School dropout rate brings child marriages into focus

RANCHI: At a young age of 17, Meena (name changed), returned to her school, Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya (KGBV) in Deoghar, as a newlywed bride with vermillion on her head and red bangles on her arm. When she went home for holidays after completing Class X, her parents forced her into getting married. However, she was brave enough to protest and, instead of quitting studies and going to her in-law’s home, she decided to return to school.
However, not many girls are brave enough like Meena to stand up against their family’s will and they end up dropping out from school. A team of Jharkhand State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (JSCPCR), headed by Sanjay Mishra, had been visiting various KGBVs in all the 24 districts of Jharkhand over the last two months. The team came across a shocking fact — around 50% of the girls who go back home on vacation after Class X never return to attend Class XI.
Mishra said, “It was really shocking for us to see the attendance in Class XI and XII to be very low. The situation was same in every KGBV we visited. When we enquired, nobody, neither the wardens and teachers nor the students, was ready to tell us the reason behind the low attendance. However, when we spoke to the students alone, they revealed that most of their friends have been married.”
He added, “However, it was good to see some students like Meena who pressed for continuing studies. We gave her our contact numbers and told her that she should get in touch with us if she is pressured by her parents to quit school.”
According to the JSCPCR survey, more than 50% students of KGBV get married after they reach the age of 16-17 years. Of them, only 20% return to complete their studies. The eight districts with the highest incidence of child marriage cases are Deoghar, Giridih, Hazaribag, Garhwa, Palamu, Latehar, Chaibasa and Ranchi.
Mishra said, “The shocking part is that the administration of these schools does not bother to track down the children once they fail to return for the new session. We had taken the matter to the HRD secretary and she said she would immediately look in the matter.”
After receiving the information, Aradhna Patnaik, secretary of the state human resource development department, visited several KGBVs in Chanho and Mandar blocks in Ranchi and some in Bokaro last week. Patnaik said, “After talking to the students, I found that they want to continue studies but are forced by their parents to get married.”
Patnaik has directed the staff of all the KGBVs to track down the girls if they do not return from holidays and the teachers have to visit their homes and convince parents not to get their daughters married.
She said, “We are planning to start activities and training programmes at the school level to make teachers and students aware about the problem so it can be prevented.”