matter hardly calls for legislation. I have heard of such marriages among the Goundens of Coimbature. 8. M. TILLAINNAYAGAM PILLAI, DEPUTY COLLECTOR, MaDURA.—Infant marriage is largely practised more among the Brahmans than other castes. Komattis and high caste Vellalas have followed this example of the Brahmans. Early marriage is however almost unknown to the low caste Sudras, among whom remarriage of widows is also permitted...... When 9 per cent is the average of widows in the European countries, 21 is the percentage obtaining in India, and 31 the percentage among the Brahmans..... Instances are not wanting where young men have been spoiled by early marriage. Many have given up their studies, unable to find time for the same, having been burdened with the cares of conjugal life. They lose their spirits, and are bound down to their houses, and in fact become less useful to society than they would otherwise be. Early marriage is therefore an obstruction to the progress of society. I have heard a highly talented candidate for the University examination tell his friends that, he would have answered some of the questions better had he not been anxious about the condition of his sick child. If this is the case even with grown up men a raw youth married early and blessed with children, must feel worse under the circumstances. Besides, early marriage affects the general health of the married couple, and their progeny, and the result is, we have a weak and imbecile nation. A man approaching the grave can easily secure a girl of 9 or 10 years for his partner, provided he makes up his mind to pay a handsome price for the creature. A leper can in the same way easily secure the hand of a fair maid for money. 9. T. PATTABHIRAM, HEAD SERISHTADAR, TRICHINOPOLY COLLECTORATE.-Among all castes of Hindus other than Brahmans and Komattis, infant marriages are rare and exceptional and not the rule............... The Brahmans bear the percentage of 4.94 to the whole population of India as detailed in the margin. Census Report Vol. I p. 308. 4.94 The Brahman female population for the whole of India is 6,606,000; of this 31 percent or 2,047,860, are widows, and 21 per cent or 1,436,805 are unmarried. Thus both unmarried and widowed females of the Brahman class come up to 524 per cent of the female Brahman population, while in Europe the single and widowed females come up to 67 per cent of the total female population there, or 14 per cent more (Census Report p. 94 Vol. I.) SECTION II. BOMBAY PRESIDENCY. 10. MAHIPATRAM RUPRAM, C.I.E. PRINCIPAL, TRAINING COLLEGE, AHMEDABAD.-Now and then we see an infant girl married to a rich old man, for the sake of his money, and, in some castes, especially the Patidar caste in the Ahmedabad and Kaira Collectorates, and the Anavala Desai caste in the Surat Collectorate and Gaekwad territory in Southern Gujarat, a boy of 6 or 8 is frequently married to a girl of 12 or 16, though, seldom, I be lieve, from any wicked designs. Generally such marriages are contracted from family pride. In other castes disparity of age also prevails to a more or less extent. Bridgrooms are several years younger than their brides. Little girls are sometimes married to old men also...................... The harm done by the custom of infant marriage is really great, and Mr. Malabari has not at all overstated the mischief arising from it. 11. NANDSHANKAR, ASSISTANT JOINT ADMINISTRATOR, RAJPIPLA.-The baneful effects of early and ill assorted marriages, are in some cases felt and acknowledged even by the uneducated mass of Hindus; but so powerful is the hold which the doctrine of fatalism or predestination has on their minds that, unfortunate marriages are regarded rather as the inevitable decrees of fate, than the result of their own folly or indiscretion. The custom is almost unknown among the aborigines of Gujrat; and among the upper class of Rajputs, the anxiety evinced by the parents to secure husbands for their daughters of a class higher and nobler than themselves, operates in some cases as a check upon this practice. Marrigeable girls among some sections of the Shravak Community, and a few sub-divisions of Brahmans, are regarded as marketable commodities, whose value rises with age. Girls 13 or 14 years of age are, when they are with their parents, regarded as a "bundle of snakes," whose presence is attended with more or less risk, and hence their eagerness to keep them with their husbands, before their passions are developed.. So long as the Hindus consider it an act of merit or honour to give away their daughters in marriage before they arrive at the age of puberty, so long as they are anxious to consummate marriage before their constitution is developed, so long as they are solicitous of marrying their sons in boyhood, and of taking part in the frolics and festivities attending the marriage of their sons and daughters, during the precarious terms of the lives of themselves or other aged members of their families, and so long as parents are eager to make money out of the marriages of their daughters, it is almost impossible to devise measures calculated to discourage child-marriages or ill-assorted unions, without offending the moral susceptibilities of the orthodox portion of the Hindu community. Prolonged virginity among Hindu females is not visited with excommunication. 