“Feet on the ground, eyes on the sky.
Childhood filled with dreams, to fly high!
Waiting to explore the opportunities umpteen.
But, the other side grass was NOT so green,
As I finished my TEEN….”
The above lines were written by Shilpa, a bright student and a farmer’s daughter. She wished to become a teacher and educate other girls of her village. As she finished her 12th grade, little did she know that her parents were planning her wedding soon. Shilpa had seen how her elder sister was married at 16 and delivered a premature baby by 18. She didn’t want to go through the same, just because of poverty and illiteracy at her home. Next day, She was filled with tears of joy when she read the news headline “Legal age of marriage for women raised to 21 from 18”. Her heart was filled with confidence to turn her dreams into reality!
What was the headline about? Is the law enough to change Shilpa’s fate? What are the scopes and challenges it comes with? What does the change in minimum age of marriage for women mean to them?
Recently, based on the recommendations of Jay Jaitley committee, the legal age of marriage for women was raised from 18 to 21. The committee was constituted to re-examine age of marriage and its correlation to health and other social indices such as Infant mortality (IM), Maternal mortality (MM), Nutritional levels among mothers and children.
While one section of the society celebrated this move, the other questioned the rationale behind it.
The Legal background of Marriages :
The minimum age of marriage is governed by personal laws. The Hindu marriage Act 1955, The Christian Marriage Act 1872 and Special Marriage Act 1954 states 18 for girls and 21 for boys as minimum age for marriage. The Muslim personal law,1937 mentions anyone attaining puberty to be eligible for marriage.
The Prohibition of Child marriage Act(PCMA), 2021 amends the PCMA 2006. It increases the age of marriage for women to 21, on par with men. Also, it amends the personal laws governing marriageable age. It defines child as a male or female, who has not attained the age of 21 years.
These changes in the law have created hopes amidst doubts.
PCMA 2021 : The Hopes
As per National Family Health Survey(NFHS)-4, median age at first marriage for urban women is 1.7 years (19.8) more than rural women(18.1). Which indicates that majority of the women are married by the time they finish 12th grade!
Now with 21 as minimum age, girls have scope of pursuing further education. There is a direct correlation between education and marriage. The state of world report 2020 by UNFPA notes that, in India 51% of girls with no education and 47% with only primary education were married by age 18. Whereas it was 29% for those with secondary education and 4% with post-secondary. Thus, increasing marriageable age to 21 is a way to post-secondary education, which will reduce early marriages.
With education comes an employment opportunity. In India, the labour force participation of women is just 24%, with a huge gap between urban-rural. Early marriages force a girl into domestic responsibilities and leave little chances for her to pursue career. Also, with low education and no employment, women have no bargaining power. With 21 as minimum age, women now can finish the education to be eligible for jobs. The exposure will help them explore different areas of opportunities. Also, the sportswomen, especially in rural areas, can reach peak of their sports during this period.
70% of early marriages took place among socially and economically marginalized communities. Early marriages make women get struck in poverty loop. Woman from these communities can climb social ladder when they are financially independent and secure. Education and employment are the ways to empowerment.
The PCMA 2021 would further reduce child marriages and forced marriages of teenage girls with enhanced awareness and effective implementation.
This progressive move ensures to bring gender parity in matters of marriage. Keeping minimum age for girls less than boys has normalized hypergamy. This also has latent patriarchal intent to keep male in dominant position by marrying a younger girl. Now that girls and boys have same marriageable age, it can bring more symmetry in decision making powers at home and society at large.
Further, the minimum age for contesting a Panchayat and local election too is 21 and also women have 1/3rd of seats reserved for them. Girls with political aspirations will now have more liberty to participate in elections and this will lead to political empowerment at grassroot level. This will also address the issue of “sarpanch pati” wherein married women are allowed to contest election as a rubber stamp of their husband.
Marriages come with its own challenges and expectations from family. Domestic violence and patriarchal domination, encroaches her freedom and liberty. Girls married at an early age are more likely to suffer from mental stress and depression for being tied to house-hold responsibilities, leaving little time for themselves.
“Health is wealth” is the fact that nobody can disagree to. To build a wealthy nation, it needs healthy population. The healthy population is born when the mothers are healthy. The reproductive health and nutritional level of majority of the women are not capable of handling early pregnancies. Thus, Maternal mortality is the second leading cause of death among women globally. This move can definitely reduce maternal and infant mortality rate. Also, women will have good understanding of family planning.
