Child marriages in Marathwada: In 4 months, 63 minor girls to be married off in Beed

To highlight the issue, the Abhiyaan organised the screening of Daptar, a short film about the forcible marriage of a 14-year-old girl to a 40-year-old man, in several districts in Marathwada region, where the practice of child marriage is rampant. The film, screened in almost all villages of Shirur-Kasar tehsil in Beed district, touched a chord with many of the viewers and made some of the girls open up about their own experiences.

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Deshpande told Newsline that some of the underage girls, who would be married off soon, were bright students who had scored as much as 90 per cent in their exams.

When queried on the issue, officials of the Women and Child Development Department admitted that tackling cases of child marriage in Marathwada region was a major challenge as most such marriages take place due to socio-economic causes.

As per a survey conducted by the state government, there are over 6,000 girls across 51 villages of Shirur Kasar tehsil and most of their family members are workers involved in sugarcane cutting. They often move around in search of work and therefore prefer to get their daughters married off early.

Deshpande, who has written to the state government and urged it to intervene in the matter, has also requested the government to allow such girls to stay in its hostels.

“I will soon meet Women and Child Development Minister Pankaja Munde, who is also the guardian minister of Beed district, to apprise her of the situation,” said Deshpande.

When contacted, Munde said that there was an urgent need to prevent such child marriages from taking place. “So far, we don’t have any such information and I have asked the district collector. However, if the activists with Lek Laadki Abhiyaan have been alerted, then proactive steps must be taken and we will support them,” Munde told Newsline.

UNFPA, Abhiyaan to organise vocational programmes

Child marriage is a human rights violation and despite the laws against it, the practice remains widespread. According to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), in developing countries, one in every three girls is married before they turn 18 and one in nine girls is married under the age of 15. The UNFPA, which released the state of the World Population Report for 2016 with a focus on investing in young adolescents, has decided to initiate two programmes in the villages of Shiru-Kasar taluka. “We will work with 2,000 adolescents, to teach them vocational skills and delay the age of child marriage,” said Anuja Gulati, state coordinator of UNFPA.