Shackled by poverty in a home that came under water when Cyclone Amphan barrelled into her village and left penniless by the pandemic, the hapless mother married off her 15-year-old daughter – their story emblematic of the Covid-climate crisis in the Sundarbans that has seen a sharp rise in the number of child marriages.
It was May last year, recalled Rashmi Devi. With only a tent as cover for her seven-member family following the super cyclone and no money for food, the marriage proposal for her young daughter seemed like a godsend.
"We could barely manage one meal every day and the decision to get her married seemed right at the time. In my mind I thought there will be one less mouth to feed and she will get more than just salt and rice to eat," the mother told PTI over the phone from Canning in the Sundarbans that falls in West Bengal’s South 24 Parganas district.
Sixteen months later, the decision doesn’t seem so right. The family is still in dire straits and her son-in-law is behind bars on charges of dowry harassment. Rashmi’s family is not the only one.
Communities in the ecologically fragile Sundarbans delta region are still reeling under the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and climate change, say survivors and activists.