Dr V.R. Anil Kumar is a graduate engineer and a businessman who set up and ran a small-scale industry dealing with the design, manufacture, supply and installation of Air Pollution Control systems and components in Chennai from 1970 to 2003. Getting interested in the origin of Hindu marriage rituals triggered by the questions of the parents of his American daughter-in-law, Dr Anil Kumar obtained a MA (Sanskrit) degree from the University of Madras in 2005. Having registered for a Ph.D. in 2006, he was conferred the doctorate in 2012 after five years of research and presentation of the dissertation entitled “Comparative Study of Vivaha Samskara in the Grhya-Sutras of the Four Vedas” in 2011.