MANT is dedicated to prevent Child Marriage, Child Trafficking, Child Labour and Child Sexual Abuse. The organization participated and organized Child Marriage Free India Campaign in Bankura and Purulia district in West Bengal covering over 100 villages under the project.
The Campaign Activities included:
Moments of connecting MANT’s activities with the masses at the Manbhum Fair and Book Fair in Purulia.
Awareness at Local Fair in Purulia
Narrowcasting by Radio Nityananda Janavani 91.2 FM at 100 villages in Bankura and Purulia – Tableau campaign to stop child marriage-child labour-child trafficking-sexual harassment.
Pledge taking at Sabrakon Rashmela at Bankura.
‘Let’s March to School’ Campaign.
Awareness at Local Fair in Purulia
When people think there is no use of the school after 10th standard for girls, we feel the responsibility to reach them at Punisole Bankura.
Highlights of our efforts and milestones in securing access to justice for children. Witness the impact and hear stories of change from those we’ve helped.
Newspaper Reports
Child marriage is not just an age-old social evil, but also a heinous crime that robs children of their childhood. Child marriage is a “crime against children” that violates basic human rights, minor girls are forced to marry and live a life of mental trauma, physical and biological stress, domestic violence including limited access to education and increased vulnerability to domestic violence. The consequences of child marriage are severe and extensive. Some of the specific consequences include: early pregnancies leading to complications and higher rate of maternal mortality and death of infants, malnutrition among both the infant and the mother, increased vulnerability to reproductive health, disruption in girl’s education and thereby reduction in opportunities of her personal and professional development, domestic violence and abuse, limited decision making powers in the household, and mental health issues.
India’s Census 2011 revealed 12 million children were married before attaining the legal age, of which 5.2 million were girls. Globally, child marriage is identified as a crime and a menace that needs to be eliminated. It finds space in the UN Sustainable Development Goals, under target 5.3 of Goal 5 that states elimination of all harmful practices, such as child, early and forced marriage and female genital mutilation by 2025.
The latest National Family Health Survey (2019-21) shows that although there is a drop in the overall rate of child marriages, from 26.8% in the National Family Health Survey (NFHS 4) to 23.3% in NFHS-5, it is still high despite laws, programmes and schemes in place to address the issue.
Understanding the seriousness of the issue, the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India in W.P. Civil 382 of 2013 pronounced that the sexual intercourse committed by the husband upon his wife being under the age of 18 years with or without her consent can be constituted as rape. To address this, the most definitive and audacious commitment to end child marriage was made with the launch of Child Marriage Free India campaign.
Child Marriage Free India (CMFI) is a nationwide campaign led by women leaders and a coalition of more than 160 NGOs spanning more than 300 districts working to eliminate child marriage in India. CMFI is working to attain the tipping point of child marriage, after which the society does not accept this evil practice and that will happen when the prevalence of child marriage is brought down to 5.5% by 2030, from the current national prevalence rate of 23.3%. This is being done by initially targeting 257 high-prevalence districts and gradually focusing on all the districts of the country.
Child marriage results in child rape, resulting in child pregnancy, and in a large number of cases, may lead to child deaths. For decades, we have been losing generations of our children to child marriage. The Child Marriage Free India campaign has received extended support from various Departments and Institutions of over 28 States. So far, across India more than 5 crore people have taken the pledge to end child marriage over the last one year through the efforts of the Child Marriage Free India Campaign.
Know more visit Child Marriage Free India (CMFI) Campaign
Noted child rights activist, author, Supreme Court lawyer and founder of CMFI campaign, Bhuwan Ribhu has authored a book – ‘When Children Have Children: Tipping Point to End Child Marriage’ and put forth a framework advocating a sustainable, holistic and focused strategy with time-bound targets and measurable indicators to make India child marriage free by 2030. This book shows the path to eliminating child marriage in India within the next decade. As suggested by the author in the book, by adopting a systematic, highly focused, and intensive intervention model, over a phased timeline it is possible to reduce the national child marriage prevalence levels to 5.5% —the threshold, the tipping point, beyond which the prevalence is anticipated to diminish organically with reduced reliance on targeted interventions.
Tipping Point Methodology
The aim of reduction of 60% of child marriage (in each of the phases) is assumed to bring down the incidence of child marriage to 5.5% in the next 9 nine years from 2021, from the last available estimates i.e., NFHS-5, till 2030. An additional assumption is that such a focused and elaborate intervention against child marriage would have a ripple effect. The tipping point analysis has been divided into two phases. The first phase will extend over a period of six years, starting in 2021. Subsequently, the second phase will span over a three-year period. It is expected that the national average for child marriage prevalence (percentage women aged 20-24 who were married before 18 years) would decline from 23.3% to 13.7% if the prevalence of child marriage is reduced by 60% in the 257 high-prevalence districts in the first phase followed by a further reduction of 60% in all districts across the country.
In order to reach the Tipping Point, the author has proposed a strategy at national and district level.
Each case we have encountered so far is different from one another. This is not just a case but a learning process for us. Here, Ms. Durga Das (name changed, 15 years) tried to elope because her parents had fixed her marriage.
The family, neighbors, friends, the village and the society – all play a very important role in one child’s holistic growth and development – physical to psychological. But that day, in Chhayari village of district Bankura, when a father was trying to marry off his daughter who has not reached the legal age of marriage, every piece in the child’s surrounding perhaps connived to make that happen. Luckily for us, our ground staff, the community social worker (Role CSW) received this information during her field visit and reported it back with the necessary details; like the contact number of her father.
Could it be just one person’s job to prevent or prohibit? In this case, as we later came to know, Durga eloped because her family did not leave any choice for her. Her sister Lakshmi (name changed), who is just a year elder, was married before turning 18. She had seen Lakshmi suffer and return to her parents, unhappy.
When we tried to speak to the father over the phone he denied the information and disconnected it. A few minutes later we received a call from the local political leader. He wanted to know the source of our information and started threatening us with dire consequences, if we pursued the case.
Then we approached the BDO and the police of Taldangra (Block), Bankura. The Police facilitated a visit to Durga’s house. Our team took a detailed note about the family and their living conditions. We started counseling – on the child’s development, the associated risks in early conjugal behavior, the possible legal actions that are related to such early marriage, and the like. They were also told that they would be held responsible, if Durga eloped to avoid this marriage. Our team also sent across a message to Durga and asked her to come back home – we assured her that her family has been apprised and they would not force her any more.
Sometime later, we could finally meet Durga physically at her father’s house and had a conversation in private regarding everything about her present situation. Why did she elope? With whom? Durga confessed that her elder sister was married off without her consent. Lakshmi’s in-laws, as she learnt from later, were not good to her. Durga did not want to experience the same fate. So, she eloped with the boy she knew as her friend.
Both the sisters had dropped out of school at an early age and their family planned the marriage to lessen the burden of feeding them. Their father had five daughters and did not have a stable income. They did not have a pucca house to live in. We tried to draw their attention on continuing education and pick up a skill which can help them to contribute to their family income. So, once the official procedures were complete, we connected them with the local High school and helped their re-admission.
This incident had far reaching effects in the villages around. Villagers requested us to run an awareness campaign for the other adolescent girls and boys. Today, Durga and Lakshmi are going to the school and the school administration is careful enough to let them enjoy their privacy with dignity.
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