Thus, with changes in PCMA 2021, the hopes are high that these issues will be resolved to some extent.
PCMA 2021 : The Doubts
The minimum age of marriage for women was set as 18 in 1978. However, child marriages started to decline only in the 1990s when there was reduction in poverty and improvement in literacy.
Despite having a law (PCMA 2006), the child marriage has shown only marginal decline from 27% in 2015-16 to 23% in 2019-20 as per NFHS.
This shows that law is necessary but not sufficient to bring the desired changes.
Higher ages of marriage correspond to better off families. Early marriages take place majorly in poor and marginalized communities. They have poor nutritional health due to unaffordability to healthy diet. The health of the poor women is going to be same at 18 or at 21 or even at 30, unless they have access to nutritional food. The maternal and infant mortality will not decline much until this is addressed. The need is to improve financial condition of these families which in turn would lead to better health and social indicators. Else the poor families have no alternative than getting their children married at an early age for sustenance.
The PCMA 2006 was mainly used for parental control against the love marriages of their children. It was misused to nullify the marriage of daughters incase of eloping with the boy of her choice. Clearly, age has never been a concern. The law was used in majority of the cases to preserve the social status and norms. However, the intent of law was never to curb freedom of choice and personal liberty. For example, In the Hadiya Case (Kerala), the adult women’s choice was challenged by her parents as love jihad. More such cases are likely to arise under PCMA-2021 as the marriageable age increases.
The definition of child in PCMA 2021 contradicts with definition of child in other laws like child labour, POCSO Act etc. Also, experts recommend to re-examine the minimum age of consent which is set at 18.
Though the PCMA declares child marriage as void, in the eyes of community it has social validity. Thus, community participation and awareness about ill-effects of early marriage need to be actively communicated.
There are questions raised on the number 21. The law commission report 2008 had mentioned to have a uniform age of 18 for girls and boys. Supreme Court in the Independent thoughts case and convention on elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (CEDAW) hold similar view. Internationally, 18 is the average age of marriage in most of the countries. Thus, experts say that marriageable age for girls and boys should be uniform at 18.
Age is just a number : there is much beyond that
Increasing the minimum marriageable age is just a small step. It is like gifting a car to a person who neither knows how to drive nor has money for the fuel!
The basic infrastructure of education and health needs to be improved. Higher education, transportation facilities, access to toilets at schools should be provided to reduce drop-out. Most of the girls drop out of education not because of marriage, but lack of access to it.
The RTE Act was a game changer for many women as they could finish primary education. The National Education Policy 2020, with separate provisions focusing on girls education and infrastructure development, can make PCMA 2021 fulfill its aim. The schemes like Kanyashree of West Bengal, that provide scholarship to girls till they finish secondary education, has indeed reduced drop-out rates.
The effective implementation of nutritional schemes under POSHAN abhiyan should be ensured to improve nutritional status of women. The Thaayi(mother) card initiative of Karnataka government, that aims to provide nutritional food to pregnant mothers belonging to SC/ST or BPL communities is a good example.
Local volunteers, NGOs, ASHA workers and school authorities should be trained to create awareness about the law and the intent behind it to avoid misuse. Panchayat Raj institutions can be the drivers of this change. Frequent advertising the provisions of the law through radios/TV channels can definitely create impact.
With proper implementation of Prevention and prohibition of Sexual harassment of women at workplace (SHE) Act 2013, girls must be encouraged to seek employment fearlessly, especially rural women.
When there is a progressive law, nobody should be deprived of it. All communities must be taken into confidence, thus making it equally accessibly to all categories of women.
Legal changes should be combined with cultural changes to have the intended impact.
Law shows the way to society:
Even today every teenage girl sings this bollywood song “dil hai chota sa, choti si aasha…”. However, not every girls’ desire gets fulfilled. With this new law, girls like Shilpa may find it hard to fight for their rights at different levels. But with the changed circumstances and proactive governance, road ahead is only going to empower women like her. Because, Law shows the way to society.
“…the laws of the land,
Are now by her side.
Challenges are many,
Gender, illiteracy and money.
Belief in the justice and courage to fight,
All it takes to make her future bright!!”
Veera Ki Daastan 