Bangladesh

51% of girls in Bangladesh marry before age18 and 16% marry before age 15.

4% of boys marry before the age of 18.

Child marriage is more common in rural areas where 53.8% of girls are married before age 18, compared to 44% in urban areas. Regionally, across Bangladesh, Rajshahi has the highest rates of child marriage, with 66.7% of girls between the ages of 20-24 married before 18, followed by Khulna (61.8%), Rangpur (57.9%), Barishal (55.6%), Mymensingh (52.2%), Dhaka (48.6%), Chattogram (44.1%) and Sylhet (31%).

Among the country’s entire population of women and girls, 38 million are married before the age of 18 and of those, 13 million are married before the age of 15.

A 2017 World Bank/ICRW study estimated that ending child marriage in Bangladesh could see a 12% rise in earnings and productivity for Bangladeshi women who married early.

Child marriage is driven by gender inequality and the belief that girls are somehow inferior to boys.

In Bangladesh, child marriage is also driven by:

● Poverty: In Bangladesh, 64% of women between the ages of 20-24 who were married before the age of 18 are from the lowest income households and 33.4% are from the highest income households. There is a negative association between child marriage and household wealth. Girls are frequently considered a financial burden and they are married off to alleviate the family economy. As a result, the median age of marriage for girls living in the poorest households of Bangladesh is 15 years, compared to 18 for those living in the richest households. Dowry prices typically increase as girls get older and "less attractive”, meaning many families marry girls off at a younger age. In Bangladesh, poverty has also been identified as a driver for polygamy and early child marriage. Parents are more inclined to marry their daughters to elderly men even if they have other wives, in order to secure their daughters’ future.

● Level of education: 68.9% of women with no education are married before the age of 18, in comparison to 32% who have completed secondary or higher education. Evidence also suggests that teaching girls about their rights and building skills for modern livelihoods can reduce the likelihood of child marriage by up to one third in Bangladesh.

● Gender norms and family honour: There are prevailing gender norms that underline and intertwine child marriage and family honour, including the shaming of unmarried girls, the fixation over the sexual purity of younger girls and the parental responsibility of marrying girls. Nearly 7 out of 10 people in Bangladesh believe that women earn their identity and social status through marriage. Because high value is placed on the virginity of girls, child marriage is often used as a way to control pre-marital sex, protect girls from (real or perceived) sexual violence and avoid stigma in case of pregnancy out of wedlock. A 2013 national study shows that fathers are most often responsible for deciding when and whom to marry their daughters to.

● Violence against women and girls: Sexual harassment and rape has increased in recent years. The number of sexual violence crimes against women has doubled in the last 10 years from 940 rapes in 2010 to 1855 in 2019, according to Bangladesh Mahila Parishad. Fear of sexual harassment, rape and kidnapping contributes to increasing cases of child marriage because families perceived it as a protective mechanism. Dowry-related violence is common in Bangladesh, with 7,079 reported cases in 2011, 325 of which resulted in death.

● Demographics: Evidence indicates that child marriage is most common in areas of Bangladesh where the adult population is skewed toward men due the traditional preference for boys and sex-selective abortion. Younger girls are being drawn into the pool of eligible marriage partners to alleviate a squeeze in the “marriage market”.

● COVID-19: The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on some of the poorest households and has exacerbated the vulnerability of children. The pandemic has exposed vulnerable families to loss of financial income, pushing them further into poverty and exclusion, and exposing the vulnerability of young girls, making them more susceptible to abuse, child marriage and adolescent pregnancy. UNICEF projections estimate that 620,000 children are expected to drop out of school in Bangladesh, of which 350,000 are expected to be girls.

● Adolescent pregnancy: Nearly 5 in 10 child brides give birth before the age of 18, and 8 in 10 give birth before the age of 20. The highest rates of adolescent pregnancy among child brides are found in Cumilla, Bhola, Chattogram, Jamalpur and Bagerhat. Between 2015 and 2020, for girls between the ages of 15-19 years, the adolescent birth rate was 74 births per 1,000 adolescent girls, with 24% of girls giving birth before the age of 18.

Humanitarian settings can encompass a wide range of situations before, during, and after natural disasters, conflicts, and epidemics. While gender inequality is a root cause of child marriage in both stable and crisis contexts, often in times of crisis, families see child marriage as a way to cope with greater economic hardship and to protect girls from increased violence.

In August 2017, Bangladesh received a massive influx of Rohingya refugees fleeing persecution in Myanmar. Bangladesh is also one of the most disaster-prone countries in the world, exposed to a variety of natural hazards including cyclones, floods, monsoon rains, storm surges and earthquakes. The high population density exacerbates the impact of disasters.

