Imagine the embarrassment Indian authorities will feel when they discover that child marriage is sanctioned in Islam.
Islamic tradition records that Muhammad consummated his marriage with (i.e., raped) Aisha when she was nine, and the resultant fact that child marriage is accepted in wide swaths of the Islamic world. Child marriage has abundant attestation in Islamic tradition and law.
Turkey’s directorate of religious affairs (Diyanet) said in January 2018 that under Islamic law, girls as young as nine can marry.
“Islam has no age barrier in marriage and Muslims have no apology for those who refuse to accept this” — Ishaq Akintola, professor of Islamic Eschatology and Director of Muslim Rights Concern, Nigeria
“There is no minimum marriage age for either men or women in Islamic law. The law in many countries permits girls to marry only from the age of 18. This is arbitrary legislation, not Islamic law.” — Dr. Abd Al-Hamid Al-‘Ubeidi, Iraqi expert on Islamic law
There is no minimum age for marriage and that girls can be married “even if they are in the cradle.” — Dr. Salih bin Fawzan, prominent cleric and member of Saudi Arabia’s highest religious council
“Islam does not forbid marriage of young children.” — Pakistan’s Council of Islamic Ideology
Hadiths that Muslims consider authentic record that Muhammad’s favorite wife, Aisha, was six when Muhammad wedded her and nine when he consummated the marriage:
“The Prophet wrote the (marriage contract) with Aisha while she was six years old and consummated his marriage with her while she was nine years old and she remained with him for nine years (i.e. till his death)” (Bukhari 7.62.88).
Another tradition has Aisha herself recount the scene:
The Prophet engaged me when I was a girl of six (years). We went to Medina and stayed at the home of Bani-al-Harith bin Khazraj. Then I got ill and my hair fell down. Later on my hair grew (again) and my mother, Um Ruman, came to me while I was playing in a swing with some of my girl friends. She called me, and I went to her, not knowing what she wanted to do to me. She caught me by the hand and made me stand at the door of the house. I was breathless then, and when my breathing became all right, she took some water and rubbed my face and head with it. Then she took me into the house. There in the house I saw some Ansari women who said, “Best wishes and Allah’s Blessing and a good luck.” Then she entrusted me to them and they prepared me (for the marriage). Unexpectedly Allah’s Apostle came to me in the forenoon and my mother handed me over to him, and at that time I was a girl of nine years of age. (Bukhari 5.58.234).
Muhammad was at this time fifty-four years old.
Marrying young girls was not all that unusual for its time, but because in Islam Muhammad is the supreme example of conduct (cf. Qur’an 33:21), he is considered exemplary in this unto today. And so in April 2011, the Bangladesh Mufti Fazlul Haque Amini declared that those trying to pass a law banning child marriage in that country were putting Muhammad in a bad light: “Banning child marriage will cause challenging the marriage of the holy prophet of Islam, [putting] the moral character of the prophet into controversy and challenge.” He added a threat: “Islam permits child marriage and it will not be tolerated if any ruler will ever try to touch this issue in the name of giving more rights to women.” The Mufti said that 200,000 jihadists were ready to sacrifice their lives for any law restricting child marriage.
Likewise the influential website Islamonline.com in December 2010 justified child marriage by invoking not only Muhammad’s example, but the Qur’an as well:
The Noble Qur’an has also mentioned the waiting period [i.e. for a divorced wife to remarry] for the wife who has not yet menstruated, saying: “And those who no longer expect menstruation among your women, if you doubt, then their period is three months, and [also for] those who have not menstruated” [Qur’an 65:4]. Since this is not negated later, we can take from this verse that it is permissible to have sexual intercourse with a prepubescent girl. The Qur’an is not like the books of jurisprudence which mention what the implications of things are, even if they are prohibited. It is true that the prophet entered into a marriage contract with A’isha when she was six years old, however he did not have sex with her until she was nine years old, according to al-Bukhari.
Other countries make Muhammad’s example the basis of their laws regarding the legal marriageable age for girls. Article 1041 of the Civil Code of the Islamic Republic of Iran states that girls can be engaged before the age of nine, and married at nine: “Marriage before puberty (nine full lunar years for girls) is prohibited. Marriage contracted before reaching puberty with the permission of the guardian is valid provided that the interests of the ward are duly observed.”
According to Amir Taheri in The Spirit of Allah: Khomeini and the Islamic Revolution (pp. 90-91), Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini himself married a ten-year-old girl when he was twenty-eight. Khomeini called marriage to a prepubescent girl “a divine blessing,” and advised the faithful to give their own daughters away accordingly: “Do your best to ensure that your daughters do not see their first blood in your house.” When he took power in Iran, he lowered the legal marriageable age of girls to nine, in accord with Muhammad’s example.
“Ill-equipped private madrassas in Assam ignore child rights, junk formal education; girl students often end up as child brides,” by Syeda Ambia Zahan, Firstpost, September 18, 2019 (thanks to the Geller Report):
The Assam State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (ASCPCR), in a recent survey, has raised a red flag over blatant violation of child rights, and of the provisions of the Right to Education (RTE) Act, 2009 in madrassas (schools of Islamic education). The survey comes at a time when the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development is working on a road map to introduce reforms in madrassas with the aim of bringing them at par with the national educational curriculum.
The ASCPCR survey was conducted by a three-member team of the commission led by its chairperson Sunita Changkakoti in private madrassas in two districts of Assam — Dhubri and South Salmara. Both these districts, some 250 kilometres away from Guwahati, are dominated by the Bengali-origin Muslim community….
