Family members of 12-year-old Sharmin (not real name) have completed all the arrangements. This is one of their repeated attempts to marry their daughter off forcefully.
Fortunately, the juvenile girl manages to escape the marriage bid, thanks to the direct intervention of the then Nageshwari Upazila Nirbahi Officer (UNO) after being informed by the Youth Forum, a local platform to prevent child marriage formed by an international NGO - Plan International Bangladesh.
Sharmin is now an eleventh grader, and it has been possible only because of the whole-hearted support from the Youth Forum and the upazila administration.
This is how Arzin Akter, a member of the Youth Forum, narrated the story of child marriage prevention. She herself has foiled nine child marriage attempts with the help of the upazila administration.
Like her, many school and college students under the platform have been running an awareness campaign to fight this serious social menace, Akter added.
Another member of the group Arin Rahman Tari, a ninth grader of Nageshwari Government High School, told the FE that their team is working to make people aware of the negative effects of child marriage. As part of the awareness campaign, the school group of the Youth Forum arranges some competitions, like bicycle race, to help strengthen their moral development, she said.
Members of the group have made garden on their school compound, separate prayer, common, and wash rooms for girls. They also work to solve various problems the schoolgirls face in their everyday life, Tari added.
Tari said, “child marriage is a social disease. As a result of early marriage, girls face extreme health risks. Many of them die because of adolescent pregnancy complications. Some others have stillbirth or give birth to disabled children. Besides, many young mothers and their newborns suffer from malnutrition.”
Reminding that the legal marriage age for girls is 18 in our country, Belbari Union Forum Vice-president Showmi Sarker said, “many of our girls fall victims to child marriage either by their family members or the society forcefully and secretly.”
She said the forum is working with the local administration jointly to resist the social menace.
Sarker herself has resisted five child marriage bids so far, she told the FE.
During a recent visit to the child-marriage prone areas, Arzin and Showmi told this correspondent about their success stories and active roles in preventing child marriage.
Some other girls like Mira Saha, Mita Begum, and Dulali Parvin also shared their stories.
Nageshwari Upazila Nirbahi Officer Shankar Kumar Biswas told the FE that he gave his phone number to the school and college students who are working to stop child marriage.
“The moment they will come to know about a child marriage bid, I asked them either to call me or send an SMS,” Biswas said lauding their role in the noble cause.
They would do everything possible to prevent child marriage in the upazila, Biswas said.
The upazila administration always remains supportive and has stopped 91 child marriage attempts from 23 October 2017 to 22 September 2018, the UNO further added.
He also informed child marriage has decreased by 70 per cent in the upazila.
When contacted, Abdus Shahid Mahmood, director of Bangladesh Shishu Adhikar Forum (BSAF), a platform of child rights organisations, said despite the progress of Bangladesh on social development, there has not been much change in people’s mindset with respect to child marriage.
“Our country still tops the table in child marriage in Asia and ranks fourth in the world,” the BSAF director told the FE.
He urged the government to be more active in preventing this social menace.
According to the available data of BSAF, a national network of 267 non-government organisations, 130 children were rescued from child marriage by the authorities concerned across the country during the January-October 2018 period.
Besides, 325 children were rescued from child marriage across the country from 2016 to 2017.
According to a 2016 report the United Nations Children's agency UNICEF found that 52 per cent of girls in Bangladesh are married off before the age of 18.
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