In the last three to four years, Indian weddings have not only been exported to venues conventionally preferred by couples in the West, like beaches, mountains and jungle resorts but also unusual ones like Formula One tracks. These weddings are multi-crore events.

Recently, the CEO of a luxury company, celebrated his wedding in the Casino Square, popular among Grand Prix fans for being the best spot in Monaco to drown in the adrenaline-boosting, collective roar of Formula One racing cars.Riding a white mare, the Indian groom, led a procession of guests, backed up by two elephants, all making their way to a five-star hotel in Monaco for a Rs 44 crore Indian wedding.

Monaco may have not seen anything quite like that, but there are quite a few destinations across the globe where Indian weddings are not a rare sight.

However, it continues to be a very niche segment. That is probably the only reason why foreign tourism bodies that are otherwise meticulous in data collection have not yet culled statistics to monitor the growth of the Indian wedding market. But there is enough anecdotal evidence that suggests that the past few years have seen a rise in Indian weddings made in foreign locales.

Last week, tourism officials from Mauritius flew into Mumbai with itineraries that included meetings scheduled with wedding planners. "In the last three years, at least 13 to 14 big Indian weddings with 200-1,200 guests have been held in Mauritius,'' said Micheal Yeung Sik Yuen, Mauritius's tourism minister. Though there are flights between India and Mauritius, Air Mauritius operated about five charter aircraft during these years to ferry the wedding guests. Though Mauritius does not attract as many Indian tourists, it has turned into a favourite wedding destination for the desis. So much so that last year, a special committee was formed by Mauritius to exclusively handle the wedding segment.

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