Child Marriage Law Vs. The Reality

Sridruti Juvvadi, School of Law, Mahindra University

ABSTRACT

Despite the fact that our nation has had legislation prohibiting child weddings for the past 90 years, child marriages still occur. According to statistics, child weddings make up 27% of all marriages in India. The socially, economically, and educationally disadvantaged groups have greater rates of child marriages, especially of young girls, with the states of Rajasthan and Bihar reporting the highest rates. The main factors include worries about her safety as she reaches puberty, control over her sexuality because patriarchal society places a high value on the virginity of brides, customs, a lack of knowledge of laws, and the fact that dowries rise in direct proportion to a girl's age and education, which causes her parents to search for more educated boys.

Child Marriage defined as marriage before the age of 18 - applies to both boys and girls, but it is more common among young girls. The issue of Child marriage is such a reality in many countries that it was not questioned for years together and was accepted as the norm. With the advent of development the adverse effects of child marriage was recognized and comparisons were made with advanced countries were age of marriage below 18 was a thing of the past and men and women have equal access to education, employment and their own personal growth and advancement. The Convention of the Rights of the Child (CRC) also set the minimum age of reaching adulthood. According to Article 1 of the CRC “any human being below the age of 18 is a child,” the CRC has been ratified by 194 countries. Those countries still having early marriage i.e. below 18 years also exhibit poor indicators relating to the MDGs. They usually have high maternal mortality and morbidity rates, low education levels for girls, especially secondary education, and overall high poverty levels.

Though 158 countries have set the legal age for marriage at 18 years, laws are not enforced. The practice of marrying young children is upheld by tradition and social norms. One third of girls in the developing world are married before the age of 18 and 1 in 9 are married before the age of fifteen (15). In 2012, 70 million women 20-24 around the world had been married before the age of 18. South Asia has the largest number of child brides with almost half of girls married by 18.