Marriages: Made in heaven, celeberated in India

So much is said about Fat Indian Weddings. One more wedding of mine to add. I got married on 25th of Nov 2007 and as usual, a lot of money was spend on decoration, tents, travel, catering. I keep on asking this question to myself..cant we do away with such a huge investment? Is it really a necessity to do so much or just a way of flaunting your economic status. Richer you are, more you spend.
Though it was a love-cum-arrange marriage, with so many Egos' crushed and crumbled, still the money spent on all the proceedings from my side and her side was huge enough to support a middle class family for 1 to 2 years with their monthly needs. I am not talking about expenses on cloths or ornaments or honeymoon as they are with you, but the expenses related to Band, Decorated Car, Grand reception of wedding, lights, camera person etc.
With camera person, I want to ask you people reading this, is there any spring in market which fits in your jaw and you always keep on smiling so that camera person can click your picture for infinite number of times. They say that its one time effort for life long memories, but with advent of these digital cameras where there are no limits for taking picture, especially wedding photographers irritate you so much that if you run all the still images taken by them, you will see a running movie.
What I like about our Desi weddings is the family ties which comes to surface. Though our lives becoming so fast we have very less time, but still our generation and last generation is trying to retain the traditions. Probably the kind of fun whole extended family does at a single place is only the marriages and few days before/after that. In my wedding I saw my mama jee dancing with us, whom we always saw in serious mood.
Obviously, a change cant be done by a single individual due to social fabric of India where each of us looks towards other and peer pressure is huge. The efforts like Delhi Sikh Committee banning night weddings and extravagent weddings are surely welcome. Unfortunately Hindus don't have a single body making social laws so some civil law from Govt might help in curbing such un-wanted and un-necessary expenses.