Sunita & Rakesh, 25 Years

Sunita and Rakesh married in Pauri in March 2000, and their children — a daughter in Bengaluru and a son in Toronto — wanted to mark twenty-five years with an evening their parents would never plan for themselves. Neither child could reach Dehradun until three days before the event, so almost everything was planned over video calls, while Sunita and Rakesh were told only that there would be a small family dinner at a garden venue near home.

Our first job was collecting the story. We gathered photographs from eleven relatives, digitised the original wedding album and invitation card, and recorded video messages from family in four countries. The theme came from the season: buransh, the red rhododendron that blooms across the Garhwal hills in March, paired with silver. The family pandit from Pauri, who had performed their wedding, agreed to travel down to lead a short renewal of vows.

The evening opened with a memory wall of 250 photographs arranged by year. After the vow renewal, their son and daughter spoke, the video played, and a ghazal singer performed the song from their wedding cassette. The dinner menu recreated the original wedding feast in Pauri, down to the jhangora kheer.