Nothing can emancipate the teenage girls of the country from the social curse that is child marriage.
The government has taken many initiatives including promulgating the anti-child marriage law, introducing marriage and birth registration, and providing stipends geared towards educating and raising awareness – but these efforts have been in vain.
The existing law in the country prohibits the marriage of girls under the age of 18, but the reality is that more than 66% of the girls in the country under that age are forced to get married.
In rural areas of the country, 85% if girls have to get married before the age of 16.
According to official figures, 16m girls give birth to children before the age of 18, a third whom are aged between 13 and 15.
Public health experts said the various initiatives taken by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare to prevent child marriage had been going down the gutter due to a lack of monitoring and supervision.
They also said young girls are facing various health hazards like fistula and many other long term diseases due to premature pregnancy resulting from unabated child marriage.
Moreover, many girls face various kinds of social and psychological problems, and many die when giving birth, before reaching the age of 18.
Seeking anonymity, a number of officials of the Directorate General of Family Planning told the Dhaka Tribune that adolescent pregnancy was not the only big reason behind maternal mortality.
They said the fact that the government has still not succeeded in ensuring midwifery services for all pregnant women in the country was one of the big contributing factors to maternal mortality.
They also said an alarming 70% of women in the country do get the supervision of a trained midwife during childbirth.
According to the Bangladesh Maternal Mortality Survey 2010, 1.94 mothers die in every 1,000 children who are born in the country. Nine years ago the rate was 3.2.
Although the rate of maternal mortality has reduced, experts say the rate is a lot less than expected.
According to the last population census conducted by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, teenage boys and girls constituted 23% of the country’s population.
Health Minister AFM Ruhul Haque said since the teenage girls do not have adequate knowledge about sex, they are often forced to take part in intercourse against their will, which results in unwanted pregnancies.
Saying that there is no alternative to building a social movement to stop child marriage, the minister urged people from all walks of life to come forward in making the girls self-reliant in every sphere of the economy and the society as a whole.
The minister made the remarks in a press briefing at the ministry on Wednesday, organised on the eve of the World Population Day.
Just like other countries in the world, Bangladesh too is observing the World Population Day 2013 with a special focus on “Adolescent Pregnancy.”
To mark the day, the government has chalked out elaborate programmes including rallies, discussions, seminars, prize giving ceremonies, special services at the healthcare facilities and film shows.
In the written statement that he read out in the briefing, the health minister also said adolescent pregnancy was not just a health related problem; issues surrounding strategic and institutional failure to address poverty, gender discrimination, forced child marriage, violence, disparities in power distribution between the sexes and illiteracy were responsible.
Amir Hossain, director general of the Directorate General of Family Planning (DGFP), said married teenage girls often become pregnant just after marriage because they do not have any idea about contraceptives.
These girls, who are neither mature enough to be mothers or wives, as well as their infants, die in large numbers, he said.
Claiming that the DGFP had taken various programmes to prevent child marriage and raise awareness, he called upon the other ministries of the government and the civil society members to come forward in helping the country out of the situation.
Professor Dr Khondaker Md Shefyetullah, director general of the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS), said in order to reduce the rates of adolescent pregnancy and maternal mortality, the usage of contraceptives and family planning tools must be augmented.