New Delhi: Sima (name changed) living with her family in the Riga block of Sitamarhi, a border district in Bihar, was pushed by her uncle into wedlock with the son of a family friend living in a nearby block of the same district. The location of the district means it is exposed to many vulnerabilities, especially for children. This was the period when the nationwide lockdown was imposed. She called a local partner organisation (CHARM) of Save the Children India, informing that her parents and uncle have forcibly fixed her marriage. This was the “first case scenario” when the entire communication and action was coordinated over the phone. Many calls were exchanged between the police, local Panchayati Raj members, the Child Protection Committee and Childline, and finally, the police with the “mukhia “(head men of villages) agreed to meet the parents of the girl. The police met the parents of the girl and warned them and also convinced them to postpone the marriage until the girl attained the legal age of marriage.
The Sunday Guardian was informed about several instances of child marriages in lockdown like that of Sima by different NGOs that have been working in this arena for years.
According to the Union Ministry of Women and Child Development (WCD), during the lockdown period between the last week of March and up until June, officials received 5,584 phone calls pertaining to underage marriages across the country. But India’s Child Protection Commission has stated that during the lockdown, there was no data indicating an increase in child marriages. However, it had asked state governments to be more vigilant about the danger due to reports of cases from official authorities of various states like Karnataka, Telangana, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal.
Dr Kriti Bharti, Founder and Managing Trustee of Saarthi which is the first organisation that annulled the first child marriage in India in 2012, recognised by the Limca Book of Records and included in the syllabus of Class 11 of CBSE Board, expressed her lack of trust on data.
She told this correspondent that the number of reported cases is anyway not equivalent to the cases actually happening. Being a field worker, she believes that the approach towards prevention of child marriages is extremely bleak. “A few years ago, I was informed that there’s a child marriage happening somewhere. At that time, our entire team was on another case as it first came to us. So, we informed the administration about the same and they handled it really well. And, I was pleased that the child marriage was cancelled without me ever going there. Two days later, the same informer told me that in the end, these people covertly managed to do the child marriage. Here, people marry children at around 2-3 o’clock at night with a few people on the field,” she said.
The NGOs’ informers are also unable to disclose any cases of child marriage because of the lockdown. In addition to the limitations of on-field operations, the main priority of NGOs in the past few months has been on Covid relief. This has given families a safe space to do away with a girl’s financial burden through her marriage.
Overall, data of National Crime Records Bureau 2018 also says that 4% of all the trafficking cases are for child marriages.
Speaking to The Sunday Guardian, Kumar Nilendu, General Manager Development Support, CRY West, said: “Because of the lack of any significant data, one cannot say anything for sure, but I believe travel restrictions may have minimized the chances of trafficking.”