Srinagar, May 18 (ANH): At least 5 percent women and nine percent men in Jammu and Kashmir are getting married before attaining the minimum legal age required for getting married.
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As per news agency—Kashmir News Observer (KNO), the National Health and Family Survey (NHFS) data says that one percent of women in the 15-19 years of age group have started bearing child which rises from one percent at 18 years of age to 4 percent among women 19 years of age.
“In Jammu & Kashmir, the median age at first marriage is 23.6 years among women aged 25-49 years and twenty-seven percent of women aged 20-49 years have never married, compared with 35 percent of men aged 20-49,” it adds.
“Five percent of women aged 20-24 years got married before attaining the legal minimum age of 18 years, down from 9 percent in NFHS-4 and nine percent of men aged 25-29 years were married before the legal minimum age of 21 years,” it said.
The survey divulging details about teenage pregnancy among women in age group 15-19 said that one percent of women in the 15-19 year age group have already begun bearing children. That is, they have already had a live birth or are pregnant with their first child, down from 3 percent in NFHS-4.
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“The proportion of women who have started childbearing rises sharply from 1 percent at age 18 years to 4 percent among women age 19 years and the proportion who have begun childbearing is much higher among young women who had no schooling (6%) than those with 1 or more years of schooling (0.6%),” it added.