“There are gross violations of child rights, especially against girl children. The students are not provided with basic facilities. The banat madrassas (women madrassa) keep the girl children in confinement. The food is of bad quality. There is a huge chance of sexual violations and above all, children are deprived of formal education,” Changkakoti said….
The number of madrassas in India, which came into being with the advent of the Muslim rulers in the subcontinent, has gone up from some hundreds in the 1950s to over 8 lakh in the 2000s, according to various reports. Despite widespread suspicions that such institutions encourage a fundamentalist mentality, they have increased in number in Assam’s char areas. (Char is the Assamese word for sandbar.)…
As per the records of the State Madrassa Education Board, the oldest in the country, there are 614 recognised madrassas in Assam. However, the number of privately-run madrassas are in thousands, said Sarkar….
The 29-year-old Mariyam Bibi is a daily wage labourer in Guwahati. She belongs to Kamlakhar village of Golakganj revenue circle in Dhubri. Mariyam was 13 years old when she got married to one Marham Ali from Barpeta district.
“I was studying at a madrassa in my village. When I got enrolled I was eight years old. After five years of studying there, my mother said I had become ready for marriage,” she said. Mariyam’s 14-year-old daughter, a student of a banat madrassa also got married in the same district.
Dhubri is one among the 100 districts of India with a high prevalence of child marriage. The National Family Health Survey (NFHS) 2015-16 stated that the undivided Dhubri and South Salmara district records 31 percent prevalence of child marriage.
Changkakoti said that the girls’ madrassas were acting as grooming centres for minor girls to get married by the age of 13-14 years.
“During our visit to banat madrassas, it was observed that girls are groomed in such a way where they do not have any interest in formal education, they do not have any dream to become anything in life other than maulana and they are interested in getting married as soon as finish their course. The madrassas are depriving the girls of experiencing the big world outside. A girl gets enrolled in the madrassas at the age of 7-8. They study a four-year course on religion. After that they are considered to be fit for getting married,” the ASCPCR chairperson said.
Sarkar, who is actively working towards the eradication of child marriage from Dhubri, seconded this. He claimed that the banat madrassas are like the finishing schools for child brides in the district.
“The parents of a girl child want to get the girl married off by the age of 13-14. So they send their children to banat madrassas. As soon as the girl takes the religious education for two-three years, she is considered to be fit for marriage. So this is another reason why banat madrassas are so popular here,” he said.
Changkakoti also expressed the high possibility of sexual violence in banat madrassas.
“In banat madrassas most of the teachers are male and they have all the access to the rooms of the girl students. The girls do not know anything outside their religious education. They do not have any sex education. The female teachers are also submissive. What happens inside would never be reported,” she said.
She also said that not only girls, but there are high chances of a sexual offence against boys also….
“There are instances where a student is beaten black and blue. But we also have to see the environment they are coming from. They are hard to be disciplined otherwise,” he said.
According to Changkakoti, there is a world of difference between the environment inside a madrassa and outside it.
“Inside the madrassas, 7-8 years old girl children are made to wear three-four layers of clothes in pick summer. They share a room with 30-40 girls. If they are lucky they would get rooms which accommodate 10 girls. Outside the madrassas, girls are attending government schools, most are not wearing a hijab and dreams of becoming a teacher, doctor and whatnot. The madrassas in the name of providing education are violating the rights of individuals which is a deterrent to developing one’s personality,” she said….
The private madrassas are one of the key reasons for such a low rate of income among the Muslim community as hardly anyone graduating from these ill-equipped institutes will have a chance to survive in today’s competitive job markets.
Then the Islamic advocacy groups will charge “Islamophobia.”
Krishna says
most of Assamese muslims are conservative bengali migrants
Infidel says
You mis-spelled ‘Bangladeshi’
Krishna says
Correct I made mistake
elee says
If the enemy chooses to deploy 51% of his population to the back rooms of their houses, for life, well, I guess Id prefer that to having them deployed with suicide belts under their hijabs. Is it a duty for civilised men to liberate these women against their quote will unquote? Wrestle with that, libbers/cultural imperialists/whatever.
Infidel says
Right now, India is conducting a census in the state in question – Assam – to determine who are actual Indians, who are actual refugees from Bangladesh (i.e. Hindus, Buddhists, Christians) and who are illegal infiltrators (Muslims). The above story suggests that the people indulging in this are Bangladeshi illegal aliens in India. Once the NRC (National Registry of Citizenship) exercise is complete, those people should be rounded up and deported to Bangladesh.
India can work separately on reforming madrassahs and making it compatible w/ whatever standards they have
gravenimage says
Good to hear, Infidel.
mortimer says
I appreciate ‘infidel’s’ first-hand knowledge of India.
Pervez Musharraf once commented that he thought the madrassa private schools were one of the biggest problems for Pakistan, because they taught children nothing practical or useful to them for life in the modern world.
Madrassas are medieval jihad academies.
Infidel says
Mortimer, I am ‘Infidel’
‘infidel’ is a different poster: notice the capitalization ?
gravenimage says
India: Islamic girls’ schools are “finishing schools for child brides”
……………
Hideous, but no surprise. I *hope* India cracks down on them.
The legal marriage age for women in India is 18–but child marriage is rife, especially among Muslims. Estimates vary, but seem to be between about 30-45%. Of course, Muslims have claimed that Indian laws do not apply to them.
mortimer says
Yes … these poor girls are gipped. They get no useful education. They are prepared to be brides for JIHADISTS.
gravenimage says
Horribly true.
Angemon says
Or, in other words, islamic schools don’t care about what infidels call “child rights” and “formal education” – they’re meant to educate in accordance to islamic tenets, and that’s what they’ll do…