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Questions to Ask Before Getting Engaged: A Guide for NRI Couples

In many Indian families, an engagement moves quickly once it is announced. Dates are fixed, venues are discussed, guest lists grow, and both families start making plans. In all that momentum, the conversations that should have come first are easy to skip.

For NRI couples there are extra layers: two countries, sometimes three, visas, and two sets of family expectations that may be thousands of miles apart.

This is not a test to pass. Very few couples agree on everything. The point is to find out what you each want, and how well the two of you make decisions together when you do not agree.

How to have these conversations

Spread them over a few weeks rather than attempting everything in one evening. Pick one area at a time, when you are both relaxed and not in the middle of planning anything.

For the big topics, it can help to write your answers separately first and then compare. People are often more honest on paper, and positions harden less.

Listen for two things: what your partner wants, and how they respond when you want something different. The second matters as much as the first.

Where you will live

• Which country and city do you see as home for the next ten years?
• Is moving back to India ever on the table? If so, roughly when, and what would make it happen?
• If one of you is offered a great job somewhere else, how will you decide?
• What do your visa or residency situations make possible, and what do they rule out?

Immigration rules are complicated and change often, so get professional advice on anything you are planning around. Our guide to moving countries for a relationship covers the practical side in detail.

Money

Money is one of the most common sources of conflict in any marriage, and NRI couples often have more moving parts than most.

• What does each of you earn, save and owe, education loans included?
• Will you combine finances, keep them separate, or do some of each?
• Do either of you support parents or siblings, now or in future? How much, and how will that work once you share a household?
• Do either of you own property in India, or expect to inherit or manage it?
• How do you each feel about spending, saving and debt?
• Who will manage everyday finances, and how open will you be with each other?

One more point, because it still comes up: if either family expects dowry or large gifts from the other, talk about it openly and early. Dowry is illegal in India, and a demand for it is a serious warning sign about how a family sees the marriage.

Families

• How involved do you each expect your parents to be in your married life?
• Would either of you want parents to live with you, now or as they age?
• When parents visit from India, how long do they usually stay, and how will that work in your home?
• How will you share festivals, holidays and trips home between two families?
• If there is a disagreement with a parent, how will you handle it together?

For many NRI couples, the question of ageing parents is the single biggest structural issue in the marriage. It is far easier to talk about now than in a crisis. Our post on meeting their parents for the first time covers the earlier stage of building these relationships.

Children

• Do you both want children? If so, roughly when, and how many?
• How do you feel about fertility treatment or adoption if it comes to that?
• Which languages would you want your children to speak?
• How will religion and festivals feature in their lives?
• Where would you want them to go to school, and how much time would you want them to spend in India?
• Who will look after them day to day? Would grandparents be involved, and would that mean them moving in for long stretches?

Whether to have children is one of the few questions with no real middle ground. If you disagree on it, take that seriously now.

Careers and life at home

• Whose career takes priority, and does that change over time?
• How do you both feel about one partner staying at home, for a period or for good?
• How will you split housework, cooking and the invisible admin of a household?
• What does a good ordinary week look like for each of you?

Assumptions about roles at home are often formed early and by example, and they can surprise both partners. Saying them out loud now is much easier than discovering them after the wedding.

Faith, values and traditions

• How do you each practise your religion, if at all, and how do you want that to look in your home?
• Which traditions matter most to you, and which are you happy to let go?
• What kind of wedding ceremony do you each want?

If you come from different faiths or communities, our guide to interfaith and inter-caste relationships covers these conversations in more depth.

Health and history

• Is there anything about your physical or mental health your partner should know?
• What did you learn from past relationships, including a previous marriage if there was one?
• If either of you has children from a previous relationship, how will family life work for them?

These conversations need trust and care. They are also the ones people most often regret not having. If either of you has been married before, our guide to dating again after divorce covers some of what is worth discussing.

How you handle disagreement

• When you disagree, what does each of you need: time to think, or to talk it through straight away?
• How do you each apologise, and how do you know an argument is over?
• What do you share with family and friends about problems between you, and what stays private?

You will learn more from how you handle a real disagreement during these conversations than from any answer on this list.

The wedding itself

• Where will you marry: in India, abroad, or both?
• How big a wedding do you each want, and who pays for what?
• Whose guest list wins when they collide?

Wedding planning is often the first big joint decision a couple makes with both families involved. Treat it as a preview of how those decisions will go for the next thirty years.

Signs to take seriously

Very few answers are dealbreakers on their own. Patterns are more telling:

• Refusing to discuss a topic at all, rather than disagreeing about it
• “We’ll figure it out” as the answer to everything
• Deferring every decision to their parents
• Secrecy about money or debts
• Pressure to get engaged before you have talked any of this through

The short version

Before you get engaged, talk through where you will live, how money will work, what each family expects, whether and how you will raise children, how you will share work at home, and what your faith and traditions mean to you. Spread the conversations out, write down your answers to the big ones, and pay as much attention to how you disagree as to what you agree on.

Couples who have these conversations are not more certain than everyone else. They just know what they are agreeing to.

If you are still at the earlier stage of finding the right person, NRI Meet is free on iOS and Android and connects Indian and NRI singles who are looking for something long term.

Frequently asked questions

When should couples talk about these questions?

Before the engagement, ideally over several conversations spread across a few weeks. Once a date is fixed and families are involved, it becomes much harder to raise anything that might slow things down.

What if we disagree on something important?

Disagreement is normal. What matters is whether you can reach an answer you both genuinely accept. A few topics, such as whether to have children and which country to live in, rarely have a comfortable middle ground, and it is better to know that now.

Should parents be part of these conversations?

Talk them through as a couple first, then decide together what to share. Families often have strong views on living arrangements, weddings and money, and you are in a much stronger position if the two of you already agree.

Is premarital counselling common among Indian couples?

It is becoming more common, particularly among couples abroad. A few sessions with a counsellor, or a structured programme through a religious community, can make difficult topics easier to raise. It is not a sign that something is wrong. It is a structured way to have conversations you would want to have anyway.