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In 2013, I came across a pamphlet from an organisation working on child marriage in the north-eastern India-Nepal border region of Shravasti. Statistics showed that 25% of girls in Shravasti, in Uttar Pradesh, were married by the time they reached 19. The figures were appalling, not only because of how rampant child marriage was in the region, but also because the practice is illegal in India.
I decided to visit Shravasti, which is less than 90 miles from my home town. My first impression was that in a place with high rates of migration among men, young women lived with their in-laws and managed their households while their children cried and played in their arms. After that first visit it became a stop for me every time I went home.
I was curious about the lives of young brides, while being deeply aware of my own privileges: what choice and agency did the women have in their own lives? What was their idea of a good life? Did they have dreams for careers? What were their expectations in love?
In April 2014, I met 14-year-old Arti a day before her wedding. She warmly welcomed me into her home and introduced me to her friends and relatives. She walked around briskly overseeing preparations for the celebrations and had the air of someone who was in charge. At 14, she could already manage a household.
On the day of the wedding, her friends and relatives sat around her while she got dressed in her new sari and her sister-in-law did her hair and makeup. In those brief moments, she exuded a vulnerability, and seemed removed from her surroundings.
When I asked her how she was feeling about her marriage, she replied: “What is there to feel? It happens to everyone.”
After her marriage Arti’s life changed considerably. She tried hard to be a good daughter-in-law, taking over all the household chores at her husband’s family home, but still failed to please her mother-in-law. While Arti had to give up her education, her 21-year-old husband continued with his.
At 17, Arti’s first pregnancy ended in a miscarriage at the end of 2019. She was heartbroken, and left physically weak. One day in April 2020, during the first wave of the pandemic, I called to check on Arti, and the phone was answered by her father-in-law. He told me that Arti had taken her own life.
Arti’s loss hit home. At a tender age, she was compelled to experience the extremity of life. The tragedy was a stark reminder of the repercussions of this oppressive practice – a system that does not give agency to women over their own lives, and can push them towards serious consequences that will never be reversed.
