BK-16 Prison Diaries: Stories of love, murder and child marriage from Shoma Sen’s years in prisons
To mark six years of the arbitrary arrests and imprisonment of political dissidents in the Bhima Koregaon case, The Polis Project is publishing a series of writings by the BK-16, and their families, friends and partners. (Read the introduction to the series here.) By describing various aspects of the past six years, the series offers a glimpse into the BK-16’s lives inside prison, as well as the struggles of their loved ones outside. Each piece in the series is complemented by Arun Ferreira’s striking and evocative artwork.
While we were in jail, Himanta Biswa Sarma, the chief minister of Assam, initiated a campaign (read: crackdown) against child marriage. Instead of formulating programmes to educate the community and facilitate social reforms, he used law enforcement to viciously subjugate the poor, minorities and rural residents, to superimpose modernism through fear and repression. A large number of women living in prison had been married off between the ages of 12 and 14, and were being held for different crimes, from theft and murder to trafficking drugs and children. I wondered if they were even aware of this other offence that they and their families had committed. If I told them that the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006 considers the legal age for marriage for girls as 18, and that attempts were being made to raise it to 21, they would casually reply, whether Hindu or Muslim, “Apne mein aisa…
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