of course marriage party is a sense of celebration. But, it is more importantly a glorified and emotionally admired conjunction of two people and their views. Whatever celebration that happen during this time should be apprehending the wishes that the couple expect from others. Its not about showing off your wealthiness. If the same spending is used in some other productive way, it may become a morale to everyone to follow. The focus has to be on esteeming & securing lives of the couple after marriage, not only glorifying the day of wedding.

Ms. Sanjana, your views are rigid but to the point.

It is shear wastage of money, but marriage is the thing which happens only once in the life of almost all Indians.

So everybody want to make it large & ready to spend so much money on clothes & ornaments & food for just a day or two.

But what can we do?

It is an individual's choice to go for it.& different from person to person.

With due respect to all,wedding are celebrated based on their status symbol that also gives out their social status in terms of money and power. Of course! even in olden days kings did celebrate that way. There is some logic of celebrating as the comminity wants it or one can see it prevalent in many countries too. In the perspective of a middle income or even a higher income group spending like what one cannot afford but just to show off is wrong. People have money to spend it. its all  their hard earned money. they have all rights to spend it in the way they want it. non of them either will give a portion of it to any of their relatives nor to us or a common man. One should not spend money just because one has to show off. Thats wrong and that amounts to waste of money. regards