New Delhi: The Law Commission has proposed that child marriage below 18 years of age for both girls and boys should be prohibited and that marriages below the age of 16 years be made void.

Besides recommending compulsory registration of marriage, the Commission has proposed that marriages involving children between the age of 16 and 18 be made voidable (which can be annuled with mutual agreement between both the parties).

Elaborating on the Commission's proposals on issues related to child marriages, the panel's member Kirti Uppal said today that the panel has proposed that the age for sexual consent should be raised from 15 years to 16 years for all girls, regardless of marriage.

Thus, if the proposal is accepted by the government, even consensual sex would invite punishment for those men who have sex with girls under 16 years of age.

Even those men who have sex with their minor "wives," aged below 16 years could be booked under the law. Till now, having sex with a minor "wife" aged below 15 years is punishable under section 375 of the IPC.

To ensure that young women and children are not left destitute, the Commission recommends that provisions relating to maintenance and custody should apply to both void and voidable marriages.

While studying the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006 (PCMA), the Commission found that the present law did not make a child marriage invalid even if it was below the age of 15 years.

But under the criminal law, section 375 of IPC makes it a crime to have a sexual relation with a child under the age of 15 years.

Source : PTI