Bangladesh suffers outbreak of child marriage with legal loopholes, lack of protection amid pandemic

A legal loophole has paved the path for parents, who feel unsafe amid a rise in sexual violence against women and financially insecure due to the economic fallout of the pandemic, to marry off their daughters.

Women’s rights activists blame a special provision for the increasing number of child marriage incidents in Bangladesh.    

The government had designed a national plan in 2018 to prevent child marriages with a goal to reduce the number of such incidents to one-third of what the number was at the time. But there has been no progress, according to the National Institute of Population Research and Training or NIPORT.

At least 59 percent of the women aged between 20 and 24 years got married below the age of 18 years, according to the Bangladesh Demographic And Health Survey report published by the NIPORT in November 2019. The 2014 report by the institute showed the same rate of child marriage.

As much as 52.3 percent of the women in the age group of 20-24 years went through a child marriage, according to the multiple indicator cluster survey of Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics in 2012-13. The rate dropped only a little to 51.4 percent in 2019.

According to a report of UNICEF based on government data, Bangladesh has the highest number of child marriage in South Asia and stands eighth globally. More than 38 million women in the country got married before reaching the age of 18, the report said.

Bangladesh must work 17 times more than the current rate to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goal target “Girls Not Brides” within 2030 and eight times more to eliminate child marriage by 2041 in line with the national plan, UNICEF pointed out.

WHAT ARE THE HURDLES?

Marrying off girls below the age of 18 was a punishable offence in the Child Marriage Restraint Act of 1929.

The government scrapped the British era law in 2017 and introduced a new law elevating the punishment for holding child marriage.

But it also kept a provision for marriage “under special circumstances to ensure the best interest of an adolescent”.

Women’s rights activists say this provision was passed despite huge protests to become the biggest hurdle in preventing child marriage.

“We had been able to prevent child marriages being held secretly earlier. Nowadays, both the parents and in-laws of the girl subjected to child marriage insist on her having a child soon. This is to ensure that they don’t have any legal trouble,” Alena Khan, chief executive of Bangladesh Human Rights Foundation.

“Can anyone nullify the marriage when the girl has a child?” she asked.

The rights activist also pointed out the health risks for under-aged girls in having children. “This dark law must be scrapped,” she said.

Lack of safety and financial instability are also among the reasons behind child marriages, Alena said.

“Firstly, the parents suffer from insecurity. They feel that marrying off their daughters will protect them from sexual harassment and rape. Also, it will reduce their financial pressure when a daughter is married off at an early age and sent to another house while they let their sons marry at a later age as the number of family members will increase with the daughter-in-law coming,” she said.

Ensuring safety of citizens and financial stability will help prevent child marriages, according to her.

She also said public representatives must be held accountable if a child marriage takes place under their jurisdiction.

“Action should be taken against anyone helping a family increase a girl’s age in documents. (Union council) members must sign the Kabin or marriage document to ensure that the bride is an adult. Only then the rampant child marriage will reduce,” Alena said.

Women do not have equal right to the assets of their assets, another factor that leads the families to consider girls as a burden and marry them off early, believes Rokeya Kabir, executive director of Bangladesh Nari Progati Sangha.

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“Child marriages won’t stop until the girls are given equal opportunity in the family and society,” she said.

She also demanded the government scrap the special provision in the Child Marriage Restraint Act of 2017.

The child marriage issue should be included in the textbooks to bring a change in society’s perception of equal rights for women, Rokeya said.

The government in coordination with the non-government organisations should also take up a campaign to promote the idea that both men and women should not get married unless they are able to earn.

Rokeya demanded an end to negative depiction of women in the religious congregations to stop child marriage.

Maleka Banu, general secretary of Bangladesh Mahila Parishad, said the special provision has led people to conduct child marriages without fear.

The administration also tends to avoid the issue thinking it is better not to get entangled in trouble as the law already has a provision, she said.

“The pandemic has pushed up the number of child marriage. People are losing their livelihoods and thus, girls are being considered a burden more and more. They also lack safety and they don’t go to schools amid the pandemic—all these lead them to be subjected to child marriage,” Maleka said.

The law has even caused some incidents where girls were married off to their rapists, she said.

The annual rate of known incidents of child marriage rose to the highest level of 197 in seven years in 2017, according to the Mahila Parishad. The number dropped to 52 in 2018 but rose again to 97 in 2019. At least 41 cases of child marriage have been reported this year until September.

The statistics may show a decline in child marriages, as not all of the marriages are reported in the media while many girls had their age increased in documents, Maleka said.

“Sometimes, the Kazi (marriage registrar) increases the age of the bride,” she said, urging the government to strengthen monitoring.

‘THINGS HAVE CHANGED’

“Whenever we hear about a child marriage, we try to prevent it,” said Abul Kashem, deputy director of monitoring, coordination and awareness at the Department of Women Affairs.

They have a plan to work with the Kazi and religious leaders like priests and imams at the union level, Kashem said.

“We have quite a few plans to end child marriage. We’ll choose a girl ambassador in every school who will play a vital role in preventing child marriage. We’ll disseminate the adverse effects of child marriage in the school assemblies. We’ll also introduce a complaint box in schools,” he said.

The child marriage incidence has dropped in Bangladesh, claimed Meher Afroz Chumki, the chief of the parliamentary standing committee on women and children affairs ministry.

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“We get reports whenever a child marriage is about to take place. Sometimes one or two incidents happen secretly, but child marriages do not take place like in old days. Things have changed,” she said.

“I’m not saying that there’s not a single case of child marriage; but I can dare say that it has reduced a lot in our social context.”

A government survey is needed to find out the real number of child marriage in the country, as different organisations provide different numbers, Chumki said.  

“They are doing surveys on those who got married five years ago; therefore the number becomes higher.”

“The countries having a small number of child marriages have other antisocial activities going on. That is not the case in our country. We may have a bigger number of child marriages but very limited social problems in comparison to them,” Chumki said on the context of UNICEF’s report saying Bangladesh tops the list of countries in South Asia with rampant child marriage.

bdnews24.com asked Chumki if the special provision in law is helping the child marriage to increase in numbers.

“We can’t stop child marriage with only a law. A change in social perspective and people’s mindset is the most important thing,” she remarked.

“A poor father who marries off his daughter may be fined; but he won’t be able to pay it. How will you run his family if he goes to prison? Therefore, amendment of the law is not a solution unless the social perception is changed,” she said.