The recent move to increase the minimum marriage age for women to 21 years might result in more women entering the workforce, says a recent report.
News reports quoted the SBI Ecowrap as saying, “We believe increasing the legal age has the potential to reduce India’s MMR (Maternal Mortality Rate) and will lead to more females doing graduation and hence coming into the labor force. Another benefit is that legal marriage age will become the same for men and women.”
The recent proposal by the government aims to fix the minimum age for marriage for women on a par with men to provide them equal opportunities for higher education and employment.
India’s female labor force participation is among the lowest, hovering at a little over 20%.
Union Minister Smriti Irani, who introduced the bill in Lok Sabha, said 7% of the girls aged between 15 and 18 years were found to be pregnant. “It is also important to bring down the incidence of teenage pregnancies, which are not only harmful to women’s overall health but also result in more miscarriages and stillbirths,” news reports quoted her as saying.
However, the increase in minimum marriageable age can be effective in improving participation rates when done in tandem at many levels. First, by encouraging girls in schools to pursue careers and being career intentional, apart from making way for them to take up vocations across sectors including STEM by creating a supportive ecosystem.
