16-Year-Old Girl Married Off To 65-Year-Old Omani For Rs 5 Lakh

In a shocking incident, a 16-year-old girl from Hyderabad was married off to a 65-year-old Omani national three months ago.

India has the highest number of child brides in the world. It is estimated that 47% of girls in India are married before their 18^th birthday.

The rates of child marriage vary between states and are as high as 69% and 65% in Bihar and Rajasthan.

The girl's mother alleged in her complaint with the Falaknuma police in Hyderabad on Wednesday that her sister-in-law and her husband took Rs 5 lakh to facilitate the marriage.

The teenager alleged physical torture by her Arab

In her complaint, Unnisa alleged that she recently received a call from her daughter saying she was being physically tortured by her Arab husband, Sheik Ahmed, in Oman’s capital Muscat, and she was desperate to return to India. "If you don't save me and take me from here, I will die..." the girl has reportedly said in phone messages to her parents from Muscat, 

Here are some other major reasons for child marriage:

 

• Limited education opportunities, low quality of education, inadequate infrastructure, lack of transport and therefore concerns about girls’ safety while travelling to school significantly contribute to keeping girls out of school and therefore tend to favour child marriage.

 

• Although there is widespread awareness of the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act 2006 (PCMA) and the illegality of child marriage, individually people feel that the traditions and norms are stronger than the law and the institutions and rarely report cases. On top of this, there is limited capacity among officials and lack of willingness to go against community decisions, since officials are themselves part of the community.

 

• Girls are often seen as a liability with limited economic role. Women’s work is confined to the household and is not valued. In addition, there is the problem of dowry. Despite the fact that dowry has been prohibited for five decades (Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961), it is still common for parents of girls in India to give gifts to the groom and /or his family either in cash or kind.

The dowry amount increases with the age and the education level of the girl . Hence, the “incentive” of the system of dowry perpetuates child marriage. 

 

• Law enforcement to prohibit child marriage is relatively weak. Limited detailed knowledge on how to apply laws and little understanding of the consequences of the laws, as well as limited trust in institutions enforcing them, undermines the implementation of the Source.