WED-LOCKED!

The Covid-19 pandemic has triggered an uptick in child marriages in India

- SRAVANI SARKAR

Deepika Gurjar has an innocent face and the mischievous eyes typical of a 16-year-old. A class 11 science student from a village near Ajmer in Rajasthan, Deepika is a talented footballer who was selected for a national coaching camp in Bengaluru last November. She is part of a girls’ team set up by the NGO Mahila Jan Adhikar Samiti (MJAS). “I want to become an international footballer,” she says, her eyes shining.

Her elder sister Sapna, 18, is the captain of the MJAS team, and idolises former Indian cricket captain M.S. Dhoni. An undergraduate arts student, she wants to be an IAS officer and a football coach, given that there are not many female coaches in Rajasthan.

Talking to these confident teenagers with such definite goals in life, it is difficult to imagine that both were married off this May 2. Though MJAS encourages girls, mostly from traditional families, to break gender barriers and helps them stave off early weddings, the sisters could only fight for so long. They had managed to stall their weddings, scheduled in May 2021, but had to bow to family pressure this year. With the world opening up after the Covid-19 pandemic, pending weddings, including those of minors, are being conducted in a hurry.

“Our family has promised that our gauna (formal send-off to the groom’s place at the proper age) will not be held for some years and we will be allowed to pursue our dreams. We would like to believe that the promise would be kept,” says Sapna.