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Dated : Friday, September 21, 2012 |
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Give them support and child brides will fight back
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A child bride bears the trauma of becoming a mother even before she has lived her own childhood. Yet, such marriages continue to happen. There is always a grandparent in the family who is dying and who wants to see the child married
Aditi Bishnoi
The incidence of child marriages nationally is coming down. But the pace of change is excruciatingly slow: From 54 per cent in 1992-93 it came down to 43 per cent in 2007-08. According to the District Level Household and Facility Survey (DLHS)-3, 2007-08, in India, 43 per cent women aged 20 to 24 are married before they turn 18. These are girls who drop out of school, who are vulnerable to sexual violence and who may not survive their first pregnancy. The figures are self-explanatory: DLHS-3 reveals that 66.6 per cent girls aged between 15 and 19 are more likely to experience complications during childbirth as compared to 59.7 per cent women in the age group 30-34.
The story of Mallamma from Andhra Pradesh’s Muddanageri village in Kurnool district puts this threat in perspective. At 15, Mallamma was married off against her will. Initially, when her husband pestered her to have a child she resisted. But later, she gave in. Mallamma’s first child did not live for long. She then gave birth to two more children, neither of whom survived. Severe health complications followed, which resulted in a hysterectomy. Mallamma can never become a mother now.
Depressing though all this may be, there are also signs that balika vadhus, or child brides, are ready to put up a stiff fight against the injustice they have bearing in the name of tradition. Earlier this year in Jodhpur, when Laxmi Sargara, 18 stood in front of cameras with a court order that annulled her child marriage, she provided an insight into the transforming mindset of adolescent girls. After her grandmother passed away, Laxmi (1) was married off to Rakesh (3) as per a local custom that dictates that when an elderly relative dies a younger relative should get married to keep away the bad spirits.
This April, Sargara’s world was turned upside down when her husband’s parents showed up to claim her. Although she opposed the move, Sargara knew her parents would not be able to stand up to the social pressures, so she ran away and took refuge with a local civil society organization, which managed to get her marriage annulled under The Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006.
Sargara’s is one of the first cases of its kind in India and the fact that it happened in Rajasthan, where more than 50 per cent girls marry before they turn 18 (DLHS-3), is good news. Media reports quoted Sargara as saying, “I feel light and free since the annulment. …I would like to learn tailoring and start my own boutique... Eventually I will trust my parents to find me a good match… But it would be my choice. And as a human being I have that right.”
Saragara certainly does, as do other like her. According to Dr Shanta Sinha, Chairperson, National Commission for the Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR), “Girls detest child marriage. During my interactions, I have found each one revealing how they hated being alone with the man, how scared they were.” Sinha further points out that a child bride bears the trauma of becoming a mother even before she has lived her own childhood.
Yet, such marriages continue to happen. “There is always a grandparent in the family who is dying and who wants to see the child married. There are always parents who have ‘given their word’ and leave their daughters with no choice. Thankfully, this is a declining trend. Girls who get support are willing to speak up now,” she comments.
Sinha was part of a panel of eminent Indians and international personalities, who agreed to become champions to end child marriage at an event jointly hosted by The Elders and the Population Foundation of India (PFI) in Delhi earlier this year. Nobel Peace laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa, Chair of The Elders, had then memorably commented, “India is a great nation and will only benefit from enabling girls and women to play their full part in building the future of the country. Let girls be girls, not brides.”
Today, both encouragement and assistance is readily forthcoming, whether it’s through government initiatives or NGO networks. Experts and activists concur that the way out lies at two levels. There are long-term measures, like enforcing the laws on the right to education and the prohibition of child marriage.
There are also effective short-term solutions. Take Rajasthan’s successful campaign in the run up to Akha Teej this year. Deepak Kalra, Chairperson, Rajasthan State Commission for the Protection Child Rights, elaborates, “In Rajasthan, marriages are solemnised as per auspicious dates, called savas. This year, we asked a Hindu priest to give us the dates for these savas in advance. Akha Teej, one of the eight major savas, fell on April 24. We collaborated with the Women and Child Development department and mounted a large-scale campaign.”
