Raising The Age of Marriage of Women in India: A Step Forward or Backward?
On December 15, 2021, the Union cabinet gave clearance to the proposal of raising the legal age of women for marriage from 18 to 21 years, making the legal marriage age of women at par with the legal marriage age of men. This was done on the recommendation of Task Force report headed by Ms. Jaya Jaitly, former President of the Samata Party, so appointed by the Ministry of Child & Women Development to examine the issue about the age of motherhood, imperatives of lowering maternal mortality rates and improvement of nutritional levels along with other incidental issues in the previous year.