Mai Agar Kahoon #1

 INCREASING MARRIAGE AGE 

( I am a teenager and will continue to be one till the next 2 years.People start new things on new year but I have taken oath to do things 'differently', so I am going to talk(or write)-right? ya write about how I see things happening around me as a teen!) 

Last week I was a part of this book reading session with Kiran Bedi ma'am.She asked us what we feel about this move of increasing marriage of age of girls.All our responses are recorded and that gave me an idea to write about this topic, so enough of this disclaimer!

https://twitter.com/thekiranbedi/status/1474384448913383434?s=20

J.S Mill classified actions into two groups - self regarding ones and other regarding.According to this marriage is a self regarding action in which its totally upto individual to decide- when to marry, whom to marry, why to marry or just not marry! But we are in India, a truly incredible India. Here it is not always individual's choice.Morever, it's a do parivaron ka rishta.Similar kind of belief was in europe during renaissance period wherein marriage was seen as a way of creating family alliance.In such situation individual choices hardly matter.Did I just not mention that we are living in a patriarchal society? Therefore, for women its never their choice conventionally.

Recently our parliamentary committee passed the bill which increased the minimum marriage age of women from 18 to 21. For men it was 21.Now for both it is 21.It is a very important decision.Not just for bringing equality but also for promoting women empowerment.Usually when a person is 18 they have just passed out of their school so how can they expect someone who has just passed school fit for marriage?? Now atleast it will become necessary for parents to send their girls to colleges because for three years they cannot marry them off.And in these three years girls can acquire this much sense where they can decide whether to marry or not.

I asked my mother about what she feels about this.She was married at the age of 24 and my father was 25 so I felt quite good about this.She said , 'shahar se zyada ye gaon ki ladkiyon ke liye acha faisla hai".I totally agree with her. In rural India we still have all these ill practices of considering beti to be a paraya dhan and all that.Now atleast beti can choose for herself. This requires child marriage prohibition act to be implemented on the grassroot level.

Some people feel that why there is even a minimum age? The answer is simply because not everyone is privileged enough to live their lives on their own terms.They simply have to agree with their parents.And not all advices made by parents are holy..isn't it?

ASMITA