{"id":62316,"date":"2025-12-22T18:14:48","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T12:44:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/?p=62316"},"modified":"2025-12-22T18:16:53","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T12:46:53","slug":"india-stand-on-child-marriage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/22-12-2025\/india-stand-on-child-marriage","title":{"rendered":"Where Does India Stand on Child Marriage?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Syllabus: GS1\/ Social Issues<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>In News<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Despite a strong legal framework and multiple schemes tackling Child marriage in India, India is still off-track to fully eliminate child marriage by the 2030 SDG deadline.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Concept, Trend and Legal Framework<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Definition: <\/strong>Child marriage refers to any marriage in which at least one party is below 18 years of age; globally, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child defines a child as any human below 18 years.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>NFHS data: <\/strong>The proportion of women aged 20\u201324 years married before 18 declined from about 47.4% (2005\u201306, NFHS-3) to 26.8% (2015\u201316, NFHS-4) and further to 23.3% (2019\u201321, NFHS-5).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>State variation:<\/strong> Eight states are above the national average; West Bengal, Bihar and Tripura have over 40% of women 20\u201324 years married before 18, making them among the worst performers.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Indian law: <\/strong>The Prohibition of Child Marriage Act (PCMA), 2006 defines a \u201cchild\u201d as a male below 21 years and a female below 18 years, and a \u201cchild marriage\u201d as a marriage where either party is a child.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Child Marriage Prohibition Officer:<\/strong> Under Section 16, states appoint these officers to prevent child marriages, collect evidence for prosecution, create awareness and maintain statistics.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Major Factors<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Poverty and economic insecurity:<\/strong> Poor households often see early marriage as a way to reduce economic burden and \u201csecure\u201d a girl\u2019s future<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Patriarchy and gender norms:<\/strong> Girls\u2019 education and autonomy are devalued; they are pushed into unpaid domestic labour and early marriage to uphold family \u201chonour\u201d.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Socio\u2011cultural and religious practices:<\/strong> In some communities, marrying girls before or soon after puberty is considered auspicious.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img data-dominant-color=\"c4b7b5\" data-has-transparency=\"false\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"556\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-120-1024x556.png\" alt=\"where does india stand on child marriage?\" class=\"not-transparent wp-image-62317\" style=\"--dominant-color: #c4b7b5; width:368px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-120-1024x556.png 1024w, https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-120-300x163.png 300w, https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-120-768x417.png 768w, https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-120.png 1384w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Initiatives<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The <strong>Prevention of Child Marriage Act<\/strong> was passed in 2006, and national child marriage rates have halved since then.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The <strong>Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 <\/strong>has also helped prevent child marriage.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Beti Bachao Beti Padhao (BBBP) <\/strong>aims to improve the child sex ratio and promote girls\u2019 education.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>District\u2011level models<\/strong> (e.g., Panchayats declaring themselves \u201cchild marriage\u2011free\u201d) use community monitoring, school\u2011based vigilance and local campaigns to deter such marriages.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>States cash transfers and scholarship schemes to encourage girls schooling.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>India is party to the UN Convention on the <strong>Rights of the Child and has endorsed the 2030 Agenda<\/strong>, including SDG Target 5.3 to eliminate child, early and forced marriage.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source: TH<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><strong>In News<\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">Despite a strong legal framework and multiple schemes tackling Child marriage in India, India is still off-track to fully eliminate child marriage by the 2030 SDG deadline.<\/li>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><strong>Concept, Trend and Legal Framework<\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">Definition: Child marriage refers to any marriage in which at least one party is below 18 years of age; globally, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child defines a child as any human below 18 years.<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">NFHS data: The proportion of women aged 20\u201324 years married before 18 declined from about 47.4% (2005\u201306, NFHS-3) to 26.8% (2015\u201316, NFHS-4) and further to 23.3% (2019\u201321, NFHS-5).<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">State variation: Eight states are above the national average; West Bengal, Bihar and Tripura have over 40% of women 20\u201324 years married before 18, making them among the worst performers.<\/li>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/22-12-2025\/india-stand-on-child-marriage\" class=\"btn btn-primary btn-sm float-end\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62316","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62316","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62316"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62316\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62321,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62316\/revisions\/62321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62316"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62316"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62316"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}