Birsamuni Kumari, a 13-year old girl from Gumla, is slowly becoming a child icon and has shown the path to a dignified living to several other girls as another girl, 17-year old Dolly Kumari, today raised her voice against early marriage and chose not to sacrifice her dreams at the cost of family’s so called honour.
Birsamuni became an example of emancipation of girls who are pushed into oblivion by the draconian custom of child marriage. The 13-year old girl had sought help from the administration to prevent her marriage and was subsequently provided shelter and was enrolled into Kasturba Gandhi Girls Residential School in Baghima under Palkot block of Gumla.
“I read about the tribal girl in the newspapers and that is how I got the idea of approaching Chief Minister. Preparation for my marriage was going on that is why I approached the CM,” said Dolly Kumari.
Dolly is a student of Civil Engineering at Vidya Memorial Institute of Technology at Tupudana and stays at a lodge at Hatia. She is happy that Chief Minister Raghubar Das convinced family members back in Koderma not to sacrifice her dreams of a career at the altar of the institution called marriage. “My father has agreed to let me continue my education,” said Dolly.
However, her marriage was as much about putting the girl in the social contract as about the exigencies of financial condition of less resourceful family where for a father, marrying girl early despite downsides of marriage in childhood is also a way to obey imposed social duty.
Dolly is the fourth girl-child among five daughters of her father, Kailash Kumar Pandit, and she has two younger brothers living with the father. Pandit, however, said that her marriage was not final and they were looking for a groom. A teacher by profession at a government school at Koderma, Pandit denied that he ever thought of pulling his daughter out of studies. Nonetheless, the father is also not sure about the exact age of the girl to verify whether the girl attained the marriageable age specified by government for girls.
“Marriage was not fixed and we were only looking for a groom. I am about to retire in the month of January and one more daughter will be left after Dolly. I have two sons to take care of so also. I have always in favour of her studies,” said Pandit.
The father assured the CM that he was never against Dolly’s studies and will support in continuing her education in future as well. “CM told me to let my child continue her education and he has assured to provide assistance in the event of any problem,” maintained Pandit.
The CM’s intervention brought truce between father and daughter as the girl made a plea to media not to disturb her father.
“My father has agreed so, please don’t trouble him anymore,” said Dolly.