It started with a quiet ceremony at a Tuscan-style resort and turned into a full-blown trend: India's biggest celebrities have made destination weddings the country's most glamorous export. Cricketer Virat Kohli and actor Anushka Sharma married at Borgo Finocchieto in Italy in December 2017 — a venue reportedly the world's second most expensive — and by November 2018, actors Ranveer Singh and Deepika Padukone were marrying at Lake Como. Even Isha Ambani's engagement, held at the resorts of Il Sereno and Villa Pliniana on the same lake, made headlines after celebrity guests posted the location on social media.
The numbers behind the sparkle are striking. A 2017 study by MRSS India and FICCI valued India's wedding sector at ₹110,000 crore, with destination weddings accounting for ₹23,438 crore — a figure projected to nearly double to ₹45,000 crore by 2020. A typical destination wedding runs between ₹1 and ₹6 crore once flights, food, décor and venues are counted; add bespoke couture and jewellery and the bill for some families can cross ₹40 crore.
The map of favoured destinations has shifted over the years. It began with Goa and Rajasthan, then business families moved to Thailand for the value, and today Mauritius, Sri Lanka, Indonesia and Oman are all courting Indian wedding business. The Persian Gulf is a real growth area: Abu Dhabi and Oman have long hosted affluent families, and Qatar and Bahrain now offer wedding packages too. Meanwhile rumours pointed to Jodhpur as the setting for Priyanka Chopra and Nick Jonas's December wedding, after her bachelorette festivities in New York and Amsterdam.
Planners say the format is changing too. Bridesmaids and bachelorette getaways — rare in India just five years ago — are now standard, and couples increasingly restage their proposals in photogenic spots. Many families still fly in their own cooks and photographers to keep rituals and food authentic; others find international destinations now have Indian wedding planners based locally. And some celebrations double as cultural showcases — one Chennai wedding organised by travel agency DMC Leisure asked women guests to wear Kanjeevaram saris and gave everything from the henna night to the menu a distinctly Tamil flavour.
Why should a traveller care? Even if you're never on the guest list, the trend tells you which hotels and resorts have invested heavily in large-scale Indian celebrations — from Lake Como villas to Gulf resorts — which often means better vegetarian catering, longer-lead booking systems and event infrastructure at places you might want to visit anyway. And the planners' tips apply to any big group trip abroad: lock in invitations six months ahead so guests can sort visas, keep everyone updated through a shared website, split ceremonies between a local and an overseas venue if the list is long, and consider travelling in a resort's off-season when lodging and airfare drop sharply. That last one is just good travel advice at any budget.
