India is to host a six-day wedding next month which is set to make the Royal nuptials seem rather modest.
Two of the country’s most prominent families will hold the special event in the town of Safai, Uttar Pradesh – the attendance of which could fill London’s O2 arena five times over.
The guest list is also likely to read like a who’s who of Indian business, politics, religion and Bollywood.
Prateek Yadav, 23, and Aparna Bisht, 21 will tie the knot in lavish style. The wedding, which opens on 2 December and concludes with a reception in Lucknow for 1,500 people on the 7th, has taken six months to prepare.
The actual ceremony will fall on the third day, when numbers will swell to 100,000. Food will be distributed, and the local streets are to be flooded with music and dancing.
Prateek’s father, is the distinguished head of the Samajwadi (Socialist) Party, three times Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh (India’s most populous region with 200 million citizens), an ex-Defence Minister of India and a political hero to millions around the country.
Aparna’s father, Arvind Singh Bisht, is the editor of the Lucknow branch of The Times of India in Uttar Pradesh.
The couple have been friends for eight years, romantically making them high-school sweethearts.