Child marriage: India
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Laws banning child marriages
Child marriage human rights violation: HC
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
From the archives of The Times of India 2007, 2009
New Delhi: Stressing that child marriage violates human rights, the Delhi high court has restrained a minor girl and her forty-year-old husband from consummating the marriage till she attains the age of majority.
Unlike some earlier decisions of HC when minor brides were allowed to reside with their husbands, a bench headed by justice A K Sikri decreed that the 17-year-old bride would be staying with her parents and not with her spouse.
‘‘In actuality, a child marriage is a violation of human rights, compromizing the development of girls and often resulting in early pregnancy and social isolation, with little education and poor vocational training reinforcing the gendered nature of poverty,’’ the bench noted on a petition filed by an NGO pleading it to declare the marriage illegal as 17-year-old Chandni was forced to marry 40-year-old widower Yashpal.
HC however, refused to declare the marriage void as the matter pertaining to the legality of marriage involving minors is still to be decided by a larger bench. The court restrained the husband from consummating the marriage and said it will await the larger bench’s verdict.
‘‘Till Chandni attains the age of 18, she shall stay with her parents and not with her spouse. Yaspal shall not consummate the marriage and it would be not only his responsibility but the parents of Chandni shall also ensure this,’’ the court ruled adding, ‘‘Child marriage perpetuates an unrelenting cycle of gender inequality, sickness and poverty.’’
In this case, Chandni’s father got her married to Yashpal who claimed he was 35. After an NGO Association for Social Justice and Research intervened, the court asked the Delhi Police to find the couple and their family as she could not be traced out. The Delhi Police lodged an FIR and arrested Yashpal and Chandni’s father and she was produced before the court.
HC expressed concern over the prevalence of the social evil which perpetuates gender inequality. ‘‘The surprising thing is that almost all communities where this practise is prevalent are well aware of the fact that marrying child is illegal, it is even punishable under the law. NGOs as well as the government agencies have been working for decades to root out this evil. Yet, the reality is that the evil continues to survive,’’ the court said.
Prevalence despite ban
In 2009
80 yrs since ban, 45% of girls still married off before 18
48% Of Them Get Pregnant Before Attaining Majority: Survey
Kounteya Sinha
New Delhi: Laws banning child marriages were introduced in the country in 1929 but 80 years down the line, the social ill continues to be as grave as ever.
Nearly half the women in India are married off before they reach the legal age of 18, a joint Indo-American study announced in the medical journal ‘Lancet’ on Tuesday.
After looking at data of 22,807 women aged 20-24 years, around 44.5% of these women were found to have got married before the age of 18.
According to researchers specialising in social and behavioural sciences at Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH), economic and educational reforms in India have failed to lower the prevalence of child marriages, fuelling risks of multiple unwanted pregnancies, their termination and sterilisations.
Even worse, it has been found to be associated with poor fertility outcomes, such as unwanted and terminated pregnancies and repeat childbirths in less than 24 months.
Lead author Dr Anita Raj, associate professor at BUSPH, said the study found that more than one in five — 22.6% — were married before age 16, while 2.6% were married before age 13. Women who married younger than 18 were significantly more likely to report no contraceptive use before their first childbirth. Nearly half — 48.4% — of women who were married as children reported giving birth before they turned 18.
These results suggest that neither recent progress in economic and women’s development, nor programmatic efforts to prevent child marriage and promote maternal and child health, have been sufficient to reduce the prevalence of child marriage in India,” Dr Raj said.
The study found sterilisation rates were higher for women married as children than for those married as adults — 19.5% compared to 4.6%. Overall, more than one in eight women, or 13.4%. had been sterilised. Of those not sterilised, more than three-quarters reported no present contraception use. Child brides were also at greater risk of a fistula — a tear in the genital tract as well as pregnancy complications and death and sickness as a result of childbirth. India introduced laws against child marriage in 1929 and set the legal age for marriage at 12 years. The legal age for marriage was increased to 18 years in 1978.
The researchers said, “Women who had been child brides were 37% likelier not to have used contraception before their first child was born; seven times likelier to have three or more births; and three times likelier to have a repeat childbirth in less than 24 months.”
They added, “They were also more than twice as likely to have multiple unwanted pregnancies, nearly 50% likelier to have an abortion and more than six times likelier to seek sterilisation compared with counterparts who had married after the age of 18.”
Unicef recently said that child marriage was increasing India’s maternal and infant deaths. Girls who give birth before the age of 15 are five times more likely to die in childbirth than women in their 20s. If a mother is under the age of 18, her infant’s risk of dying in its first year of life is 60% greater than that of an infant born to a mother older than 19. “More than 40% of the world’s child marriages take place in India. Worldwide, more than 60 million women between 20-24 were married before they were 18. Child brides become mothers much before their bodies are physically mature,” Unicef ’s Karin Hulshof said. She added child marriage prevented many girls from continuing education and are less likely to seek medical attention for babies.
CHILD BRIDES
22.6% girls married before 16, while 2.6% wedded before 13
48.4% of married girls have a child before they turn 18
37% of them did not use contraception before first baby
They are seven times likelier to have more than three children Three times likelier to have a child again in less than 24 months They are also nearly 50% likelier to have an abortion
The legal position
Annulment
The Times of India, Mar 07, 2016
Divorce must to annul child marriage: HC
A marriage of minors will not become void automatically without either of them obtaining divorce within two years of attaining the legal age for marriage, the Madras high court has ruled. A division bench set aside the order of a lower court refusing to take on file a woman's divorce petition on the grounds that she was a minor during marriage which was automatically void.
