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| Child Marriage In Pakistan |
A girl under 18 gets married nearly every two
seconds somewhere in the world.
Child
marriage, as defined by UNICEF, is, “any formal marriage or informal union
between a child under the age of 18 and an adult or another child” and
occurs throughout the world.
Children
often have big and bold dreams, but by marrying them off even before they have
physically or emotionally made it to adulthood, we are cutting short those
dreams. By curbing this awful practice we will be one step closer to breaking
the cycle of poverty and unleashing the potential of girls worldwide.
CHILD
MARRIAGE RATE IN PAKISTAN:
Human rights violations ranging from forced disappearances, torture and suppression of freedom is a recurrent issue in Pakistan and Child Marriage is the worst of its kind. Pakistan ranks sixth in the world in terms of absolute numbers of child marriage.
Human rights violations ranging from forced disappearances, torture and suppression of freedom is a recurrent issue in Pakistan and Child Marriage is the worst of its kind. Pakistan ranks sixth in the world in terms of absolute numbers of child marriage.
- According to UNICEF, three percent of girls in Pakistan are married
before the age of 15, and 21% before 18.
- Sindh has the highest percentage of child marriages with 72% girls
and 25% boys becoming victims to this menace: WHO
Adding
to this nightmare, Pakistan has become a marriage market for the Chinese.
Hundreds of women and girls from Pakistan's Christian minority have been
trafficked to China as brides in the recent months. Pakistan’s deep patriarchal
society makes easier to lure desperately poor parents to sell their girls.
KEY DRIVERS OF SKY-HIGH CHILD MARRIAGE
RATE
Alongside the deeply entrenched gender norms in Pakistan, traditional customs like swara, (where girls are married off to resolve disputes or debt), Satta (bartering for brides), pait likkhi (marrying girls off before they are born or very young), family practices (34% of married 16-17 year old girls are married to a first cousin on their father’s side), dropping out of school early are a cause and consequence of child marriage in Pakistan.
Recently, Pakistan’s Senate has voted to raise the age girls can marry to 18 across the country of 210 million. While human rights activists welcomed the vote it faced enormous opposition from the religious parties. The Child Marriage Restraint (Amendment) Bill 2018 seeking to set minimum age for marriage at 18, faced a noisy protest from Pakistani Parliamentarians who termed it as against Sharia.
Pakistan needs better educated, healthier and happier women. Not child brides.
Alongside the deeply entrenched gender norms in Pakistan, traditional customs like swara, (where girls are married off to resolve disputes or debt), Satta (bartering for brides), pait likkhi (marrying girls off before they are born or very young), family practices (34% of married 16-17 year old girls are married to a first cousin on their father’s side), dropping out of school early are a cause and consequence of child marriage in Pakistan.
Recently, Pakistan’s Senate has voted to raise the age girls can marry to 18 across the country of 210 million. While human rights activists welcomed the vote it faced enormous opposition from the religious parties. The Child Marriage Restraint (Amendment) Bill 2018 seeking to set minimum age for marriage at 18, faced a noisy protest from Pakistani Parliamentarians who termed it as against Sharia.
Pakistan needs better educated, healthier and happier women. Not child brides.
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