What happens when girl gets pregnant?

The Senate approved the Miscellaneous Provisions (Marriage) Bill 2016 amending the Marriage Act, Muslim Marriage and Divorce Act, Hindu Marriage Act, Orisa Marriage Act and Matrimonial Proceedings and Property Act, changing the legal marriageable age to 18.

Umar Abdullah of the Islamic Front did not agree with the bill and did not believe Government and those supporting the bill thought out the matter properly.

“By raising the marriage age to 18, it will definitely put a strain on our social and family infrastructure.

Here you are telling people if they have intercourse and the girl becomes pregnant, they need to either have to abort the child or if she wants to have the child she can not get married to the young man.” “How are we going to treat with that relationship between the girl and the boy? Obviously the boy has committed a criminal offence. You are looking at the boy serving time in prison. How is that going to auger for the young child that would be brought up in a home where there is no father?” He said since abortion was against the law, the girl would have to go to her family and ask for help without the support of the father.

Abdullah stressed that children getting married should not be the norm but it was necessary when no one had been able to deal with the issue of children having sexual relationships.

He said what should be done is to try to curb teenagers from having sexual intercourse. He said parents and schools could not do anything about children having sex, and the government had not introduced programmes to stop or reduce occurrences.

In addition he said the country’s society was developed on child marriages. He said many people’s parents and grandparents were married at a very young age, some were arranged, and they were successful.

“Our social infrastructure has broken down tremendously, the government has done nothing to bring it back to that pristine form, and they are going to let the courts legislate our basic rights as a family structure... When we interfere with God’s law we pay for it in the long run. We will have a wrecked society.” In a radio interview, general secretary of the Sanatan Dharma Maha Saba, Satnarayan Maharaj, commented on the bill and said, “We believe that the practice of our religion is guaranteed under the Constitution and any attempt to take away that constitutional right can be challenged. We are awaiting advice of legal team on the way forward.” Anglican Bishop Claude Berkley, on the other hand, was in agreement with the move as he believed it was important to keep pace with international standards and basic human rights.

He said it would make it easier to regulate the treatment between male and female relationships so that claims of exploitation of young people could be standardised and properly monitored. At the same time he said, “I hope if there are any other considerations after we have looked at this for a period of time, a case would be made if there are differences in opinions.”