Government should plan to extend the Girl Marrital age to 21 ?

The demand for raising the age of marriage of girls was being made for a long time. The cabinet has approved to make the minimum age of marriage for boys and girls the same i.e. 21 years. The existing law will be amended now to give it a legal form. The most important thing is that if this law is made then this rule will be applicable to all religions.

It is important that girls are not pushed into marriage early; marriage should not be compulsory for them to gain social and economic status. Yet, an increase in the minimum age of marriage to 21 years will be counterproductive. Girls have been shown to be greatly aspirational in the past decade. Particularly in the field of education, when given the right opportunity. The percentage of girls going on to higher education has increased, with only a small difference between the boys and girls. BPL families in these areas find it a great burden to send their girls to school. For them, the best option is to unburden themselves by getting her married.

The CEDAW meeting of 2003 was especially critical of countries that set different ages of marriage for men and women. Today, most countries have 18 as the age for both men and women. Those who allow girls below 18 to get married are Afghanistan, Pakistan, Qatar and Mali. The countries that have declared 21 as the age are Puerto Rico, Botswana, Hong Kong, Lesotho, Namibia, Philippines, Rwanda, Singapore, Zambia. No country in the developed Western world allows marriages below 18.

Now, to increase the age of marriage to 21 years would mean that girls will have no say in their personal matters until they are 21.

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