Yes to divorce, but also to arranged marriages.

Yes to divorce, but also to arranged marriages. Yes to living in, but also to joint families. Young Indians, across big cities and small towns, want managed modernity and tradition with a twist. Dilip Bobb writes in India Today about about the changing social mores among youth.

In India, this generation, 700-million strong, is poised at a defining moment in the country's history. The dramatic changes in the economy, the market place, in job opportunities and lifestyle choices, their access to enabling technology and the affluence that they currently enjoy make them the most privileged and prosperous generation India has ever known. They are also the most potentially decisive in terms of shaping a new India and ensuring its place in the world.

The most dramatic change witnessed between this survey and the one conducted in 2004 is the attitude towards traditional social taboos like divorce. An astonishing 71 per cent now feel that getting divorced is a better option than staying in a bad marriage. The surprise element was that the region most heavily in favour of leaving a bad marriage was the traditionally conservative east. Even more revealing was the fact that among youth in non-metro towns like Ludhiana, Kochi, Lucknow and even Patna, the support for divorce as an option was over 60 per cent. Small town youth are clearly more progressive than is popularly believed.