From District Collectors to the police to anganwadi workers, everyone was involved. Control rooms were set up and the 1098 number was used to register calls of complaints. Local control room numbers were also publicised in schools. Complaints were accepted even in cases where the complainants were unwilling to reveal their identities. Reveals Kalra, “That week, we were able to prevent 1,400 weddings, which was the total number of weddings stopped in the whole year in 2011.”
Although Kalra is satisfied with this effort, she knows that the pace of activity and advocacy could slacken over time, so she emphasises the importance of providing quality education to girls. “Girls today want better opportunities in life. We need more schools at the village-level that give good education,” she asserts.
R Venkat Reddy, National Convenor of MV Foundation, a Hyderabad-based NGO working on education and protection of child rights in Andhra Pradesh, underlines the hurdles faced by girls accessing higher education, “In many villages, there are still hardly any schools for girls beyond Class Five in the immediate vicinity. This, combined with deficiencies like the lack of toilets and proper transportation, make parents reluctant to send their daughters to the higher classes.”
A possible solution to this problem has been found from within the community. Helping to keep girls in school are youth groups that have come up across the country. For instance, Andhra has Balika Sanghas, Rajasthan has Bal Manches and Bihar, Jagriti youth clubs. The NCPCR, too, has created a force of ‘Bal Bandhus’ (child rights’ defenders) in nine districts across the five states of Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra, that are facing acute civil unrest. Had it not been for the timely action taken by Mukesh Paswan, the Bal Bandhu of Parsauni Kapoor gram panchayat in East Champaran district, Bihar, Jyoti Kumari (13) Class Five student at Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidhayalaya in Patahi could not have escaped the common fate of illiterate child brides battling domestic violence.
In Andhra, besides rallies and public meetings, MV Foundation initiated an unusual youth group in 2006. In Rangareddy, Warangal, Kurnool and Nalgonda districts, it has mobilized the community with the help of young boys chosen because they were also potential grooms. “We were able to convince these boys to support us after child brides talked to them about the impact of such marriages on underage couples. Today, they go into different villages and convince panchayats to take action,” informs Reddy.
Stopping underage marriages is very much a work-in-progress. But there is hope because girls are increasingly seeking their own version of ‘Happily Ever After…’ Sinha concludes, “Child marriage has been stubborn to change. But greater bounce in the society, in terms of development, opportunities and education, will help girls to exercise agency and say, ‘No, I don’t want such a marriage’.”
Ultimately, says Sinha, every girl is capable of fighting her own battle, provided she has a life after it.
(Women’s Feature Service) |
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Scene changers: Why some districts do better
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Jajpur is the site of ancient Buddhist monuments and had even caught the eye of famous seventh century Chinese traveller Xuanzang - better known in India as Huien T’sang. Today, this district in the State of Odisha has more than its share of challenges. An estimated 95 per cent of its population of 1.82 million is rural, and there is widespread poverty.
It is commendable, therefore, that Jajpur was recently conferred the JRD Tata Memorial Award for the ‘best performing district’ in the ‘medium population’ category, from among 584 districts in the country. This was to recognize that it had made striking progress over the last decade on 13 developmental indicators, ranging from improved access to sanitation and adoption of modern contraceptive methods to ante- and post-natal care and immunization of children.
How did Jajpur manage to deliver significantly better on health, reproductive health and general development than its counterparts elsewhere in the country? Anil Kumar Samal, Jajpur’s collector and district magistrate, says it is all about “team work” and “sincere” implementation of government programmes. “We are able to keep girls in school longer and there are hardly any under-age marriages in Jajpur now. The free cycles we distribute to girls when they reach Class XII are such an attraction!”
Retention of girls in schools has innumerable positive impacts. Not only does it create a generation of more educated and socially aware women, it helps postpone the age of marriage and child bearing. Today, Jajpur has a female literacy rate of 73.7 per cent – which is nine per cent higher than the State average. It has also been able to bring down the number of women bearing over three children by 25 percentage points between the year 2002-2004 and 2007-08, going by District Level Household Survey (DLHS) data.
According to Samal, there has been a special focus on women of the child-bearing age. “Under Odisha’s ‘Mamata’ scheme we make a sum Rs 5,000 (US$1=Rs55) available to pregnant women to compensate for the loss of daily wages and to improve her dietary intake,” he says. These sums are transferred electronically into bank accounts in four stages - Rs 1,000 in the sixth month of pregnancy; Rs 1,500 in the ninth month; another Rs 1,500 after delivery, and a final installment of Rs 1,000, six months after the delivery. “We stagger these payments to ensure that the money is used for the benefit of the woman, and not to pay off a loan or something,” explains Samal.