● Displacement: As of December 2023, there are approximately 971,904 Rohingya refugees, living across 33 camps in Cox’s Bazar District and Bhasan Char, escaping violence in Myanmar. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) have reported instances of child marriage among young girls in refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar. Families have reported marrying off young girls to access food rations and protect them from sexual violence within camps. As of December 2023, there are 2 million children in need of humanitarian assistance, 6.7 million people in need of humanitarian assistance and 500,000 Rohingya children in need of humanitarian assistance.

● Natural disasters and climate change: Natural disasters have been shown to exacerbate child marriage in many regions of Bangladesh. Frequent flooding means many families live in insecure conditions and they marry off daughters as a survival tactic. For example, a 2016 UNICEF study found that the economic crises created by climate challenges are leading to an increase in child and forced marriages because the dowry is cheaper for younger girls. In 2023, Tropical Cyclones Mocha, Hamoon and Midhili and flash floods impacted 1.3 million people, including 480,000 children.

Bangladesh has committed to ending child, early and forced marriage by 2030 in line with target 5.3 of the Sustainable Development Goals.

During its Voluntary National Review at the 2017 High Level Political Forum, the government noted that women’s empowerment plays a prominent role in the Constitution of Bangladesh, the National Women Development Policy and the Child Marriage Restraint Act. In its 2020 Voluntary National Review, the government reiterated its commitment to ending child marriage by 2041. The government has not submitted a Voluntary National Review in any High Level Political Forum since 2020.

Bangladesh co-sponsored the 2022 UN General Assembly resolution on child, early and forced marriage.

Bangladesh ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1990, which the Committee on the Rights of the Child has interpreted to recommend the establishment of a minimum age of marriage of 18. In 2015, the CRC Committee expressed deep concerns about the prevalence of child marriage in Bangladesh. Bangladesh acceded to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in 1984, which obligates states to ensure free and full consent to marriage. Bangladesh has entered a reservation to Articles 2 and 16(1)(c) CEDAW, due to their conflict with Sharia law.

In 2016, as part of its periodic review, the CEDAW Committee called on Bangladesh to take measures to end the harmful practice of child marriage by addressing the root causes, raising awareness and holding accountable those responsible.

During its 2023 Universal Periodic Review, the government noted that the National Action Plan to End Child Marriage (2018-2030) was adopted to eliminate child marriage by 2041. Through the Child Marriage Restraint Rules 2018, an IT system has been launched to check the ages of the bride and groom by using birth certificates to prevent child marriage. Between 2017-2022, the licenses of 40 marriage registrars and 3 notary public were terminated for their involvement in child marriages. Approximately 15 million girls have received stipends to prevent child marriage.

During its 2013 Universal Periodic Review, Bangladesh supported recommendations to improve efforts to protect children from forced marriage, and to more effectively implement the Child Marriage Restraint Act and the Dowry Prohibition Act. During its Universal Periodic Review in 2018, Bangladesh supported similar recommendations to move towards ending child marriage, including clarifying gaps in the Child Marriage Restraint Act in order to prevent misuse of the provision allowing marriage for children below the legal age in “special circumstances”.

Bangladesh is a member of the South Asian Initiative to End Violence against Children (SAIEVAC) which adopted a regional action plan to end child marriage from 2015-2018.

Representatives of the South Asia Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), including Bangladesh, asserted the Kathmandu Call to Action to End Child Marriage in Asia in 2014. As part of its commitment, Bangladesh will ensure access to legal remedies for child brides and establish a uniform minimum legal age of marriage of 18.

At the 2014 London Girl Summit, the Bangladeshi government signed a charter committing to end child marriage by 2020. During the Summit, the Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina also pledged that Bangladesh would end marriage under the age of 15 by 2021 and under 18 by 2041, and reduce the number of girls getting married between 15 and 18 by more than one third by 2021.

In 2019, at the Nairobi Summit on ICPD25, Bangladesh committed to reduce gender-based violence, including early and forced marriages, and ensuring the implementation of the National Action Plans to End Violence Against Women and to End Child Marriage.

Bangladesh is a partner country of the Global Partnership for Education (GPE).

Bangladesh is also one of 11 countries working to create child marriage-free communities by 2020 as part of the Her Choice Alliance. Since the COVID-19 Pandemic, Her Choice Alliance has been working alongside NGO Dalit to train girls on how to make their own reusable menstrual products and face masks. It is hoped that this will provide these girls with the skills to generate income and recognition within their communities and provide them with support to prevent them from abuse and child marriage.

Bangladesh is a focus country of the UNICEF-UNFPA Global Programme to Accelerate Action to End Child Marriage, a multi-donor, multi-stakeholder programme working across 12 countries over fifteen years. Since 2016, UNICEF and UNFPA have implemented and supported Bangladesh in different initiatives. In 2018, the Global Programme established anti-sexual harassment committees in 72 secondary schools and trained committee members on how to prevent sexual harassment in schools.

