Sharafat A. Chaudhry
Rabia Mustafa
Marriage is a formalized, binding partnership between consenting adults, which sanctions sexual relations and gives legitimacy to any offspring. Child marriage, on the other hand, involves either one or both spouses being children and may take place with or without formal registration, and under civil, religious or customary laws.
As per OHCHR, Child marriage, or early marriage, is any marriage where at least one of the parties is under 18 years of age. Forced marriages are marriages in which one and/or both parties have not personally expressed their full and free consent to the union. A child marriage is considered to be a form of forced marriage, given that one and/or both parties have not expressed full, free, and informed consent.
According to the World Health Organization and Girls Not Brides, pregnancy complications and childbirth are one of the leading causes of death amongst girls aged 15 to 19 across the globe; 90% of such pregnancies are within wedlock in the developing world; and the consequences of child marriage are severe such as a child born to a mother under the age of 19 has a 50% chance of being still born or dying within the first year. Therefore, advocacy against child marriage in Pakistan is necessary due to the health impacts.
Child marriage or child brides in Pakistan is one of the most pressing development challenges in Pakistan today. According to Girls Not Brides (2022), 18 percent of girls in Pakistan are married before the age of 18 and 4 percent are married before the age of 15. The rank of Pakistan is the sixth highest in terms of women married or in a union before the age of 18 in the world, the estimate is 1,821,000. A Survey conducted by the National Institute of Population Studies, in 2018, found that one in four girls is married before the age of 18, and 34 percent become mothers before turning 20. Child marriage statistics in Pakistan are alarming. The overall estimates show that 4.6 million girls are married before the age of 15 whereas 18.9 million are married before the age of 18. However, in 2020, the report by United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) indicated that Pakistan is the home to nearly 19 million child brides where 1 in 6 young women were married in childhood.
Causes of child marriage in Pakistan indicated that child marriage in Pakistan is deeply rooted in poverty and centuries-old patriarchal traditions, with devastating effects on girls that last a lifetime. Pakistani culture and child marriage seem to be linked. Child brides in Pakistan are at an elevated risk of sexual and physical abuse, reproductive health complications, and other adverse physiological and social outcomes.
A report published by Sahil shows that a total of 119 cases of child marriages were reported in all the provinces of Pakistan during the year 2020. Sindh province topped the list with 91 cases while Punjab stood second with sixteen cases. Three cases were reported from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa while two and one cases were reported from Islamabad and Balochistan respectively. The report also found that in almost all age groups only girls are subjected to child marriages. Sahil’s report in 2021 pointed out that a total of 80 cases were reported with 70 cases of girls and 10 cases of boys. However, according to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, in 2021, 51 cases of child marriage were reported whereas, in the same year, the helpline recorded 84 complaints of child marriage and 92 calls of forced marriage.
Child marriage, early marriage, forced marriage, or child brides, whatever you name it, have devastating impacts in Pakistan such as on health, economy, society, and more importantly, on ever increasing population of Pakistan. The Islamic Republic of Pakistan is the world’s fifth-most populous country, and now you can understand WHY. Stopping the child marriage will not only be beneficial for the child bride but also for the development of the country. A 2017 study by World Bank/ International Centre for Research on Women projected that ending child marriage in Pakistan could see a 13 percent growth in earnings and productivity for Pakistani women who married early. So, advocacy against child marriage in Pakistan should be propagated through social media, print media, seminars and awareness campaigns.
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Sharafat A. Chaudhry is a human rights lawyer and the founding Chairperson of the School for Law and Development.
Rabia Mustafa is a Senior Research Fellow at the School for Law and Development.
