Sarada Bill of 1929

                      Child marriage is considered to be a violation of human rights by the Human Rights Commission and is prohibited. Let us see what all efforts were made by the British India government in early 1900s to eradicate child marriages.

                       In order to curb the child marriages in India especially in the states of Rajasthan, Bombay and  Madras, British-India government has passed a resolution known as 'Child Marriage Restraint Act of 1929'. This Bill was presented by Rai Sahib Harbilas Sarda of Ajmer Presidency in 1927 to the Imperial Legislature in India. Hence, this act got the name as 'Sarada Bill'. As per this act, the husband of the under-aged girl, people who compel her to get married and parents / guardians of both the parties will be punished.

                      This bill was very famous in those days. It was the first social reform issue that was taken up in India for the benefit of women. Now, let us see how clever our (Great) Grand parents were in obeying the law...

                       My Grandmother got married at the age of 9 before this act was passed in Guntur which comes under Madras State of British India. So, at that point of time, her parents had no problem. She had a younger cousin.. and it was decided that she would get married to my grand father's brother. This marriage got fixed after the bill was passed.

Now... did they postpone the marriage to another five years..?

                      Answer is a big 'No'. They simply went to Yanam, about 150 KMs from Guntur to complete all the marriage rituals., and then came back to Guntur silently.

What is so special about Yanam... 

                       This was a small French Territory located on the Coromandel Coast about 9KMs from Bay of Bengal. It is surrounded on all sides by the Madras State (currently surrounded by East-Godavari District of AP).  It being a French- Indian colony, British Law had no value and thus there is no Sharadha bill.

                      In a similar way, people went to surrounding French (Mahe, Karaikal, Pondicherry, Yanam) and Portuguese (Daman, Diu, DNH, etc) territories in India to complete their marriage rituals. How clever they were!!!

So, I can say that my Grand Mother's cousin got married in a Foreign country.

If a war-widow re-marries, will she remain eligible for the benefits?

                     We celebrate when we win any war or when we are successful in tackling the enemies across the borders. We lose many of our jawans / soldiers in this process. A war-widow is a woman whose spouse has died in a war. We all owe a lot to those who lost their lives just in-order to save us from the enemies, terrorists and extremists.

                      We honor such great Indians who served the nation by providing various benefits, subsidies and quotas / reservations. A person, who has served in the armed forces and currently retired, is known as Ex-Service man. He will be entitled to many benefits from the Government.

                     A person who sacrificed his life for the State, also comes under ex-service men category. His entire family will be eligible for many benefits from the Central Government. So, it is clear that, a war-widow and her children will be eligible for such benefits.

Now, what happens when the war-widow remarries ?

                     Since she got remarried, she is no more a dependent. She will now be leading a totally different life and no more associated to the military. So, she must not be eligible for benefits.

                     But, we should understand one thing.. who is responsible for the greatest loss to her life? Is it the fate? or destiny? No, it's we.... The government i.e., the common people.

                    Hence, Ex-Service men eligibility rules have a separate clause for war-widow category. It states that...  if a war widow remarries she will be eligible for all the benefits. Now, what about the children? Even they remain eligible for the benefits of ex-service men quota.

                    However, a quite obvious thing is that, her husband and children from him will not be eligible. Moreover, parents of the war-widow are also not eligible.