Despite being illegal since 1961, the tradition of paying dowry’s, both financial and material, to the groom’s family is still alive in well in the country of India.

It may sound romantic to some, after all, dowries were once meant to assist the new husband in making sure that his wife is taken care of.  But in 2010, India’s National Crime Records Bureau cited an alarming 8,391 dowry-related deaths.  It seems the tradition has turned ugly and husbands are now demanding dowries well after the ceremony is over.  When families don’t comply, brides may end up tortured or even worse, murdered.

Thankfully, a new online game called Angry Brides hopes to shed light on the problem of dowries and inform the world of the increasing number of crimes against women living in India.  It’s a play on the popular game Angry Birds and in order to play the user (Bride) has to strike the dodging grooms.  Each groom (there are 3 – an engineer, doctor, and pilot) starts of at a dowry value of 1.5 million rupees (~30,000 USD). Each hit decreases the total cost of the groom’s dowry and credits money back to her Anti-Dowry fund.

The game is available as a free Facebook application and can be downloaded at app.facebook.com/angrybrides.

Photo credits: facebook.com/angrybrides