Farmers Movement Archive

MP questions need to raise marriageable age of women

Rajya Sabha member L. Hanumanthaiah has questioned the need for the Centre to increase the legal age of marriage for women in the country from the existing 18 to 21. Addressing a press conference in Mysuru on Saturday, Mr, Hanumanthaiah, a Congress leader, pointed out that several adivasis and weaker sections of the society were unaware of the legal marriageable age of women while several marriages of girls under 18 years were being held in different parts of the country. “Under such circumstances, is it necessary at all to increase the minimum legal age for marriage of women to 21?”, he said. Also, Mr. Hanumanthaiah sought to know from the Government whether there was any study on ideal age of marriage for women that is backed by science. He also asked the Government to make public any demand for the increasing the legal marriageable age. The Centre’s proposal to increase the marriageable age would only lead to more people doing the rounds of police stations and courts for violating the law, he regretted and urged the Government to constitute a parliamentary committee to study the need. Accusing the BJP Governments at the Centre and the State of taking up “bogus” issues while remaining silent on the real problems, Mr. Hanumanthaiah pointed out that there were others that required the immediate attention. Similiarly, he said the Karnataka Right to Freedom of Religion Bill 2021 is also an excuse to divert the attention of the people. He sought to know from the Government if there is any data to show if the population of the minorities has increased because of alleged forceful conversion. On the contrary, he said the population of Christians has come down. Contending that the introduction of such a Bill was not part of the Government’s work, Mr Hanumanthaiah accused it of implementing the agenda of RSS. The penal provision in the Bill were an “insult” to the lower castes, Mr. Hanumanthaiah said and observed that the Bill provided for 10 years imprisonment while even a life sentence is only upto seven years. He criticised the Centre for not allowing a discussion in the Parliament when the three farm Bills were withdrawn. “As a responsible Opposition, we wanted to know the reasons to withdraw the Bills,” he said before pointing out that the Opposition wanted to know whether the Government would stick to the reasons it had cited at the time of introducing the bills.

The Hindu

2022-01-02

January 02 2022 05:56 IST,KARNATAKA