Indian villagers build road to try to get married

More than 100 unmarried villagers in India's Bihar state are working flat out to build a 6km (3.7-mile) road to help their efforts to get married.

The village of Barwaan Kala, in the west of Bihar, is located high in the Kaimur hills and is known locally as the "village of unmarried people".

Some 121 villagers aged between 16 and 80 remain bachelors, they say, because of the remoteness of the village. The last wedding in the village was reportedly 50 years ago.



"Even those who have managed to get married have done it surreptitiously by taking temporary shelter in the less remote villages of their relatives," Ram Chand Kharwar, a 50-year-old bachelor, said.

Apart from the inaccessibility of Barwaan Kala, outsiders are also fearful of Maoist militants who operate in the area. Amenities are in short supply - of the six village hand water pumps none is working and a government school has no teacher. The nearest police station and hospital are both 45km (28 miles) away.

Without development, many families refuse to agree to marry off their daughters to prospective husbands from the area.

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