A powerless reality 

Farah was 14 when her parents told her she was going to be married. They were already struggling to provide for Farah and her younger sister and brother when COVID hit. Farah’s father was the family’s sole breadwinner, and his work delivering goods dried up. No one knew how long the pandemic would last, or how long it would take for work to start again. Their situation was more desperate by the day. Farah’s parents decided it was the best option for the family to have one less mouth to feed.    

Farah, who dreamed of being a nurse one day, was devastated at the news. It meant she would have to leave school and go live with a husband and his family, 40 km away. Within weeks, it was her reality.

The wedding was barely finished when the abuse from Farah’s new husband and in-laws started with name calling, humiliation and threats. She called her parents, miserable, but they told her to make the best of it—they had invested their few savings into paying her dowry. But Farah only became more and more unhappy. One month and more calls later, Farah’s mother arrived to take her back home.

Farah was relieved to be home again and able to go back to school. But not everyone welcomed her back—many of her neighbours laughed at her or told her she should be ashamed. It has been a hard road and Farah is still rebuilding her life.

Empowered to act  

She is in Grade 10 and working hard to finish school so she can pursue her career. Financial independence is even more important now because being divorced and no longer ‘pure’ means her parents would be expected to pay a much higher dowry if she was to remarry in the traditional system.

But she is also working with the child forum, established with World Vision child sponsors’ support, to help stop other girls in her community from being forced into a child marriage. She speaks at the Village Development Committee meetings and talks to parents whenever she can, explaining her experience, the harm child marriage has on girls, and how Bangladesh law protects children’s rights and prohibits child marriage.

The impact of sponsorship

Child sponsorship is helping to tackle the challenges girls in Wazirpur, Bangladesh face with a multi-pronged approach. We are working with parents, faith leaders (including 30 Hindu priests who have been trained in child protection), community leaders through World Vision-supported Village Development Committees, and children to educate them about children’s rights and the harm child marriage causes, not just for girls, but their whole family.

We are also helping to address the financial insecurity that drives parents to marry off their girls early through programs to help people produce more food, eat more nutritious diets, have access to clean water, earn more income and manage the money they earn. More than 500 families have received ducks in the past two years, which provides eggs for the family to eat and to sell to augment their other income. Savings groups have also been established to give women the opportunity to save money for their future and contribute to their family’s financial situation.

Right now, 1,000 girls like Farah need your help. We urgently need sponsors for 1,000 girls by March 31 in honour of International Women’s Day. Sponsor a girl today.