Marriage of minor halted by police

Brother reported the incident to police

SARGODHA: A minor girl’s wedding was crashed by police in Sillanwalli on Monday evening.

The girl’s father allegedly obtained Rs0.5million from a 50-year-old man to marry his 11-year-old daughter.

The incident occurred in Chak -140 where a man named Mazhar Iqbal, resident of Chak-138 forcibly tried to tie the knot of his minor daughter Yasmeen with an old man, Mazhar.

Police raided the house immediately after being informed by Yasmeen’s brother Mohammad Wasim Akram and arrested five accused, including the girl’s father. The rest of the suspects escaped.

Police said that the minor was not even informed about the wedding. There were some people present in her house when she came back from school, as per police. Her father told her that the wedding had been arranged, due to which Yasmeen started crying. The minor’s mother and brother confronted the decision, but all their efforts went in vain. SHO Hafiz Naveed Akram said, “As soon as we were informed about the minor girl’s marriage, we immediately brought the police force into action, arrested the accused and took the 11-year-old girl into custody for her safety.”

Akram remarked that the culprits will be treated in accordance with the law. Police said some of these incidents are reported as Watta Satta, or marriages between children of two families under an arrangement. In other cases, parents sell their minor daughters and fix their marriages with elderly men. Such incidents mostly do not get reported.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 22^nd, 2020.