Hyderabad:
In an exclusive interview to NDTV, Sania and Shoaib Malik describe how and where they met, and the toll their controversial wedding has taken on the couple.
Speaking to Shekhar Gupta, Editor-in-Chief of the Indian Express and host of NDTV's Walk the Talk, Sania said that she spent three hours getting her mehendi applied. The couple got married earlier this week. Ribbing her husband for his impatience, Sania said, " He couldn't sit still and he went away for an hour and a half...he told his brother 'entertain your bhabhi'."
Pakistani cricketer Shoaib tells NDTV they met "in 2004 for two minutes." Sania says, "We were staying at the same hotel. I was on my way to the gym and we met there."
They say they met again in Dubai.
Sania says, "A long courtship was not possible. Because we are well-known in our own and each other's countries, so it would have been tough to keep under wraps. We are both from respectable families."
The wedding turned into a national headline after another resident of Hyderabad, Ayesha Siddiqui, emerged days before the marriage to reveal that Shoaib had married her on the phone several years ago. At first, Shoaib denied that, but later, he went through with a divorce mediated by community elders in Hyderabad, where he was staying at Sania's house.
Sania says her husband's most winsome qualities are that he's "charming and simple."