‘Child Marriage Free India’ campaign launched in Assam

 Staff Reporter

GUWAHATI: Close on the heels of the crackdown against child marriages in the state, Assam Centre for Rural Development (ACRD), an NGO working on child rights and human trafficking in Assam, on Monday officially launched a ‘Child Marriage Free India’ campaign in Assam, with support from the Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation of America.

On October 16, 2022, Nobel Peace Laureate Kailash Satyarthi gave a clarion call to end child marriages in India. 76,000 courageous women leaders from across 7,028 villages in the country came forward to work for elimination of this evil practice and took pledge to make their communities child marriage free. The organization informed that around 1.9 crore people participated in the campaign in 2022, to make their communities child marriage free.

To continue the campaign, a coalition of NGOs from across the country, supported by the Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation of America, has launched the Child Marriage Free India campaign across 300 districts of India, including Assam, with the mission to make India child marriage free by the year 2030. The primary purpose of this campaign is to prevent and protect children from early marriage by ensuring effective implementation of the law, carrying out mass awareness and sensitization of the people.

In Assam, Chief Minister Dr. Himanta Biswa Sarma and his government had initiated a crackdown on child marriage in February 2023 to address the state’s poor health matrix. Arrests of thousands of accused were made in the first phase of the drive to serve as a deterrent to the practice of child marriage. Similarly, the second phase of the drive against child marriage began on October 2, in several districts such as Kokrajhar, Bongaigaon, Dhubri, Kamrup, etc and many people have also been detained this time around.

Under the Child Marriage Free India Campaign, a number of events and activities have been planned by the NGO in three districts of Assam— Baksa, Kamrup and Kamrup Metropolitan — including launching of a book titled: “When Children have Children- Tipping points to end Child Marriage”, written by Bhuwan Ribhu, a child rights advocate and an advocate in the Supreme Court of India. The organization will also hold rallies and candle light marches in Mushalpur, Tamulpur, Guwahati, Hajo, Moniari Tiniali, Borduar Bagan, Goroimari, Hajo, Rangia, and give badges to public personalities and government officials, including the Police, in support of ending child marriage in Assam.

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