Couples rush to cast their votes, then get hitched

On the biggest day of their life, several newlyweds dropped in at polling stations to cast their vote which they felt was no less important than their wedding day. They also posed for some rare set of wedding day pictures outside booths. A couple from Belagavi even missed their muhurtha.

When Viola Fernandes rushed to the St Lawrence English Medium School at Bondel in Mangaluru, she grabbed everyone’s attention. She had turned up at the polling station in her white gown en route to Belthangady, about 60km from Mangaluru, where she was to marry Sylvester Rodrigues.

“Our families debated the issue when we were deciding on a wedding date. We decided to go ahead with May 12 with a resolution that we will vote in the morning before getting married,” said Viola, who was all excited about voting on her D-Day.


“It is a memorable moment,” she gushed.

Yatin Vijay Hande and Manini Vijay Tahsildar’s muhurtha was at 12.35pm. After the haldi celebrations which went on till the wee hours of Saturday, the young couple dashed to their respective polling booths around 11am. While the bride’s constituency was Belagavi North, the groom’s was Belagavi South. As they hurried between their stations in a hired car, they missed the muhurtha. “It is the right given to us by our Constitution and we wanted to exercise it. We had decided we would vote. We missed the muhurtha and got married half hour an late,” they said.

In booth No. 131in Kandanakolli in Madikeri, Imaniyanda Smitha in all her bridal finery was one of the first to line up to cast her vote. She arrived at 7am, got inked and left in a vehicle to the marriage hall. In Dharwad, Mallikarjun Gamangatti, Nikhita and Arpita Adavadagi too cast their votes before heading for their wedding. However, Arpita’s fiancé was unable to vote.