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Of innocence robbed Mehrin Lubna and Tahmina Shafique unravel the curse of child marriages in Bangladesh, exploring its social and cultural roots and building a case for why we need to combat it artwork by Shibu Kumar Shill It was two years ago, year eleven-year-old Bilkis Begum took her biggest step towards adulthood. The young girl from Lalmonirhat, 390km northwest of Dhaka, was oblivious of the consequences of marriage and submitted to her parents’ wish that she should be married off. She had never seen the groom, nor was she aware of what was expected of her at her in-laws’, or even what kind of people they are. Her mother explained to Bilkis that she was lucky to be able to get married at such an early age, especially given her family’s financial and social status. She was not allowed to know about the negotiations her father had made with her father-in-law. The festive mood in the family and the sudden affection and care with which her every whim was now treated made her feel that perhaps her life was about to change for the better.    Unfortunately, Bilkis’ realised soon after she arrived at her in-laws’ place that she was no longer treated as a child. She was frequently beaten, abused, and expected to shoulder the burden of the household work. At thirteen she found herself pregnant.    Bilkis suffered from ailments arising out of her pregnancy at such a tender age. Neither her husband nor her in-laws seemed to care. As she started complaining and protesting when she was mistreated, the abuse increased. Earlier this year, she was cast out of her in-laws house after a particularly vicious beating, soon after she gave birth to her daughter. Her parents, her husband told her, had failed to pay the dowry.    All that she brought back home were horrifying memories and seven month old daughter Jeba.    ‘Back then I did not know what the actual meaning of marriage was. I had no idea that my life would change so dramatically. It became worse when I was forced to have sex with my husband, something I had no idea about,’ says Bilkis.    Her in-laws, she said, tortured her regularly because her father had not been able to pay the dowry, fixed at Tk 30,000. The thirteen year old would be beaten up and sometimes had to spend days without eating even when she was pregnant. ‘Sometimes I just wanted to die.’    Bilkis was finally turned out of the house when she gave birth to a daughter, she says still struggling to hold her tears back.    Like Bilkis, many girls of her village suffered the same fate. At village Mogholhat in Lalmonirhat, it is a tradition to get girls married as early as possible. ‘From the time of birth, parents begin to look for a groom for their daughter. There is no regard of his age or family. Sometimes, young children are even married to men who have married several times,’ says Bilkis. Predictably, most girls meet the same fate as Bilkis.    Child marriage, especially for girls, is not only a problem in the remote villages. It is a common phenomenon in the numerous slums of Dhaka where a girl child remains a burden, an extra mouth to feed, to parents.    Like Bilkis, Jahanara had been married when she was 12. Jahanara used to live in a slum in Banani. She had her first child two years later. The following year her husband left her and remarried.    Since then she has been working at a garment factory for 15 hours a day to provide for her daughter. ‘I don’t live for myself anymore. I live for my daughter. Everything that I am doing today is only to make sure that she gets all the opportunities that I did not. I just don’t want my daughter to have the same life as I did,’ says Jahanara, a grave resignation for a 19-year-old, who by 21st century standards should only be starting her life as an adult.    Early marriage has been a major social problem for Bangladesh for centuries perhaps, given the cultural customs and traditions. Despite the obvious consequences of early marriage, a large number of people, especially among the poor, continue to perpetuate the practice.    Children, mostly girls, are married without being asked consent, which even if it were sought would be ludicrous considering their age. According to a worldwide research on child- and early-marriage by the UNICEF, the United Nations Children’s Fund, Bangladesh has one of the highest percentages of marriage among girls before 18 years of age.    Statistics indicate that among the 28 million adolescents in Bangladesh, five per cent of the girls between 10 and 14 years and 48 per cent of those between 15 and 19 are married. Furthermore, it has been found that approximately 50 per cent of these married girls had no knowledge of their families’ negotiations on their marriages.    The research carried out by UNICEF studied both, physical and emotional consequences of early marriages. It identifies child marriage as the direct violation of child rights and presents three key concerns — the denial of childhood and adolescence, the curtailment of personal freedom and the lack of opportunity to develop a full sense of selfhood as well as the denial of psychosocial and emotional well-being, reproductive health and educational opportunity.    ‘For both boys and girls, early marriage has devastating physical, emotional and intellectual consequences,’ says Carol Bellamy, executive director of UNICEF.    ‘The practice virtually ends a child’s chances of pursuing education or exploring professional and social life opportunities. For girls, the end result of child marriage is almost invariably premature pregnancy,’ she says. According to Bellamy, the risks of early pregnancy and childbirth are well documented and include high risk of death, premature labour, complications during delivery, low birth-weight, and a higher chance that the newborn will not survive. ‘We have been trying, with very little success, for years now to end the silent despair of thousands of children in Bangladesh and other countries, especially girls, who are being shuttered, away in lives often full of misery and pain,’ Bellamy laments.    Although societies have often identified the practice of child marriage as a social evil for ages, the numbers have hardly decreased. The UNICEF report lists poverty as the primary reason for early marriage. In Bangladesh, for example, poverty-stricken parents who can no longer afford to take care of their daughters are persuaded to part with them through marriage. ‘Parents often use early marriage as a strategy for economic survival. In families that are very poor, a daughter may be seen as an economic burden that must be shed through marriage as early as possible,’ says Bellamy. ‘Similarly, the economic gains incurred through the marriage of a daughter may also be an important motivating factor for poor families. On the other hand, parents are usually very considerate about their sons. Sons are often viewed as sources of income in the future and as a result, they are treated differently. While daughters are married off as soon as possible, sons are given better care and education,’ she says.    Advocate Mohammed Yeasin Khan of the Supreme Court echoes these views. He explains that getting a girl to marry early is one way to ensure her security and protection. Some parents also feel that marriage places their daughter firmly under male control and verifies that the children she bears are legitimate. ‘Girls in their teenage years often find themselves to be victims of exploitations and assaults. Thus fearing social disgrace, the parents wed off their daughters early,’ he adds.    According to Advocate Masuda Rehana Begum of Bangladesh Mahila Parishad, a watchgroup that works to protect the rights of women, there is more behind early marriages than simply poverty or security of daughters. ‘The custom of arranging marriages for daughters as early in their lives as possible has age old roots. Our traditional norms that are passed on by the mothers to their daughters, portrays an ideal woman as the one who let go of all her desires and dedicates herself into taking care of her husband only regardless of the fact of how he treats her,’ she says. ‘Actually, women in our society have always been seen as a weaker individual who cannot live without a man’s support. Right from the moment a baby girl is born in a family, her parents suffer from a deep sense of insecurity and thus to escape from this feeling they try to get her married as soon as possible. Even today, to many parents, a girl’s life is considered meaningless and incomplete, unless of course she is married!’    Whatever maybe the true reason behind early marriages, its effects on the health of young children is alarming. Early marriage is the direct or indirect cause of many health related problems and diseases among young women, often leading to death. In fact death due to untimely pregnancy is still a statistic that mars the otherwise impressive strides Bangladesh has made in health care.    ‘Pregnancy related deaths are the leading cause of mortality for 15-19 year old girls worldwide and at present Bangladesh has the world’s highest rate of maternal mortality which is 4.5 per 1,000 live births,’ says Dr Parveen Sultana a gynaecologist at Dhaka’s reputed Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical Hospital. ‘The risks of early pregnancy and child birth not only increases the risk of the mother dying of premature labour but it also creates complications during delivery and the chance of the newborn’s survival becomes exceedingly slim.’    She further points out that child marriages may put girls at an increased risk of HIV or other sexually transmitted infections (STI’s). ‘Young girls usually get married to men who are much older. As a result, in many cases, the men, who have had other sexual relationships act as the carriers of the virus and pass it on to the girls. Thus, without being aware of it, the girls become infected with the virus. Unfortunately, the eventual sufferers are their children.’    Although often overlooked, another major casualty of early marriages is the education of married children. Most girls are forced to stop their education after marriage. This is due to the socially accepted belief that all the responsibilities of a girl are inside the house. As a result, girls become completely dependent upon their husbands. This leaves them in a helpless predicament in case the marriage breaks down as they do not have the qualifications to be financially independent.    