Child marriage averted for 9 girls

A Prothom Alo Illustration
A Prothom Alo Illustration

Six underage girls were rescued from child marriage by the intervention of upazila administration in Sirajganj sadar on Friday. On the same day, two girls in Satkhira and one in Meherpur also were saved from child marriage.

Meanwhile in Barishal and Sherpur, the mobile court imprisoned and fined four persons, including the guardians and the prospective groom, on charges of carrying out child marriage.

According to Prothom Alo’s local correspondents, the local administration took action against these marriages and imposed fines on those responsible.

When Sirajganj upazila’s assistant commissioner (land) and executive magistrate Md Anisur Rahman got information of a 13-year-old girl being forced into marriage in an area of the pourashava, he arrived at the place and prevented the marriage.

Throughout the day and into the night he also halted five other child marriages and through the mobile court, imposed fines totalling Tk140,000.

Administrative head of the Satkhira committee for the prevention of child marriage, Sakibur Rahman, on Friday said that they had heard that the marriage of a minor girl would take place that night at a village of Jhaudanga union of the sadar upazila.

Along with members of the child marriage prevention committee and other eminent persons of the locality, they arrived at the girl’s house and determined that both the girl and the boy were underage, the girl being 13 and the boy 14, he added.

The committee members explained the incorrectness of child marriage and prevented it. After that they prevented yet another marriage being arranged between a 16-year-old girl and an 18-year-old boy in the same area.

Meanwhile on Friday night, upazila assistant commissioner (land) in Meherpur, Main Uddin, prevented the marriage of a 15-year-old girl in a village of Gangni upazila. The mobile court fined the prospective groom Tk 5000.

The Upazila Nirbahi Officer (UNO) of Hijla, Barishal said he came to know that a fake birth certificate had been used to marry off a 17-year-old girl and he arrived at the groom’s house on Friday afternoon. The groom and his father were fined Tk 30,000.

In Nakla, Sherpur, a mobile court sentenced a man to seven-day in prison for marrying off his 13-year-old daughter.