Praying Mantis (mating)

The last photo shows the habitat. My friend and her family had fallen behind as we were strolling down a hilly path in Tirthan Valley in Himachal Pradesh, India. I stepped to one side to wait for them to catch up when it struck me as odd that a weedy plant near my foot had oval-ish leaves with two straight twig-like appendages on one side. I kneeled to take a look and discovered the "twigs" were a mating pair of Praying mantis; each the length of my middle finger (at least). This is a road where narrow or not, bus routes operate, and any sudden excited movement on my part could potentially send me tumbling into the boulder-laden Tirthan River below...my friend's daughter wanted to stay back to see the female crunch up the male....but nothing of the sort happened on our watch...say 15 minutes. The pair vanished the next day.