12-year-old girl says parents forcing her into marriage, seeks legal action
A 12-year-old girl has approachedthegovernment-run One Stop Centre (OSC) to stop her upcoming marriage and has sought legal action against her parents who are pressuring her to agree for the wedding.
The incident has been reportedfromMachhriyavillage of Rajasthan’s Dholpur district – considered as home turf of chief minister Vasundhara Raje, who is married to the Dholpur royal family andisfondly called Maharani by the people.
The girl, a student of Class 8 at a government senior secondary school, got her complaint registeredwiththeOSCinDholpuron November 16 over phone. The girl had secured the OSC’s telephone number from the State Women’sCommission’swebsite. She had got to know about the OSC during an awareness ses- sion held at her school.
In her complaint, the girl alleged that her parents have fixed her marriage with a 19-year-old boy from Harlal Ka Nagla village in the district. The wedding is scheduled on December 4 and she said her parents have also started sending out the invitation cards for the function.
The girl alleged that her par- ents beat her up when she protested against getting married. She said she doesn’t want to get married and wants to continue with her education.
The service provider at the DholpurOSC,SanjeevChauhan, confirmed having received the complaint.
“She informed us over phone about her upcoming wedding and sought help for stopping it. We forwarded her complaint to the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) and the district collector for legal action against her parentswhoareforcingtheminorto get married,” Chauhan said.
Chairman, CWC, Dholpur, Vrijendra Parmar said, “We have told the police officials to stop the marriage.”
Circle officer, Maniya, Bachan Singh said the station house officer of Dihauli police station was directed to stop the marriage. The police team has restricted the parents fromgoing ahead with the minor’s marriage. They have also taken in writing from the parents that they will not get the girl married before she turns 18 and in case they do, legal action will betaken against them.
Parmar added that they have also the directed the would-be groom’s parents not to get him married before he turns 21.
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