Because govt didn’t ask the girls, we did

In the villages of Deoghar district in the Santhal Parganas division of Jharkhand every woman is either called Kumari or Devi If she is the youngest among her siblings shersquos probably a Chhutki Otherwise she is Badki meaning big sister ldquoWomen are not used to being addressed by their first namesrdquo says Namrata Sharma a development practitioner working at Quest Alliance a notforprofit trust that equips young people with skills by enabling selflearningOver a decade ago when Sharma moved from Meghalaya to work in the region these peculiarities stood out like a sore thumb ldquoTheir identity was entirely shaped by their male relatives She was soandsorsquos daughter sister wife or motherrdquo With young women being encouraged to pursue education a lot is changing in the region And yet not thinks Sharma Namrata Sharma development practitioner Quest AllianceMarriage conversations here still start very early A rishta is made ldquopakkardquo when the girl ldquocomes of agerdquo with dowry negotiations beginning soon after By the time she is 15 she is sent to her husbandrsquos home where early motherhood often takes a toll on her bodyItrsquos in this environmentmdashwhere child marriage and dowry laws are openly rejected and violatedmdashthat young women from the village working with the Quest Alliance team were informed about a new development that took place last week during the Winter Session of ParliamentIn Deoghar Jharkhand girls are married at puberty because of poverty absence of middle and senior schools within their villages to allow them to continue studying and higher dowry demanded for older girls PicAarti KumariOn Tuesday Union Minister for Women and Child Development Smriti Irani introduced The Prohibition of Child Marriage Amendment Bill 2021 in the Lok Sabha The bill that proposed amendments to the 2006 law seeking to raise the age of legal marriage for women from 18 to 21 has been sent to a Parliamentary Standing Committee for further discussion Speaking in LS Irani had said that the proposed legislation was secular and would apply to all communities ldquoWe are 75 years late in providing equal rights to men and women to enter into matrimony In the 19th century the marriageable age for women was 10 years By 1940 it was increased to 1214 years In 1978 women who reached the age of 15 were married For the first time through this Bill men and women keeping in mind the right to equality can decide on their marriagerdquo she had saidThe bill comes in the wake of recommendations by a 10member task force led by exSamata Party leader Jaya Jaitly formed by the Union Ministry for Women and Child Development in June 2020 to look into its feasibility The mandate was to study ldquomatters pertaining to the age of motherhood imperatives of lowering MMR maternal mortality rate improvement of nutritional levels and related issuesrdquoDr AL Sharada Kanksshi Agarwal Poonam Muttreja and Leena KejriwalThe excitement among the girls from Deoghar is palpable but they are also aware that this means little to their neighbours and villagers The poor especially are a nervous wreck ldquoIf their daughters remain unmarried till 21 unko bahut taane sunne padengerdquo says Aarti Kumari 22 a resident of Rajdaha village Madhupur in Deoghar district who works with Quest AllianceAartirsquos comment is a reflection of the very complex social fabric that governs this region of Jharkhand where child marriages are rampantmdashthe state has been listed third in the high child marriage prevalence states list by the National Family Health Survey4 201516In this file picture taken in April 2006 young women under the age of 18 were married in a mass wedding ceremony on the occasion of Akshya Tritya in the village of Funda 30 km from Bhopal PicGetty ImagesItrsquos also why the bill though considered wellintentioned has garnered mixed responses Population Foundation of India PFI a national nonprofit organisation that promotes and advocates for the effective formulation and implementation of gender sensitive population health and development strategies and policies said that ldquoincreasing womenrsquos age of marriage was akin to treating symptoms instead of the causerdquo Sharma echoes this sentiment ldquoIf you look at the ground reality the child marriage law has never been effective It was 18 years for girls all this while and despite that we have witnessed so many cases of 14 and 16 year olds getting married in Jharkhandrdquo Sharma tells midday in a telephonic interviewPoonam Muttreja executive director PFI shares cold facts ldquoDespite the existing law having been in place for decades according to the recently released National Family Health Survey5 data 233 per cent of women age 2024 years reported that they got married before the age of 18 a marginal decline from 27 per cent in 201516 NFHS 4rdquo ldquoSo while legal enactment may be a necessity it is far from sufficient to decrease the number of child marriagesrdquoThe Missing Link Trust has been reaching out