Daily Times

Marriage is a precious bond between a woman and a man. Marriage at an early age is a tough challenge for the spouses, especially for a girl. The sudden shift in roles, responsibilities and environment create a lot of stress. Immaturity, physical as well as psychological, is a serious hurdle to successfully dealing with the emerging demands and can lead to problems like depression, sepsis and obstructed labour.

The problems are entirely preventable. The problem is rooted in social, cultural, economic and religious factors. Educating girls and making them self-reliant is key to a solution.

Most early marriages and child marriage are directly attributable to deep-rooted gender inequalities and traditional practices. The close relationship between female chastity and family honour forces many parents to marry girls at an early age. This is done to prevent sexual transgressions and the consequent damage to the family reputation. The conceptualisation of a girl child as ‘another’s property’ prevents some parents from investing in their daughters’ education. Such daughters are married off at an early age to relieve parents of their burden.

Child marriage is at times sought to be justified on religious basis.

In certain peculiar situations, it takes place under what is known as dand or badla in Sindh, vani in Punjab, and swara in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the Tribal Areas. In this practice, the family of a person accused of a serious crime gives its girl(s) in marriage to the aggrieved family to prevent or settle a blood feud. The women and girls so married live in a hostile environment and are treated as daughters or relatives of the enemy.

The fate of the bill laying down 18 years as the minimum age for marriage now lies in the hands of the National Assembly speaker

The Muslim Family Laws Ordinance 1961 (No VIII) effective July 15, 1961, raised the permissible minimum age for a girl to be married from 14 to 16 years, and lowered it for a man male from 21 to 18 years. The law was limited in its scope to Muslim citizens. The age for non-Muslim citizens remained unchanged. The Act, after being amended by the 1961 Ordinance, states that whoever being a male above 18 years of age contracts a marriage with a girl, less than 16 years old, shall be punishable with simple imprisonment extending up to a month, or with a fine extending up to Rs 1,000, or with both.

The fate of the bill laying down 18 years as the minimum age for marriage now lies in the hands of the National Assembly speaker, Asad Qaiser. It is his prerogative to decide which standing committee he refers it to for deliberation and approval. The Child Marriage Restraint (Amendment) Bill 2018, introduced by Sherry Rehman of the Pakistan Peoples Party, and passed by the Senate amid a noisy protest by religious parties and some members of the Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf on April 29, is now required to be submitted to the National Assembly for its passage. The National Assembly is required to pass the bill in 90 days after its presentation.

Cracks in the political parties in the National Assembly over the issue were exposed when Dr Ramesh Kumar Vankwani of the PTI managed to introduce a similar legislation. Speaking on behalf of Interior Minister Brig Ijaz Shah and Religious Affairs Minister Noorul Haq Qadri, Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Ali Muhammad Khan, had opposed the bill in the Senate as well as on the introduction of a similar bill by Dr Ramesh Kumar in the National Assembly. He had called it un-Islamic.

The introduction of the bill in the National Assembly had aggravated the problem as Human Rights Minister Dr Shireen Mazari argued in support of the bill, and asked the chair to refer it to the committee concerned.

The two bills are expected to be sent to the same committee and be clubbed.

The chances of sending the bill to the committee on religious affairs are remote. If the speaker refers it to the religious affairs committee its passage would be impossible. The committee is headed by Asad Mahmood of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam. The religious affairs minister is an ex-officio member of the committee.

The PPP and the religious parties have taken a clear stance on the two bills. Voting in the Senate and at the time of its passage and then in the National Assembly at the time of the introduction of a similar bill has caused polarisation between conservative and liberal members within the PTI and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz.

The provincial assembly of Sindh has passed a similar bill, and it was not challenged or opposed at any forum.

The National Assembly cannot pass the bill without the support of religious parties.

The writer is a freelancer