Kamrup dist records 160 child marriages in 2019

  • | Tuesday | 19th February, 2019

Kamrup district, not very far from the city, has emerged as one of the areas with the most child marriages.Since the beginning of this year, the district has recorded 208 cases of children in distress, of which 160 were cases of child marriages. In the majority of such cases, the victims were lured into marriage.Mukleshwar Rahman, a Childline official working against child marriage, said, “We are attending to cases of child marriages in the district on a daily basis. Guwahati: Despite constant awareness programs, minor girls, mostly from rural and char areas of the state, continue to remain vulnerable to child marriage. They were rescued from forced marriages in Rajasthan and Gujarat too,” said Kamrup Police.The state’s social welfare department records show that the number of child marriage cases in the state have been escalating at a startling rate. “Many such girls have been rescued from flesh trade centres in Hisar, New Delhi, Bikaner and even several south Indian states.

Guwahati: Despite constant awareness programs, minor girls, mostly from rural and char areas of the state, continue to remain vulnerable to child marriage. Kamrup district, not very far from the city, has emerged as one of the areas with the most child marriages.Since the beginning of this year, the district has recorded 208 cases of children in distress, of which 160 were cases of child marriages. In the majority of such cases, the victims were lured into marriage.Mukleshwar Rahman, a Childline official working against child marriage, said, “We are attending to cases of child marriages in the district on a daily basis. Most of such cases were reported from Mandira, Nagarbera, Sontoli and Boko. This week, a 13-year-old was rescued before she was about to get married with a 34-year-old. She was lured into a relationship over a few phone calls. Taking advantage of her ignorance and innocence, the man forced her to elope with him.”Police suspect that in a number of such cases, minor girls are trafficked out of the state by agents who trap these girls and then take them away to Delhi, Gujarat, Haryana and other locations. “Many such girls have been rescued from flesh trade centres in Hisar, New Delhi, Bikaner and even several south Indian states. They were rescued from forced marriages in Rajasthan and Gujarat too,” said Kamrup Police.The state’s social welfare department records show that the number of child marriage cases in the state have been escalating at a startling rate. From 32 incidents in 2015-16, this number shot up to 96 in 2016-17. The next year, in 2017-18, it went up almost threefold to 317.“Child protection units are carrying out different activities, including distribution of information, education and communication materials, such as leaflets and posters, in every district to create awareness against child marriage,” said a social welfare department official.Besides Kamrup, districts like Goalpara, Barpeta, Cachar, Dibrugarh, Nagaon, Karbi Anglong, Jorhat, Lakhimpur and Tinsukia also show prevalence of child marriage.

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