Police foiled an attempt to marry off a 12-year-old girl to a 72-year-old man in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The elderly groom has been arrested but the father of the minor girl fled the scene.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa: A bizarre incident has surfaced from Pakistan where a father forced his 12-year-old daughter to marry a 72-year-old man in Charsadda town, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, ARY News reported. However, police intervened and foiled the attempt, arresting the elderly groom. According to police, Alam Syed agreed to sell his minor daughter to the old man for PKR 500,000. Shortly before the ‘Nikkah’, the police arrested the groom, identified as Habib Khan, and the ‘Nikah Khwan’ (a person who solemnizes the marriage). However, the girl’s father fled the scene.
However, the case has been registered against the girl’s father, the 72-year-old man and the ‘Nikkah Khwan’ under the marriage-act”Child Marriage Act, according to the ARY News.
Despite laws against child marriage, such incidents continued to occur in Pakistan.
Recently, law enforcement agencies thwarted similar attempts in Rajanpur and Thatta, where young girls were being forced to marry older men. In one case, an 11-year-old girl in Rajanpur, Punjab, was set to marry a 40-year-old man, as per Ary News.
Separately, a young girl was forcibly married to a 50-year-old landlord in Thatta but fortunately, she was saved after the timely action of the police.
On May 6, the police arrested a 70-year-old man for marrying a 13-year-old girl in Swat.
The father agreed to marry her daughter to a 70-year-old man. Police swung into action after getting the information and took the groom and father of the minor girl into custody, the ARY News said.
Cops also apprehended Nikkah Khwan and the marriage witnesses, while the minor girl was sent to a hospital for a medical examination.