In India, a gift for inter-caste couples-Officials hope to help erode the rigid social hierarchy by rewarding those who break taboos to marry 'down.'

Plenty of women may feel they deserve an award for marrying their husbands, but Madhavi Arwar is actually getting one -- from the Indian government, no less.

 Not that her husband, Chandrashekhar, is a bad sort. In fact, he's a good-looking guy, holds a steady job at an insurance company and dotes on their apple-cheeked son.

But he is also a Dalit, or an "untouchable," the lowest of the low under India's ancient caste system. Madhavi is not a Dalit, and for marrying "down" the social ladder, she is entitled to $250 in cash, plus a certificate of appreciation.

"I was a bit amazed that even for a thing like marriage, they were giving money," Madhavi, 33, said as she sat in her living room here in central India.

The windfall is part of the government's campaign to chop away at the barriers of caste, the complex hierarchy wherein a person's place in society is determined purely by birth.

As India struggles to modernize and transform itself into an important world player economically, officials know they need to erase these age-old divisions and expand opportunities for social mobility for all the country's 1.1 billion people, including the majority who have historically been considered low-caste and oppressed.

Mandatory quotas in education and public-sector jobs have been in place for years. Now private companies, the engine of India's rapid economic growth, are also looking to train and hire more employees from lower-caste backgrounds.

The integration efforts have enjoyed some success, especially in booming cities such as New Delhi and Mumbai, where caste distinctions are somewhat blurred. High-caste Brahmins sit next to Dalits on packed public buses. Upper-caste Indians, who in the countryside might refuse to draw water from the same well as lower castes and "untouchables" for fear of "spiritual contamination," are served by low-caste waiters in chic new restaurants. Dalits occupy some of the highest positions in the Indian government.

Last holdout

But one institution has proved stubbornly resistant to change: marriage.

Scan the matrimonial ads in any Sunday newspaper, and the importance of caste quickly becomes apparent. In a country where the vast majority of marriages are arranged, parents seeking spouses for their children tout their eligible "Agarwal," "Khatri," "Gupta," "Gujjar" or "Jat" sons and daughters, all names of castes or of communities whose caste affiliation is immediately understood.