to families in the Sunderbans counselling them and discussing the cons of early marriage and its repercussions on a girlrsquos health and wellbeing ldquoWe also let them know about the implications of violating the lawrdquo says Prabir Mishra Sunderbans CoordinatorSharma adds ldquoI am afraid that it might put off many parents especially in rural areas from having girl childrenrdquoAfew years ago Quest Alliance having noticed a lot of girls in Jharkhand drop out early from school started making doortodoor visits to understand the cause ldquoOne of the major reasons was poverty of course Some girls also had to assist their families in running the household and looking after younger siblings Lack of access to higher education in their villages which meant travelling miles to attend middle or senior school was another deterrentrdquo says Sharma But child marriage appeared to be a reason that directly or indirectly influenced all other factorsNamrata Sharma centre a development practitioner working at Quest Alliance a notforprofit trust that equips young people with skills by enabling selflearning says that policy making and change must take into account socioeconomic realities on the groundSharma says that in rural Jharkhand educating women is seen as a liability rather than a boon ldquoFirstly the opportunities for them to work are few and far between Most women prefer teaching or taking up government jobs but itrsquos really hard to find employment in these sectorsrdquo This leaves marriage as the only end goal Therersquos also a prevailing regressive mentality around ldquoolder educated girlsrdquo ldquoThe more she studies the more they feel it will be difficult to lsquotamersquo or lsquocontrolrsquo her after marriage and get her to adjust to the new responsibilities This is why families seek the hand of younger girls Older girls therefore often have to give a higher dowryrdquoFollowing the survey Quest Alliance started working with outofschool girls in the Deoghar region forming youth groups led by ldquogirl championsrdquo Currently the district has coopted 1600 girls spread out across 135 groups which meet regularly organising sessions where they are trained to develop new skills encouraged to pursue higher education and are made aware of their rights including the prevalent laws around child marriage Aarti who is a girl champion was in Class VIII when her parents decided she would marry Since she had two elder sisters she was able to convince them to allow her to study ldquoAfter a lot of pleading I was able to get them to call off the weddingrdquo she recounts to midday But due to financial restrictions she was unable to study post Class X and took up odd jobs including weaving carpets She joined Quest three years ago and has now gone back to school She is currently in Class XII and is engaged to be marriedAarti is glad that the government has considered increasing the age of girls for marriage as she feels that by 21 women will at least be ldquomentally emotionally and physicallyrdquo ready to take on the challenges that come with it and can also finish their education However she does express a reservation ldquoI donrsquot think our society is ready for it In my hometown a 21yearold unmarried girl is considered lsquooldrsquo Now parents with daughters are going to worry sick about finding a suitable groom for themrdquo Shampu Kumari 19 from Silgaria village says the new law when implemented wonrsquot affect rich business and landowning families as they can afford to keep an older daughter at home ldquoThe poor canrsquot do that They are going to be victimised furtherrdquo Aarti says many families are already reeling in debt due to dowryThis writer spoke with a 16yearold bride who wished to remain anonymous ldquoI got married last year during the lockdown I didnrsquot want to but my mother forced merdquo She has however decided to continue her education and wonrsquot move into her inlawsrsquo home until she turns 18Therersquos also the issue of sexual harassment of young women which says Sharma is not being addressed Many migrant labourers canrsquot keep their daughters home while they are away and think itrsquos better to get them married for their own safety Girls are also at the risk of eveteasing and harassment especially when travelling long distance to schools ldquoThe government is giving young girls free cycles to encourage them to study further Instead they should build schools nearer their homes and provide better opportunities to use their skills so that they are motivated enough to studyrdquo More and more women are however becoming aware of their rights Earlier this week a 16yearold girl from the district who is also a member of Questrsquos youth group filed a police complaint against her father after he forcefully tried to give her hand in marriage to a 35yearold ldquoUnfortunately there is a custom here called lsquotilakrsquo where you reserve a groom for a price The father had already paid a dowry of Rs 50000 which the groomrsquos family wonrsquot returnrdquo