TOPIC – Age and marriage
Good intent does not guarantee favorable outcomes. Coercive laws without wide societal support often fail to deliver even when their statement of objects and reasons aims for the larger public good. Within days of the Union Cabinet approving a proposal to rise the age of marriage for women from 18 to 21 years, the same age as for men, the Government listed it for legislative business in Parliament this week. If passed, various personal and faith-based laws which govern marriages in India now, including The Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, the Special Marriage Act, 1954, and the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006, will have to be amended. In her Budget speech last year, Finance Nirmala Sitharaman had announced that the Government would set up a task force to look into the age of a girl entering motherhood with an aim to lower maternal mortality rates, improve nutrition levels as well as ensure opportunities to women to pursue higher education and careers. With these targets in mind, a panel headed by former Samata Party chief Jaya Jaitly was set up in June last year. The panel submitted its report in December 2020. Though the objective looks good on paper, merely rising the age of marriage without creating social awareness and improving access to health care is unlikely to benefit the community it wants to serve: young women not yet financially independent, who are unable to exercise their rights and freedoms while still under the yoke of familial and societal pressures. According to Ms. Jaitly, raising the age of marriage is one of its recommendations, which include a strong campaign to reform patriarchal mindsets, and improve access to education. As per the National Family Health Survey (20192021), 23.3% of women aged 2024 years married before 18, which shows that the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006, has not been wholly successful in preventing child marriages, especially among the poor. Women’s rights activists point out that parents often use this Act to punish their daughters who marry against their wishes or elope to evade forced marriages, domestic abuse, and lack of education facilities. Hence, within a patriarchal setting, it is more likely that the change in the age limit will increase parents’ authority over young adults. A good, but not easy, way to achieve the stated objective is to take steps to counsel girls on early pregnancies and provide them the network to improve their health. The focus must be on creating social awareness about women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights, and ensuring girls are not forced to drop out of school or college. Laws cannot be a shortcut in the path to social reform.
The Hindu Editorial Words with meanings, synonyms, and antonyms
Amended (adjective) – Not complete or absolute
Synonyms – Moderated, adapted, provisory, codicillary, hypothetical
Antonyms – Degenerated, unseemly, arrant, decisive, unconstrained
Opportunities (noun) – A time or set of circumstances that makes it possible to do something
Synonyms – Feasibility, presumption, tendency, instance, potentiality
Antonyms – Implausibility, dubiousness, consummation, encumbrance, detriment
Awareness (noun) – Knowledge or perception of a situation or fact
Synonyms – Advertency, grasp, vigilance, cognition, percipience
Antonyms – Oblivion, vagueness, detachment, bewilderment, numbness
Yoke (noun) – A connection or relation between things, people or ideas
Synonyms – Liaison, propinquity, splice, juncture, conduit
Antonyms – Detach, abstract, dislodge, depose, extract
Recommendations (noun) – The act of endorsing something, usually by being complimentary
Synonyms – Advocacy, extolment, salutation, encomium, panegyric
Antonyms –Dissuasion, remonstrance, disparagement, castigation, opprobrium
Patriarchal (adjective) – Characteristic of fathers, paternal
Synonyms – Indulgent, avuncular, vigilant, solicitous, benignant
Antonyms – Maternal, hostile, youthful, motherly
Elope (verb) – Run away secretly in order to get married
Synonyms –Decamp, abscond, scram, sally, scoot
Antonyms –Confront, encounter, assist, appear, arrive
Abuse (verb) – Use (something) to bad effect or for a bad purpose
Synonyms –Perversion, tainting, dissipation, embezzlement, profanation
Antonyms –Praxis, decency, rectitude, probity, plaudit