Convergence is the new mantra in Jajpur. “It is all about team spirit. We have combined 13 departments so that they can impact each other’s programmes. Six months ago we gave the horticultural department a role in the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS). Vegetables grown by the horticulture department on government land were made available to local anganwadis for the benefit of mothers and children.”
Jajpur was one of six districts that won JRD Tata Memorial Awards this time – the others being Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh, Thoubal in Manipur, Ahmadnagar in Maharashtra, Firozpur in Punjab, and North Goa. Two states – Mizoram and Goa – were also recognised for their stellar performances.
It is the district of Varanasi that has had to overcome the biggest challenges, including the fact that it has the highest population – 3.8 million – among the award-winning states. But despite this, Varanasi has been able to raise its female literacy rate to 68.2 per cent, which is nine per cent higher than the state average. Also a larger number of women here are now marrying after attaining the legal age of 18, and the percentage of those with more than three children fell sharply from 52.8 to 18.8 per cent between the years 2002-2004 and 2007-08.
Saurabh Babu, the present District Magistrate of Varanasi, believes that personalized health care delivery is the key to change. “Today, our staff contact eligible families and conduct counselling sessions on issues like general health and contraception. We also make available health vouchers that entitle the poor to access free treatment in specially demarcated health facilities. We believe this approach has made a difference.”
Health is also a concern for Dr SK Karuna Raju, District Magistrate and Collector of Firozpur, which has won the award as a district falling in the “non high-focus state” category – ie, States that are relatively prosperous and have higher health outlays, as classified by the National Rural Health Mission. The approach that Firozpur adopted, and which seems to have borne results, is to track each case of conception through the pregnancy to at least a year after the child is born.
Reveals Raju, “Every child is registered at birth. Once a pregnant woman is brought in by the ASHA (Accredited Social Health Activist), all data on her – including anaemia levels, the number of ante-natal visits she has made, her weight gain, whether she has a history of post-partum haemorrhage, and so on – are entered into the computer and the progress tracked.” Weekly meetings are also held with the auxiliary nurse midwives (ANMs) and ASHAs.
These efforts have yielded results. Today, 80.6 per cent of women in this district have had safe deliveries, and it has achieved almost universal coverage in terms of immunisation of children. Interesting, too, is the fact that Firozpur is one of the districts in a state notorious for its low sex ratio to record an improvement in its sex ratio and child sex ratio between Census 2001 and 2011. But Raju is also concerned about the shortage of trained medical personnel, “The biggest problem we now face is the lack of doctors. Today, thanks to our counselling and outreach work, more and more women are seeking institutionalised care but keeping these facilities well-staffed is a big challenge.”
The new visibility of women in the public space has been a critical factor in achieving change. In both the districts of Ahmednagar and North Goa – winners of the award in the non high-focus states – there is a clear correlation between higher levels of female literacy and better social outcomes. And how did a district like Thoubal, that falls in the eastern half of the Manipur Valley, and which has often been a site of conflict, win the award for best performing district in the low population category among high-focus states?
According to K Radhakumar Singh, Thoubal’s deputy commissioner, the entire credit should go to local women. “We found that women were far more receptive to new ideas than the men. They are quick to understand and respond to government measures,” he reveals. Census and DLHS data bear his words out. While Thoubal’s female literacy rose from 52.50 per cent in 2001 to 67.57 per cent in 2011, the percentage of women who had had safe deliveries rose from 55 per cent to 84.4 per cent between 2002-2004 and 2007-08. Moreover, the percentage of ‘currently married women having an unmet need for family planning’ fell sharply from 70.7 per cent to 23.4 per cent in the same period.
Like Jajpur’s District Magistrate, Samal, Singh too believes in the need for government departments to work in synergy for best results. As he puts it, “The real challenge before us collectors is to achieve coordination and ensure that each department breaks free from the old practice of seeing its own activities as existing in a water-tight compartment.”
Awards, ultimately, are just another way of recognising the best, in the hope that it can inspire change. Each of the districts that won the JRD Tata Memorial Award has a story to tell the country, a story about how good governance and committed work can actually transform lives in the most challenging of situations.
