ENGLISH ASSIGNMENT

➢TOPIC: CHILD MARRIAGE IN INDIA

➢ SUBMITTED TO: Proof VIVEK SINGH

➢SUBMITTED BY: ADITYA SUREKA

➢ROLL NO: 73
 CHILD MARRIAGE IN INDIA

Since time immemorial, child marriage has been one of the greatest evils
plaguing India. Marriage is a sacred relationship between two individuals who
are ready to accept each other. Child marriage is an abuse of such union and is
not permitted by law in India. History has always proven child marriage
detrimental for our society. India has the second highest number of child
brides in the whole world. It is estimated that approximately 27% of girls in
India are married before their 18th birthday.

The legal age for marriage in India is 18 for women and 21 for men according
to the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act (PCMA) of 2006. Any marriage below
the legal age is considered as child marriage. One in three married women
from Hindu and Muslim communities got married before their 18th birthday
making them vulnerable to not just higher maternal mortality rates but also
domestic violence. Studies show girls who give birth before turning 15 and the
infants of child mothers are at greater risk. Underage marriages interrupt
education and most child brides are unable to negotiate with their family
members making them liable to domestic violence.

There are many causes of child marriage in India. In many communities, girls
are seen as an economic burden and marriage helps to transfers the
responsibility to her husband. Poverty and marriage expenses such as dowry
leads a family to marry off their daughter at a young age to reduce these costs.
Patriarchy, class and caste influence the norms and expectations around the
role of women and girls in India. In many communities restrictive norms limit
girls to the role of daughter, wife and mother who are first seen as the
property of her father and then of her husband. Controlling girls and women’s
sexuality is an influential factor in the practice of child marriage too. Pressure
towards early marriage aims to minimise the dishonour associated with
improper female sexual conduct, often leading to marriages arranged around
the time of puberty.
The recent statistics released by the Government of India on married Indian
women show 31.3% Hindu women and 30.6% Muslim women marry before
the age of 17. Moreover 6% of all Hindu women married even before turning
10.The corresponding figure for Muslim women was 5%. However on the other
hand only 6% of men were married before 18. The 2001 census found 43% of
women were married before 18 years of age. In 2011 the figure stood at 18%.
The proportion of women married before 18 years between 2001 and 2011
was 20%.

National Action Plan to prevent child marriages was drafted by the Ministry of
Women and Child Development in 2013, however, it has not yet been finalised.
The Indian Government has also used cash incentives, such as the Dhan Laxmi
scheme and the Apni beti apna dhun programme, adolescents’ empowerment
programmes (Kishori Shakti Yojana) and awareness-raising to induce behaviour
change. In addition India is a member of the South Asian Initiative to End
Violence Against Children (SAIEVAC), which adopted a regional action plan to
end child marriage. The regional action plan is to be implemented in 2015 –
201ecided by courts the same year convictions were secured in only 14 or 15
cases ,i.e., only 6%.

India has been unable to enforce the law that was first enacted by the British
in 1929.The Child Marriage Restraint Act fixed the age of marriage for girls at
14 and boys at 18 years. It was last raised to 18 years for girls in 2006.In 2014
police registered only 280 cases across the country under the 2006 Prohibition
of Child Marriage Act. Of the 103 cases decided by courts the same year
convictions were secured in only 14 or 15 ,i.e., only 6% cases.

According to the report ‘Why Children Commit Offences’ published by Delhi

Commission for Protection of Child Rights (DCPCR) in June 2015 focused on
children in conflict with the law in Delhi. The report looks at multiple issues like
the socio-economic profile of children with a criminal record, the nature of
offence that these children were accused of and analyzed the factors that push
children towards deviant behavior. The report highlighted the role of the
family, the community, the school and education as well the peer influence.
The report after studying 182 children in observation homes, special homes
found that poverty is one of the biggest contributing factor in children taken to
crimes. Most of the children had undergone multiple deprivations with low
economic households, uneducated parents; disrupted families. The children
were dropouts and working independently to support their families.

Only laws and law enforcing agencies will not prove instrumental in reducing
and eventually eradicating child-marriages. The mindset of the society has to
be targeted in order to create a world free of such evils. Citizens will have to
actively participate in spreading awareness regarding this practice and by
abiding to the existing restrictions imposed by the government. Girl child has
to be given equal opportunities and right education to safeguard themselves
from such practices and rise in the society. The journey of gender equality will
only be completed once practices like child marriages; female feticides
violence against women are eradicated.

So overall Child marriage is a violation of child rights, and has a very

negative impact on physical growth, health, mental and emotional
development, and education opportunities. Moreover it does not
only affects the individual, rather it also affects society as a whole
since child marriage reinforces a cycle of poverty and perpetuates
gender discrimination, illiteracy and malnutrition as well as high
infant and maternal mortality rates. Although child marriage is
declining, the rate of decline is slow.