NEW DELHI: After his Independence Day speech where he had hinted that government was considering revising upwards the age of marriage for girls, which is currently 18 years, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday assured girls writing to him on the issue that a decision would be taken soon.
“To decide on what should be the right age of marriage for girls, discussions are on. I have been getting a lot of letters from aware daughters from across the country asking for an early decision on the matter. They ask why has the committee’s report not come yet. I assure all those daughters that very soon the report will come and as soon as that happens, the government will study it and work on its recommendations,” he said.
Committee led by Jaya Jaitly giving final touches to report
The PM’s remarks came during his speech at the release of a commemorative coin to mark 75 years of the Food and Agriculture Organisation, where he spoke on the government adopting an “integrated and multidimensional approach” to tackle the problem of malnutrition. TOI has learnt that the committee headed by Jaya Jaitly is giving final touches to the report. The task force constituted in June was to originally give its report by July 31. The committee was formed after an announcement by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the Union budget for 2020-21.
The task force has the mandate to examine matters pertaining to age of motherhood, imperatives of lowering maternal mortality rate, improvement of nutritional levels and related issues. It will also suggest suitable legislations or amendments in existing laws and a detailed rollout plan with timelines to implement these recommendations.
On August 15, in his speech from the Red Fort, the PM said a decision on “what should be the right age of marriage for girls” would be taken as soon as a committee set up to study the issue gave its report. As of now, the legal age of marriage is 18 years for girls and 21 years for boys. The age of marriage has been a point of debate for long with some civil society organisations opposing the move to raise the age of marriage.