Height, Complexion and Weight in a Marriage Biodata: What to Write

Height: write it in feet and inches, the way people say it out loud: 5'4" or 5 ft 4 in. Add centimetres in brackets if you like, as in 5 ft 4 in (163 cm). Write your real height, not a rounded-up one.

Complexion: in a biodata, it means the natural colour of your skin, and the row asks you to sum it up in one word, such as dusky, fair or wheatish. You don't have to fill it in. Your photo already shows it, so you can delete the row. If an elder or your family's format insists on keeping it, write the word you'd use about yourself.

Weight: optional, and plenty of biodatas leave it out. If you include it, write your current weight in kilograms: 58 kg.

How to write height in a biodata

Feet and inches is what most families use, so start there. Either of these is fine:

• 5'4"
• 5 ft 4 in

Centimetres in brackets, 5 ft 4 in (163 cm), help anyone who thinks in centimetres. Centimetres alone is fine too, if that's what the people reading it use.

Three things that save a correction later:

• Write your real height. If you're 5'5", write 5'5". An inch added on paper is gone the first time you stand next to someone. If you're between two inches, write the half (5'5½") or the lower figure.
• Measure it if you're not sure. If the number in your head is from years ago, or was measured in shoes, measure again: barefoot, back against a wall.
• Don't write 5.4 for 5 feet 4 inches. A foot has twelve inches, not ten, so 5.4 feet is really 5 ft 4.8 in. Many readers will guess what you meant, but anyone converting it to centimetres gets the wrong number, and 5.10 looks like 5.1. Use the foot and inch marks, or ft and in.

Feet and inches to centimetres

One inch is 2.54 cm. Rounded to the nearest centimetre:

For a half inch, or a height outside the table, turn it into inches and multiply by 2.54. 5'5½" is 65.5 inches, and 65.5 × 2.54 is 166.37, so 166 cm.

What complexion means in a biodata

Complexion is the natural colour of your skin, mostly the face. On a biodata the row asks for one word to describe it.

The words you'll see, in alphabetical order:

• Dark: deep brown skin.
• Dusky: brown to deep brown skin.
• Fair: light skin.
• Wheatish: Indian English for light-brown skin, the colour of wheat.

Complexion meaning in Hindi

In Hindi, complexion is रंग (rang) or रंगत (rangat). Hindi biodatas that keep the row often use गेहुँआ (gehuan, wheatish, from गेहूँ, wheat), गोरा (gora, fair) or साँवला (saanvla, dusky). Everything below applies to the Hindi row just the same.

You can delete the complexion row

If you came here wondering what to write in this row, the simplest answer is nothing: take it out. Older formats print it, but a printed row isn't a reason to fill it in.

• Your photo already shows it. A word adds nothing a reader can't see for themselves.
• The words don't mean the same thing to everyone. Two families can look at the same photo and pick different words, so whatever you write gets read through someone else's idea of it.
• Some readers don't want the row there at all. To them it reads as judging people by skin colour.

Delete the whole row, not just the answer. "Complexion:" with nothing after it looks like something you forgot to fill in, and someone will ask about it. If your template is a table in Word, right-click a cell in the row, choose Delete Cells, then Delete entire row. In Google Docs, right-click the same way and choose Delete row.

If your biodata goes out without a photo, families often ask about complexion sooner. The other two reasons above still hold, so leaving the row out is your choice either way, and a biodata without a photo covers what else changes.

If someone in the family wants it filled in

Sometimes it isn't only your call. A grandparent wants the row kept, or the family's format has always had it.

Then write the word you'd use about yourself, not one someone thinks will go down better. Whoever reads it will see you, in your photo or when you meet, so a different word only creates a mismatch. If you're a parent filling it in, that means the word your son or daughter would use about themselves.

The same row turns up in partner preferences, too. The partner expectations guide explains why a line about a partner's complexion is one to leave out.

Weight in a biodata

You don't need it. Many biodatas leave weight out, and your photo shows your build better than a number does.

If your family's format has the row and you want to fill it, write your current weight in kilograms, as a whole number: Weight: 62 kg. Not what you weighed two years ago, and not the weight you're aiming for.

Blood group and the other physical rows: keep or drop

Older templates print a few more physical rows. None of them is required.

Physical status, health and disability

Many templates carry a row that reads "Physical status: Normal / Physically challenged".

