I believe the system in Thailand is the reverse of the the system in India due to the fact that the woman receives a dowry which in Thailand is called 'sin-sot'.
As part of the marriage ceremony, the sin-sot is placed upon a table, this will include gold and cash, and the cash has to be new notes! The Thais are very particular about this and the notes which will be a mix of high denomination notes have to be ordered in advance from the bank to make sure you get uncirculated, mint notes.
The history behind it is due to the fact that traditionally, the male has been the bread winner and children must support their parents in old age so the money goes to the bride's parents to help them in their old age. In modern times, if the parents do not need the money, they often give it back to the couple upon which, the wife will save it for her future. Especially if she is giving up work and in case the couple split in the future.
The amount of money is dependent upon the females family status, her perceived beauty, her education and her age also plays a part and the amount is agreed over a family meeting before the wedding. A very fraught discussion!
Status, or perceived wealth are very important in Thai culture, it's all about keeping face so the wedding has to be as lavish as possible to impress friends and family. For the couple, they basically spend the whole time parading about and posing for photos with the guests.
Wedding gifts are simply envelopes into which is placed a cash gift which in turn are placed into a box upon entering the venue. These cash gifts are then opened by the couple on their wedding night and will hopefully pay a big part of the wedding costs, this doesn't often happen and I once went to a wedding where the groom had to have a further collection as he didn't have enough cash to pay the venue, even after frantically opening all his envelopes!!
No invites are sent, just people who are even distantly related simply turn up, you need to guesstimate the numbers for the caterers, and don't talk to me about alcohol. Its expected to be a free bar. That's a lot of whisky!
How do I know all this?
I married a Thai girl and despite my hatred for this particular tradition and its ramifications on furthering gender inequality, I for once, put aside my reservations and principles for love.
It was explained that its was 'culture' and 'tradition', my protestations that it was 2015 and times had moved on fell on stony ground!
The whisky was Black label, for show. The venue was a beautiful traditional Thai Teak house wedding venue and I've no idea of what the food was as I never managed to get to eat any.
The family was happy, but it all left a slightly bitter taste in my mouth.
As for the red envelopes with cash, I made back about 10% of the cost!! and I'm not even going to tell you how much the dowry was, most of which the in-laws kept.
A ridiculous, and dated tradition in my opinion, but hey ho.......life goes on. At least the new in-laws were happy!!