Bangladesh’s new child marriage law that has a special provision allowing marriage of minors has raised new concerns in the country, which has one of the highest rates of child marriages in the world.
The ‘Child Marriage Restraint Bill 2017’, passed in Parliament on February 27, puts boys below 21 years of age and girls below 18 years in the under-age category, saying any marriage below the legal age will be considered ‘child marriage’ and be punishable. However, the same law states marriages involving under-age brides or grooms will not be considered an offence, provided they take place with the consent of a court in “special circumstances”.
Women organisations and rights groups have raised concerns against the law saying the provision of “special circumstances” would allow parents to get a court order and marry their children off before they reach the minimum marriageable age. As no age limit is specified in the law for marriages under “special circumstances”, they say, there are chances for minor to be victimised.
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“The special provision will encourage child marriages rather than stopping it,” says Sultana Kamal, a human rights activist in Dhaka.
Bangladesh has the highest child marriage rates in Asia. Over half (52%) of girls get married before 18 and almost one-fifth (18%) are married off before 15 in the country.
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Legal loopholes
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“This is a completely contradictory law and will risk the lives of our girl children,” says gender expert Fawzia Khondker Eva, who stressed that loopholes in the new law would be detrimental to efforts to prevent child marriages. Executive Director of the Bangladesh Mahila Ainjibi Samity Advocate, Salma Ali, says: “I am shocked. We are not going to accept such a special provision. We will go to the court”.
However, the government argues that such concerns have no basis.