Demonetisation plays spoilsport for brides- and grooms-to-be

It is her wedding in a week from now, but the bride to be, Shruti Singh, 29, could not collect her lehenga on Tuesday, as the store in north Delhi's Kamla Nagar refused to take cash. Singh negotiated with them, as she had to try on the wedding lehenga at her salon, but no luck. She had to return home without her wedding dress. Singh will now have to take the chance of waiting till the day of her wedding for the dress.

"Its my wedding and I don't have a wedding dress!," said the bride to be. "Jitters is not a strong enough word for how I feel right now. What if I don't find my perfect dress in time? What if it doesn't fit? What if it needs last minute fixing, I am scared it will not be done in time for my perfect day. This is nightmarish, and I cannot even think about how I am going to work things out," said Singh.

The step taken by the government to rein in black money is good, but it has made life difficult for common people, said Singh.

The ban on old high-denominations of currency notes that came into effect from Tuesday evening has hit the middle-class, but it was even worse for those tying the knot during this winter's wedding season, in particular, between November-December.

It has hit both buyers and shopkeepers in markets including north Delhi's Kamla Nagar and south Delhi's Lajpat Nagar and south Extension, among others, which are known for wedding shopping.

These places, which during this season are packed to capacity with traffic snarls and not even an inch to set one's foot, on Wednesday had deserted streets.

"We cant help the situation, as we too are suffering losses. Today business was reduced to only 15-20% of the usual weekday. Customers asked us to accept Rs 500 notes, but we had to refuse them if their bill amount was lesser," said, Ramesh Chandra, who owns a cosmetics store at Lajpat Nagar.

However, shoppers disagree and have another version on how the shop-owners are using the situation to their advantage.

"I had bought toiletries for Rs1,700, but the store people asked me to buy more stuff to make it a complete 2,000 so that they did not have to tender change. They are playing wicked and harassing customers at a time like this," said Rajat Dhimani, a resident of Bungalow Road in north Delhi.

This is not all, people plan to skip destination weddings, as they cannot move their finances at all.

"I plan to skip my cousin's wedding in Rishikesh by the river in the coming week, as we had planned to hire a cab for the destination wedding. But I dont think all of us would be able to go now. The cab company does not accept cheques or has debit/credit machines. I believe only my parents would now take a train and go. The government's decision has played a spoilsport for this weeding season," said, Kartikeya Mittal of Karol Bagh.