( Women’s Feature Service)
Anuradha Sahni |
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Saving Mughal-era ponds in Agra
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With Agra losing its Mughal-era ponds to builders and a court issuing an order to save them, a citizen’s group, using Google Maps and land records, has been looking for the water bodies in city of the Taj Mahal.
The exercise was undertaken after an Allahabad High Court directive to Agra district authorities to ensure that the existing ponds did not fall prey to land grabbers. The court passed the order while hearing a public suit on lost community ponds in Agra, most of them grabbed by builders to construct apartments. The court, which will next hear the case Monday, also expanded the ambit of the suit.
A division bench consisting of Acting Chief Justice Amitava Lala and Justice PKS Baghel said a public suit “cannot be restricted to just one district. A copy of this order be circulated by the state to all the district authorities so that no land grabbing etc. by converting ponds will be allowed and if such action is initiated, that will be stopped till further order is passed by this court.”
The court also sought a status report from the Agra district magistrate about the filled-up ponds within two weeks besides those which continue to exist.
While the magistrate is still to act on the orders, the citizens’ group, consisting of environmentalists and professionals, completed the exercise of spotting the ponds and submitted the findings to the divisional commissioner to be forwarded to the court.
In January 2011, the court bench had issued contempt notices to top officials of the Agra administration, civic agencies and police over a petition alleging that several ponds in the city had been usurped by builders who had raised commercial complexes or houses on them.
In his petition, environmentalist DK Joshi had submitted a list of over 100 community ponds that were removed to make way for buildings over the years. The court issued the notice on January 7.
“The government agencies did not positively respond to the directions. Therefore, I approached the court which sent notices to officials to explain why action should not be initiated against them,” Joshi said.
Joshi said the city once had more than 400 ponds. “Now, only a handful are left. Most have been gobbled up by builders.”
In his petition, Joshi referred to a statement of the district magistrate who admitted that 92 ponds had been encroached upon but action had not been taken so far to free the ponds of illegal structures.
“In the Bodla area, the district urban development agency has constructed a building in the middle of a pond,” Joshi said.
Joshi had first filed his petition in 2005. The high court took note of it and directed the authorities to initiate action after a detailed survey. But nothing happened.
“The case has been hanging fire,” Joshi said.
As such, the citizen’ group has now prepared its own status report on the missing ponds.
“In their affidavit, district authorities had told the court that more than 40 ponds were restored and filled with water. We are contesting that claim with our report which has been prepared after spot surveys,” Sharad Gupta, who was part of the team, said.
“It is a criminal act to level water bodies and grab the land. Not just private builders, even government agencies have been doing that.,” alleged Shravan Kumar Singh, an activist.
KS Rana, an academic, said: “This is a unique initiative of civil society. Even before administrative officials could wake up, we had submitted our report.”
Brij Khandelwal |
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Too much time spent at work biggest regret for parents
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The biggest regret parents have about their children’s early years is spending too much time at work, a new study has revealed.
The study found that more than three quarters have at least one thing they regret doing or not doing, during this period.
Two thirds admitted that they would do things differently if they could have the time again.
Almost six in ten with more than one child said that they had changed their approach with their second child to make sure they did not end up with the same regrets, the Daily Mail reported.
More than a quarter had given advice to friends after they had children, so they didn’t feel the same way.
Seven out of ten felt they had taken their youngster’s childhood for granted.
More than two thirds said it was easy to forget they would not be young forever.
In addition to working too hard, the top five regrets included worrying too much about things that did not really matter, not playing with the children more, not going on more holidays and not taking enough photos.
More than half of parents said they regretted not having more quality time with their children when they were younger.
The survey of 2,000 parents found 63 per cent wish they had done more activities with their child.
“Things can seem simpler with hindsight, and it seems you definitely live and learn when you’re a parent,” Lauren Revell, from Huggies Little Swimmers, which commissioned the research, said.
“When your little ones are young, it’s easy to imagine your baby being that age forever. It’s only a few years down the line, as your children are getting older, that you really start to look back and wish you had done some things differently. When it comes to parenting, many mums and dads wish they could spend a little more quality time with their little ones, but given the pressures of daily life sometimes these opportunities can be lost,” Revell said. (Agencies) |
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