The 2022 annual report of the Global Programme to end child marriage established:

15 million people were reached through 3,800 imams and female teachers were trained on delivering key messages on child marriage and violence against children.

49 million people were reached through Icchendana, season 3, an educational entertainment drama series that addressed key adolescent issues.

3,015 boys and men participated in dialogues to promote positive masculinities.

8,295 girls were provided with educational support and provided with bicycles, as a mode of transportation to and from school.

480 child journalists from 24 districts published over 150 news reports on child marriage, gender inequality and girls’ rights.

The Ministry of Women and Children Affairs, the Department of Youth Development, and the Directorate of Secondary and Higher Education developed a career pathway booklet to provide support and information to girls on different careers paths and institutes that provide education and training.

11,000 adolescents were able to access contraception, 87,019 adolescents received counselling and treatment for sexually transmitted diseases

USAID-funded Ujjiban Social Behaviour Change Communication project 2017-2022, implemented by John Hopkins University, is the leading campaign to improve health in Bangladesh and increase knowledge on adolescent pregnancy and investing in girls’ education. This project aims to raise awareness on the current laws in Bangladesh that prohibit child marriage and provide mechanisms to report incidences of child marriage and victim support.

With the support of UNICEF, and despite stagnation of progress due to the backlash against regressive legal proposals, in August 2018 the much-awaited National Action Plan to Eliminate Child Marriage 2018-2030 (NAP) was launched under the leadership of the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs, to implement the commitment of the Prime Minister and the Multi-Sectoral Programme on Violence Against Women of the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs.

Alongside the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs (MOWCA), USAID is a project partner for the 10-year National Plan of Action to End Child Marriage in Bangladesh 2018-2030. The multi-sectoral National Plan of Action is the result of consultations at national and sub-national levels with different stakeholders, including civil society and adolescent girls and boys themselves. The goal of the NAP is to end the marriage of girls below 15 years of age, to reduce by one third the rate of marriage for girls below 18 years by 2021, and to eliminate child marriage by 2041. There are five implementation strategies in the NAP:

● Strategy 1: Take action to implement sector specific policies as per demand and necessity of children and adolescents.

● Strategy 2: Ensure amendment and implementation of laws, proper formulation of policies and accountability.

● Strategy 3: Develop positive social values and norms through influencing, supporting and engaging families, communities and policymakers for preventing child marriage.

● Strategy 4: Ensure empowerment of adolescent girls and boys as an agent of social change.

● Strategy 5: Promote the digitalization of education, legal, reproductive health facilities of adolescents as well as social protection system of children and ensure appropriate incentives for adolescent girls.

A monitoring and evaluation framework for the NAP was meant to be developed in 2019.

In preparation for the launch of the National Action Plan, in 2017 Bangladesh also carried out, with the support of UNICEF, a scoping analysis of the budget allocation to end child marriage. This study found that only 1.2% of the total budget of Bangladesh was dedicated to end child marriage.

In 2018, UNFPA also supported the setting up of a Parliamentary sub-committee on “preventing gender-based violence including ending child marriage”.

In February 2017, Parliament adopted a revised Child Marriage Restraint Act which is a strengthened version of the previous Act, despite widespread concerns over a provision allowing child marriage in ‘special cases’. The Act does not define what constitutes a special case. Since then, different voices have raised the alarm that such a provision will legitimise statutory rape and encourage child marriage. The President signed the bill into law on 11 March 2017. Bangladesh also made it compulsory to present a birth certificate at the time of marriage.

In October 2018, Bangladesh published the “Child Marriage Restraint Rule”, which provides further explanation and implementation mechanisms for the Child Marriage Restraint Act 2017. The rule also explains the formation of committees at national and local level to restrain child marriage and the roles and responsibilities of the committees.

A costed National Adolescent Health Strategy (2017–2030) specifically mentions child marriage as a form of violence against adolescents, and sets strategic objectives to end child marriage, mitigate its consequences and raise awareness.

In recent years, Bangladesh has also implemented at least two national awareness raising campaign which ran on radio, television, print media and social media, with comprehensive messages on ending child marriage, and has set up a National Helpline to prevent violence against women, including child marriage.

Previous initiatives include the Child Marriage Free Unions (unions are the smallest rural government units in Bangladesh), which are movements led by local government and facilitated by Plan Bangladesh with the aim of enforcing existing law more effectively.

The minimum legal age for marriage in Bangladesh is 18 years for girls and 21 for boys.

However, the Child Marriage Restraint Act 2017 includes a loophole where a court can allow child marriage in “special cases” (for both girls and boys). The Act does not explicitly define what those “special cases” might be, but there is fear that this loophole will allow girls under 18 in cases of rape and early pregnancy to marry their perpetrators to avoid social stigma and shame.