During Indian weddings, Sehra is the most common traditional headdress wore by the groom. It commonly involves festoons hanging covering the groom’s face. Wearing a Sehra adds illustrious quality to the man’s general look and it likewise includes a component of mystery to the man’s face as it is hidden just like the lady’s face. Moreover, Sehra actually protects the groom from evil eye as he is at the center of attraction on the wedding day.
With time, Sehra has changed a lot regarding to their shapes, sizes and styles. Nowadays, grooms tend to wear a “Pagdi” instead of Sehra as pagdi doesn’t have festoons hanging with it. But Shehra is wore specifically to veil the groom’s face throughout the wedding.
“Sehra” truly implies a lyric sung amid a “nikah” or the Islamic wedding. Among Muslims, the sehra has been disparaged and soaked up in the Islamic culture since the Mughal time where emperors wore expensive headgears encrusted with valuable pearls and stones amid their weddings.
In Hindu culture, it can be seen widely in North India where white bloom strings are fixed to the turban or Pagdi and suspended to cover the groom’s face, same as the “Ghoonghat” or cloak.
For the Sikh grooms, this convention goes back to the periods of Guru Govind Singh who added bloom strands to the Pagdi or turban which included a component of pride and glory.
Today, it has been an essential part of the groom’s clothing. In any kind of marriage and in any part of India, Sehra is a must.