‘Bal Vivah Mukt Bharat’ Campaign:
The Union Minister of Women and Child Development recently launched the “Bal Vivah Mukt Bharat Campaign”.
- It was launched by the Ministry of Women and Child Development, Government of India.
- It seeks to engage multiple stakeholders in a collective effort to eliminate child marriage in India.
- It will focus on the seven high-burden states: West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, Rajasthan, Tripura, Assam and Andhra Pradesh and nearly 300 high-burden districts where child marriage rates are high as compared to the national average.
- The campaign will call on every State and Union Territory to devise an action plan aimed at reducing the child marriage rates below 5% by 2029.
- Child marriage rates dropped from 47.4% in 2006 to 23.3% in 2019-21, according to government data.
- A key feature of the initiative is the launch of the Child Marriage Free Bharat portal, a platform to raise awareness, report cases, and monitor progress.
- The portal is designed to facilitate effective monitoring of Child Marriage Prohibition Officers (CMPOs) by strengthening supervision and evaluation mechanisms to ensure their active role in preventing child marriages and supporting affected individuals.
- People will be able to register their complaints pertaining to child marriage, and these will be directed straight to the concerned CMPOs anywhere in the country.
- All States have been directed to log on to the portal and register the CMPOs so that there is real-time monitoring of cases.
- Nodal officers will be assigned at the Centre for monitoring the portal.
- It seeks to enhance public access to information, making it easily available to enable better communication and support.
