Crackdown on child marriage: Fear of arrest forces home birth, teen bleeds to death in Assam

GUWAHATI: A 16-year-old bled to death after delivering a healthy baby girl at home in Assam’s Bongaigaon district as her family did not take her to hospital fearing arrest amid a widespread police crackdown on child marriage. About 2,763 people have been taken into custody in a week in the state.
Her husband, 25-year-old Sahinur Ali, and his father Ainal Haque, 53, were arrested under the Pocso Act and Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006.The duo was sent to judicial custody for 14 days.
Doctors said the teenager wasn’t alive when she was brought to the civil hospital on February 5. Her baby is at her mother’s and did not need hospitalisation, Bongaigaon joint director of health services Dr Paresh Roy said on Thursday.
“She was 16 at the time of delivery. Though she was medically fit and was being monitored by an Asha worker, delivery at home turned fatal. Unskilled people were involved during delivery. They did not inform the health department when she went into labour,” Roy said. The district administration has instituted a magisterial inquiry.
According to health officials, the victim was shifted to her parental home a few days ago, mainly to evade arrest. Among those rounded up in the crackdown are husbands of pregnant girls.
“Her father-in-law has said she was sent to her parental home so that the baby gets delivered without being noticed. They didn’t inform the village Asha worker either. They did not bring her to a hospital because all hospitals are now listing teenage deliveries. Based on the hospital data, the government is tracking child marriages,” a police officer said.
Police suspect there could be more such cases of pregnant teens being shifted elsewhere for their families to evade arrest.
TOI has reported earlier that families are keeping pregnant teenage wives away from hospitals fearing arrest, thereby losing out on government benefits and free medical care.
Hospitals in rural Assam — especially those in the lower Assam districts that have a large population of Bangladeshi immigrants from the religious minority community — are reporting fewer teenage pregnancy tests and registration.