If you have no disability, delete the row. "Normal" is meant to say "no disability", but it reads as though the other answer is abnormal. If the format needs an answer, write "No disability".

If you do have a disability, the biodata still leads with what you do, the same as anyone's: your work, your city, how you spend your weekends. If you choose to put it on the biodata (whether to is your call, see below), it's one plain line after that. Say what it means day to day, like how you get around or what you use, rather than a diagnosis or a medical history. "Physically challenged" on its own tells a reader less than one specific line does.

Physical status: Uses a wheelchair; drives a hand-controlled car and travels for work

Physical status: Hearing aids in both ears; prefers meeting in person to long phone calls

Physical status: Walks with a limp (left leg) since childhood; no other effect on daily life

Some people would rather say it in About Me, where it sits inside a description of their life instead of under a label:

I work as a software tester in Raipur and live with my parents. I've had low vision since birth, so I use a screen reader at work and a white cane when I'm out, and I get around the city on my own. Weekends are for long walks and audiobooks, mostly Hindi fiction.

Whether it goes on the biodata at all is your call. If it's on the biodata, families who'd step back do so before anyone has spent time on it, and the ones who get in touch already know. If you leave it for an early conversation, you get to say it in your own words, to someone who's already interested. Both are reasonable. What tends to go badly is the version where it comes up after the families have met. Your photo may already show it, in which case a line lets you tell the rest yourself instead of leaving it to guesswork.

A health condition works the same way. A biodata isn't a medical record, and it gets forwarded to people you've never met, so reports, medicines and history stay off it. If a condition shapes daily life in a way the person you marry would live with too, the choice is the same one: a plain line on the biodata, or an early conversation. The detail belongs in the conversation either way.

If a parent is writing your biodata, this is the line to word yourself. And if it's a sibling's disability rather than your own, the family details guide has wording for that.

The physical details, written out

A downloaded template might print seven physical rows: height, complexion, weight, body type, blood group, spectacles and physical status. Here's how two people might fill them in, keeping only what they want to say. Both are invented.

PERSONAL DETAILS
Name: Tanvi Sawant
Age: 27
Height: 5 ft 2 in (157 cm)
Blood Group: A+
Marital Status: Never married
Mother Tongue: Marathi
Current Location: Thane, Maharashtra

PERSONAL DETAILS
Name: Varun Hegde
Age: 31
Height: 5'10" (178 cm)
Weight: 74 kg
Blood Group: O+
Spectacles: Yes
Marital Status: Never married
Mother Tongue: Kannada
Current Location: Hubballi, Karnataka

Neither has a complexion or body type row; the photo shows those. For the other sections around these rows, the formats for a girl's biodata and a boy's biodata each have a complete one to copy.

Common mistakes

• Rounding up. 5'5" becomes 5'6" on paper, and the first meeting puts it back.
• 5.4 for 5 feet 4 inches. Write 5'4" or 5 ft 4 in.
• A blank row left in. "Complexion:" with nothing after it looks like you forgot. Delete the row.
• A complexion word chosen because someone thinks it'll go down better. Whoever reads it will see you, in the photo or in person.
• Last year's weight. Or the one you're aiming for. Write your current weight, or leave the row out.
• Medical detail on a document that gets forwarded. Reports, medicines and history don't belong on a biodata.

If you're making it on Marriage Profile

Height is an optional box on the first step of the form, with 5'8" as the example in it. Whatever you type is what prints, character for character, and it stays exactly that when a family reads your biodata in Hindi, Marathi or Gujarati. On most of the designs it sits under your name, next to your age, with no label in front of it. So write it with its unit: 5'6" or 168 cm reads as a height, but 5.6 on its own doesn't. If you leave the box empty, nothing prints.

There's no complexion, weight or body type field. A photo is required to publish, so a family reading the biodata can already see you.

For blood group, spectacles or weight, add a row of your own in the "More personal details" block at the end of the first step: "Blood Group" as the name, "O+" as the details. It prints at the end of your personal details. The free plan includes two of these rows per biodata, and the paid plans allow up to ten per section (see pricing). A physical status line fits there too, or in About Me.

Anything you write is as visible as the rest of the biodata. You can't hide one row from some readers and show it to others. What you control is the link: on the paid plans you can put a password on it, so only people with the password can open it. Even then, anyone who can open it can take a screenshot, which is worth knowing before you add a health line.