The consequences of early marriage reach beyond the lives of young married girls themselves to the children they give birth to. Poor infant and child health outcomes are strongly associated with the early age of mothers, due in part to young women’s physical vulnerabilities and in part to the lack of social and reproductive health services for this high-risk group of Bangladesh. In most cases, infants and children of mothers who give birth to them before the age of 20 face consistently higher mortality rates even through to the age of five. Those who make it past that are often denied of proper education and guidance. Young girls unsurprisingly fail to play the role that is expected from them and cannot carry out their responsibilities efficiently.    Joynal, the six year old son of two very young parents in a Dhaka slum, is the innocent victim of an early marriage between his parents. From the time of his birth, he has been suffering from various illnesses. Furthermore, his young parents have failed to earn enough for his education. ‘There is hardly enough money in the family to pay for food. Besides, I have to spend a lot of money behind my child’s heath. I wish I was older so that I could earn more and give my wife and son a better life. It was foolish of me to marry so early according to my parents wish. I think early marriage is not only a mistake but also a crime,’ explained Nazrul, only 23 years old with a son of six.    Despite such obvious drawbacks of early marriages the measures being taken to prevent it are in no way drastic. It may probably be due to the fact that people differ in their attitudes towards early marriage. More importantly, the laws concerning early marriage are too old and simply not sufficient to deal with the problem. The only available act that deals with the marriage of under aged children is the Child Marriage Restraint Act 1948 (CMRA). The Act defines a child as a male under 21 years or a female under 18 years old. According to Section 4 of the Act, the maximum punishment for a male marrying a child younger than 18 years is simply a fine of taka 1,000 and one month’s imprisonment. Section 6 has similar punishments for other people involved in the marriage like the parents of the children and the kazi who administers the marriage.    ‘It can be said without any doubt that the so-called law is not at all effective, because it is a toothless and anomaly-ridden law. Moreover, how many people are aware of the consequences of marrying early?’ asks Dr Faustina Pereira of the Dhaka-based NGO Ain O Shalish Kendra, which has built a reputation in working to establish rights for women and children. She further points out that the law has no punishment for the girls involved in early marriages although there are cases when the girls have a big role to play in early marriages and therefore bear part of the blame.    The most crucial drawback of the law is the fact that although it punishes those involved in arranging a child marriage, it does not judge the validity of the marriage. ‘This is where the main anomaly of this law lies. Though the Child marriage is punishable under this Act, this Act does not invalidate the marriage. If child marriages are to be seriously stopped, the laws definitely need modification and people have to be made aware of the laws,’ says Pereira.    The question, however, still remains as to simply the modification of laws can effectively prevent child marriages or not. The measures that are to be taken must not only prevent parents from arranging early marriages for their daughters but should also provide them with alternatives. A US-based International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) study on Bangladeshi women revealed that when jobs are available to girls, both daughters and parents become interested in delaying marriage. The IRCW study by Sanyukta Mathur and Margaret Greene reports that the readymade-garments industry in Bangladesh has played an important role in extending the period before marriage, while at the same time providing young women with the means to earn a living. The report also reveals that unlike most neighboring countries hardly any step is being taken in Bangladesh to promote education among young girls so as to prevent their early marriage.    Wiping out the tradition of child marriage from Bangladesh requires much more attention from the government than is being currently given, say experts. More importantly, the social belief about girls being the weaker gender has to change, they say. ‘The old Bengali saying which observes: ‘Caring for a daughter is like watering a neighbour’s tree summarizes the attitude of people towards women in this country. It reflects the view that it is a waste of resources to invest in a daughter who will be ‘lost’ to another family through marriage,’ wrote Janet Reynor a researcher on women’s rights working for the UK-based charity OXFAM. ‘It is vital for the future of a country that children receive the rights they deserve and are not burdened with the curse of marriage at a very early age.’