Closed schools and economic hardship due to Coronavirus are seeing more young girls married off. We’ll hear from a young girl who managed to resist her family’s attempts to marry her to an older man. But many other young girls are not so lucky. Anindit Roy Chowdhury of Save The Children India estimates tens of thousands of such marriages may have already taken place during the pandemic, often with illegal dowries being exchanged for the young girls. Dr. Kriti Bharti, a leading activist for children’s rights, the peculiar economics of Indian marriages, along with some surprise consequences of the pandemic, gives parents a strong incentive to marry their girls off young, even in secret. And economist Dr. Monika Chaudhary reflects how this crisis highlights the longer-running tragedy of how the economic system India denies girls the chance of proper schooling.

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