12. LALLUBHAI NANDLAL, NATIVE ASSISTANT TO THE COMMISSIONER, NORTHERN DIVISION.-There is such ....... thing as marrying two infants together except on rare occasions very Among the higher caste people, girls are generally married from between the age of 7 to 10, the bridegroom being a little older. It is among the people of the middle caste, that infant betrothal is carried on to a certain extent. 13. GURSHIDAPA VIRBASAPA, DEPUTY COLLECTOR, BELGAUM, (A LINGAYAT.)—From my knowledge which extends only to the Southern Division, I find that infant marriages are of rare occurence now-a-days, and that child marriages too are becoming scarce, as people have begun to understand that such marriages end in unhappiness. By child marriage I mean marriage celebrated before a female child is 11 years old. In India owing to climatic causes we have precocious maturity and precocious old age, while this is not the case in Europe and other cold countries. A female child generally arrives at puberty at the age of 12, and a girl arriving at the age of 12 cannot be called in this country a child, but she is at this age a young woman. It may be noted here that, however early the marriage may take place, consummation, as a rule, never takes place before the girl arrives at maturity, and that the husband of the girl is always older than the girl by some years. Moreover child marriages do not affect those classes in which widow marriages are allowed. ..... 14. NARAYEN BHIKAJI, DEPUTY COLLECTOR, NASIKI am fully acquainted with the customs obtaining in the Deccan and Carnatic. Marriages... ...of big grown up girls of 12 to 15 years of age, betrothed to boys of 8 to 10 do not occur therein. An elderly woman is considered in the light of a mother, and therefore the boy's age always exceeds that of the girl by 3 to 6 years In very rare cases it is equal, but in no case less than that of the girl, in the Deccan and the Southern Mahratta country. While employed in the Ahmedabad District, I had a Magisterial case before me in which a big grown up Kunbi girl having been betrothed to a small boy, he was poisoned by the friend of the girl when she arrived at maturity. Cases of this kind occur sometimes in Gujrat, but not in the Deccan and Karnatic. 15. K. C. BEDAKKAR LL. B. DEPUTY REGISTRar, High COURT.-Mr. Malabari's complaint against the parents of boys of tender age married to elder girls, is a gratuitous slander upon Hindu society. Such marriages, so far as I know, are more common in the section of the caste of the Surat Anavlas called Desais. With this community I am well acquainted, and I assert, without fear of contradiction, that it is not guilty of the criminal arrangement insinuated by Mr. Malbari. Rare instances of misconduct may be found among Desais, but they will also be found elsewhere. 16. TRIMALRAO VENKATESH, INAMDAR AT DHARWAR.It is true that infant marriages have already ruined Indian society to a very great extent, and unless put a stop to, will do more harm. Boys and girls, under the age of 10 years, have no idea of what marriage means, and what its consequences will be, and do not express any wish to be married. They only know that they are well-dressed, and fed, and led through several processions of music, dances of dancing girls, fire-works &c., and that they are married. It is the parents, and specially the mothers, sisters and other female members of the infant brides and bridegrooms, that really wish their infant children were married, not so much for the purpose of getting them married, but more for the sake of enjoying the fun and pleasure of going through the ceremonies attendant upon the marriages. Infant marriages take place mostly among the rich, and not to that extent among the poorer classes. 17. VENAYEK VASUDEV.--According to my information, there is now a considerable decrease in the number of infant marriages compared with past years. 18. HARIPARSAD SANTOKRAM, DESAI OF BHAVNAGAR.What actually takes place in most cases in Gujrat and Kathiawar, is that the parents of the brides select a suitable person, and go through the ceremony of Veshval or betrothal. The actual marriage is usually deferred to a future date convenient to both |