Hyderabad: If all goes well, the ‘Imams’ – the one who leads the prayers – will be delivering lectures at mosques about the ills of marrying off girls to elderly foreign nationals.
Following the recent case of a teenager being married off to an elderly Oman national, the district women and child welfare officials will be approaching the committees of the mosque to seek their help in curbing the practice.
“We have sought the help of the Telangana State Wakf Board in this regard to soon hold a meeting with the Imams and the muezzin of the mosques. They will reach out to the community and spread the message,” said Mr. Mohammed Imtiyaz Raheem, District Child Protection Officer.
He said that the help of eminent religious scholars, seminaries and noted Muslim personalities were being sort to curb the menace. “Our focus will be on the Muslim-dominated slums in the city which have a history of ‘contract’ marriages or ‘child marriages’,” Mr. Raheem said.
Awareness programmes in schools – government and private– are also on the anvil. “We will be sending volunteers and counselors of the department to the schools. They will interact with the girl students and brief the teachers too about the ills of child marriages,” the official said.
Last year 11 child marriages were stopped in the city by officials and of these six marriages pertained to Muslim girls. “We occasionally receive a tip-off about child marriages. But most of the time it goes unreported,” Mr Imtiyaz explained.
