What is character- loyalty to a person or a relationship?

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What according to you is character, when it comes to love, marriage and a relationship? Loyalty, I guess, is the prime factor which many of us would attribute to when it comes to sincerity in a relationship. Here’s a real life situation which might just get you thinking about loyalty, sincerity and the entire moral standings on which marriages are based.
Rimjhim, now a 32 year-old woman in her second marriage, was married to Saurav, a few years ago. The couple loved each other dearly, but they were not destined to stay together. As in many marital homes, she was forced by her in-laws to take divorce as she was diagnosed to be infertile. Though her husband loved her, his mother’s threats to kill herself if she did not see a male heir to her property in her lifetime, compelled him to agree for the divorce.
Rimjhim, consented and moved out of the family. As she was a young and pretty woman, it was not long before a gentleman discovered her and approached her family with a marriage proposal for her. Unlike, so many women who would take advantage of such opportunities, Rimjhim was traumatized by the proposal. How could she forget the one man whom she learned to love so dearly in her marriage? The very thought of forgetting her husband from her annulled marriage and starting life with a new man brought intense distress to her, especially when she felt that her husband was reluctant to let her go out of his life, but was compelled to. Rimjhim sought support from her near and dear ones, but except for a few close cousins, all relatives, including her parents blamed her for not contemplating the prospects of a new life with Rakesh- the gentleman who came with the proposal. They also went to the extent of making her feel guilty for still loving her ex-husband intensely, as though he was an outsider now and it was being “ characterless” on her part to think of anyone else than the new person waiting to come into her life. Rimjhim was shocked and extremely hurt to realize that the very persons who taught her to love and respect her husband as though he was the sole “God” in her life, are now regarding her unaltered love and affection for him as adultery !
Being the simple Indian girl that she was, Rimjhim succumbed to the pressure of re-marriage and got married to Rakesh and forced herself to adapt to the new husband and environment. She tried to be sincere to the best of her abilities, but as responsibility cannot make one love a person, try as much as she would, she could not make herself fall in love with Rakesh, which he could not take. Even the very mention of her ex-husband’s name made him accuse her of “characterlessness” …
Now I leave the story there friends and ask you what is character- is it loyalty to a person or a relationship? Do you think human emotions should be controlled by a “switch-on” and “switch-off” process dependent on social circumstances?
Lastly, you might say, Rimjhim should ideally forget Saurav as he was not strong enough to hold on to the marriage. But is there a hard and fast rule that one should only love a person when he is able to take her responsibilities?

Image courtesy: ABC News

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