says Sharma adding ldquoItrsquos quite a grim situation really And these social and cultural complexities cannot be ignored during policy makingrdquoPhotographer and installation artist Leena Kejriwal is the founder of the Missing Link Trust a communications nonprofit which uses art technology and school programmes to raise awareness about prevention of sex trafficking Her work in the Sunderbans since 2016 where girl trafficking has been on the risemdashldquoWest Bengal accounts for 43 per cent of the trafficking victims with a majority from Sunderbansrdquomdashenabled her to focus on child marriage as well as she says ldquoitrsquos the root cause of increasing vulnerability of womenrdquoldquoGirls here are getting married by 12 and having babies by 15rdquo she says During the COVID19 lockdown when schools were shut the number of girls getting married suddenly spiked ldquoWe were seeing many young mothers walk into clinicsrdquoSince parents were already struggling to keep girls in school the pandemic became the perfect excuse to get them out she says ldquoThe other issue was the increased use of Android phones and social media that put many girls at risk There is a lot of content that young children are consuming and which we really know little about This has also led to an increase in cyber crime Fearing that their daughters would fall into wrong hands and bring a bad name to the family they are being married youngrdquo she addsKejriwal says that the new bill is a move in the right direction but it cannot be implemented in isolation Muttreja of PFI suggests a more holistic approach ldquoInvesting in girlsrsquo education is essential given that global evidence illustrates that allowing girls to complete their education delays marriage We must also empower women both economically and socially by investing in skillbuilding and gender equality initiatives Another underutilised strategy is targeted social and behaviour change communication which can go a long way in changing social norms We must not forget that child marriages continue to take place because the communities see them as a solution while we view them as a problem We need to work towards changing this mindsetrdquo she addsThatrsquos where the efforts of organisations like Missing Link Trust and Quest Alliance might prove effective Prabir Mishra Sunderbans Coordinator of Missing Link Trust has for the last five years been working closely with school children tackling adolescent sexuality through weekly programmes which involve talks and audiovisual sessions on abuse trafficking and sex education ldquoWhen we come to know of a child marriage case we reach out to the girl and her family as well as the boy counselling them and discussing the cons of early marriage and how it can have repercussions on their health and wellbeing We also let them know about the implications of violating the lawrdquo he saysInterestingly a bill that the government believes will ensure freedom for young women could end up tying their hands Muttreja shares how the existing child marriage law has often been misused to ldquocriminalise young peoplersquos choicesrdquo According to a survey by Partners for Law in Development PLD 65 per cent of the cases filed under the existing child marriage law related to elopement and were filed by disapproving parents ldquoOften despite the consent of the girl the male partner of her choice is punished as a criminal and the girl locked up or forcibly married to someone elserdquo Domestic abuse and unregistered marriages may further disenfranchise adult womenldquoIt is evident that we need to go beyond legal provisions and work towards changing social attitudes to put an end to this harmful practicerdquo says MuttrejaKanksshi Agarwal of NETRI Foundation a bootstrapped incubator and accelerator training women in Bihar to realise their political ambitions feels that raising the marriageable age for women might also impact their aspirations to enter politics earlier on ldquoWe have often seen that women who plunge into politics wait to get to a point when they have significantly lower familial responsibilities like after their children have grown up As this law doesnrsquot relieve women from the patriarchal expectations of fulfilling familial roles and unpaid care which are often seen as inhibitors in personal career growth their leadership journey might slow downrdquoDr AL Sharada director of Population First a social impact organisation that works for women empowerment says that if a woman at 18 can decide who the next PM of the country is going to be she can take charge of her sexual and reproductive rights ldquoNow more women will fall under the child marriage category and this will only put them at a disadvantage They risk more discrimination and violence How is this empowering for womenrdquo she asks adding ldquoOur existing laws are good enough Where we fall short is in implementationrdquo233 per centRatio of women age 2024 who reported getting married before the age of 18 according to Family Health Survey5 data