child marriage

A 63-year-old Christian priest in Ghana married a 12-year-old girl, sparking outrage over the African nation where legal age for marriage is 18.

Following the outrage, AajTak tweaked the headline removing the word “pujari” and inserting “padri”. However, AajTak’s X post still has the old headline. The said post has received severe criticism from social media users.

Earlier, the Assam government led by Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had launched a massive crackdown against child marriage with police arresting more than 4000 people across the state.

Instead of removing provisions pertaining to the marriage of minors from the legislation, the Congress govt in 2013 increased the registration charges for such marriages from 4 annas to ₹10.

In January this year, Himanta Biswa Sarma informed that Assam will be the third State in the country to implement the Uniform Civil Code (UCC).

In the state of West Bengal, around 41.4 percent of girls get married before their legal marriageable age which is 18 whereas 20.1 percent of boys get married before they attain the age of 21. The constantly increasing numbers are worrisome given that child marriages are a human rights violation and a recognized form of sexual and gender-based violence.

Crackdown against child marriage continues as Assam police on Tuesday, 3rd October, arrested more than 800 accused persons.

At least 17 fake qazis were apprehended in Assam’s Hailakandi district on September 13 amidst the crackdown on child marriages.

Hailakandi police have arrested a man involved in child marriage and rescued a minor girl along with an infant.

In a sweeping crackdown on child marriage in Assam, the police arrested around 2,044 people for their involvement in child marriage