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Common sense finally prevailed on the issue of marriageable age for women when the Senate Standing Committee on Interior cleared a bill seeking to increase the age of marriage of women to 18 from the previous age of 16. Moved by PPP Senator Sehar Kamran, The Child Marriage Restraint (Amendment) Bill, 2017 proposed that the minimum age women can be married be raised from 16 to 18. Earlier this month, the same committee had rejected the bill after declaring it un-Islamic. While the bill was finally cleared by a majority, what was worrisome was the stand taken by some parties, particularly Senator Javed Abbasi from the ruling PML-N party. At a time when party leader Mian Nawaz Sharif wants to portray the party as a moderate face of Islam, Senator Abbasi was doing everything to quell this impression. Initially he started by opposing any discussion on the bill as he insisted that the matter had been settled. Then he argued that Pakistan should not follow other Muslim countries in this matter and let the parents decide what is the best age to marry off their daughter. In another candid remark, the same senator said that 16 years was the best age as it lessened the burden on the state when it came to orphan girls being kept at Darul Amans. If that was not all, the senator then went on to reject the opinion of the head of the Shariah Academy who had been brought to give his opinion and said that he did not consider the gentleman as an authority on the issue. Despite his vehement opposition, thanks to the common sense of others in the committee, the bill was cleared. This is an encouraging move but brings into question what kind of policy the ruling party wants to pursue on such issues in the future. It is time for the PML-N to stop appeasing pockets of its supporters and function as a national party. It needs to stand up to regressive forces. 

Published in The Express Tribune, October 25^th, 2017.

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