Chumki: Sharp decline in child marriage

A new nationwide multimedia campaign was launched to build awareness about ending child marriage on Monday. The campaigning was launched by the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs, and has been developed with technical and financial support from Unicef, Unfpa, and Government of Canada. State Minister for Women and Children Affairs Meher Afroz Chumki said child marriage has been declining this year: “So far the rate of child marriage under the age of 15 is 10.7%. This was 22.5% in 2016 and 62.8% in 2015. “While the rate of child marriage under the age of 18 is 47% this year and it was 59.7% in 2016 and 62.8% in 2016.” There has been no data presented on whether the new Child Marriage Restraint with the controversial special provision had any affect on the numbers. The special provision allows child marriage in “special cases” such as pregnancy out of wedlock in order to protect the “honour” of the child, that critics say will embolden rapists to marry their child victims. Representative of Unicef in Bangladesh, Edouard Beigbeder, said: “Recent evidence from different studies and surveys suggested a sharp downward trend in child marriage where the rates have declined rapidly below 50%.” According to Unicef, in 2016, Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) and Implementation, Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED) with support from Unicef conducted a real-time monitoring on the coverage of social services in Bangladesh, and among the 200,000 households interviewed, 35% of the women of age 20-24 years, reported that they got married before the age of 18. Speaking as the chief guest, Information Minister Hasanul Haq Inu said: “Child marriage is a crime against humanity. Campaigns like this is important because even after laws against child marriage, it still happening in Bangladesh. “Teenagers need to made aware of their sexual health and their rights and the harmful effects of child marriage needs to be spoken about openly.” Part of the campaign involves television and radio broadcasting of public service announcements and drama series surrounding issues of child marriage issues. In addition to print and broadcast, digital media like Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and mobile messaging will be used to create interactive platforms for young people and their parents. The ministry also launched a helpline, 109 that can be directly contacted regarding child marriages.