Peer-education and social awareness among the community people including young generation, parents, teachers and members of the civil society are very vital for freeing the society from child marriage, speakers in three separate community level events observed. More arrangement of cultural programmes could be the effective means of creating awareness among the villagers as they are the key-players to resist the child marriage. Miss Rozana, Project Coordinator of High Commission of Canada in Bangladesh, witnessed the activities.
They came up with the observation while addressing a 30-member community group meeting, school level awareness campaign and cultural programme (gambhira) at Madhabpur village under Nachole Upazila of the district yesterday.
Agriculture Sustainable and Socio-Economic Development Organization (ASSEDO) organized the events in association with Prevention of Child Marriage through Edutainment and Community Engagement Project and High Commission of Canada.
“Eradicating child marriage and child pregnancy is imperative in creating a glorious Bangladesh” was main theme of the programmes. Over 1,000 people comprising male, female, juvenile, members of the civil society and other stakeholders joined the gambhira programme.
Upazila Vice-chairman Mujibur Rahman, ASSEDO Executive Director Rabiul Alam, Programme Coordinator Mahbub Jaman and Programme Manager Ajhar Ali spoke on the occasions.
They observed that adolescent-friendly reproductive health services need to be expedited and schoolteachers alongside guardians, particularly mothers, should be trained on the issue so that they can teach the students and other adolescents and guide them properly.
Upazila Vice-chairman Mujibur Rahman said freeing the youth from various misconceptions regarding reproductive health is very vital and called for building a social resistance against child marriage and teenage pregnancies.
There is no alternative to creating community awareness through raising school-based awareness on adolescence for combating the existing rate of child marriage.
Responsive support from the community is very vital to ensure adolescent-friendly reproductive health services to all the target people.The grassroots level awareness related projects should long-lasting so that the village people can derive their total benefits.
ASSEDO Executive Director Rabiul Alam said the project aims to involve community people so that they can play pivotal role in changing the social mindset on child marriage and child pregnancy. Besides, the venture intends to build awareness among the adolescents about their rights to reproductive health, he added.
The practice of child marriage is very damaging, especially for girls. It seems that girls are treated as burden to society, mostly in rural areas. It is vital to increase awareness regarding the negative impacts of early marriage with the help of the mass media.
