In a major boost to the efforts for eliminating child marriage, five such alliances were prevented on a single day in Rajasthan’s Sikar district through court-issued injunction orders, following coordinated action by the police and voluntary groups working for the protection of child rights on Thursday (July 16, 2026).
Among the children rescued were two boys aged nine and 12 years, who were to be married to the girls of similar ages under the traditional Aata-Saata (exchange alliance) practice. Another case involved a girl below the age of 18 years.
Gayatri Seva Sansthan, a partner organisation of Just Rights for Children (JRC), received information that a minor girl was being married in a village under Gokulpura police station. When the organisation’s members, accompanied by the police, reached the village to intervene, some people attempted to conceal the facts and the girl’s family tried to mislead the police by claiming that she was an adult. The girl’s date of birth was eventually verified through school records, which confirmed that she was below 18 years of age. It was also found that she was being married to a 42-year-old widower.
During the intervention, the team discovered that two more marriages involving boys aged nine and 12 years from the same family were scheduled to take place after a couple of days under the Aata-Saata custom.
Gayatri Seva Sansthan immediately approached the Additional Judicial Magistrate, Sikar, under the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006, seeking injunction orders to prevent the marriages. The court issued injunctions directing that none of the children could be married before attaining the legal age of marriage, thereby preventing all five child marriages.
Issued by the court of the Judicial Magistrate under Section 13(1) of the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, an injunction order empowers the authorities to proactively prevent a child marriage before it occurs. The court also usually declares that a child marriage solemnised in contravention of the order would be void ab initio (from the beginning).
After his marriage was stopped, the 12-year-old boy said he dreamt of becoming a lawyer and feared that the marriage would have forced him to abandon his education and take up work instead.
Gayatri Seva Sansthan’s Director Shailendra Pandya said here on Thursday that Sikar was emerging as a leading district in effective implementation of the law against child marriage. “During Akshaya Tritiya earlier this year, Sikar witnessed the first-ever use of court injunctions to prevent the child marriages of two girls,” he said.
Mr. Pandya, a former Member of the Rajasthan State Commission for Protection of Child Rights, said the interventions by voluntary groups had sent a strong message that the law against child marriage was no longer confined to paper and was now being enforced firmly.
JRC national convener Ravi Kant said the sustained awareness campaigns launched by non-government organisations were supporting the local communities in coming forward to report child marriages being planned in their vicinity.
Among the children rescued were two boys aged nine and 12 besides a girl below the age of 18
Published - July 17, 2026 09:42 am IST