Girl wants court to save her from forced marriage

AAS claims her mother has hired a group of men to monitor her movements. [iStockphoto]

Marriage is a beautiful voyage, so it is said. Even then, it has to be with the right person and at the time and age.

For a teenager, identified in court papers as AAS, her mother is trying to deny an opportunity to be a child and marry when she wants.

The mention of the word marriage to AAS evokes betrayal, pain and anguish.

The minor has now gone to court seeking its intervention as she seeks to block her parent, HA, from pushing her into a ‘prison’ by marrying her off.

The court heard that HA wants to marry off the child to an old man.

The applicant said that other than being a child, she does not have a 'single spark of love' for the suitor her mother has picked for her.

The girl, in a historic case exclusively seen by The Sunday Standard, wants the court to affirm her right to marry when she wants and to whoever her heart desires.

AAS said she learned from their house help that she was a 'booked bride'.

To scuttle her parent’s plan, the girl packed her belongings and took off. Her escape was almost foiled after her stepfather and their neighbours pursued her.

After dodging them, the girl says she tried to reach out to different people for help but failed. She finally got help from two human rights organisations.

AAS claims her mother has hired a group of men to monitor her movements.

“However, the spies’ plans failed. That is when my mother went to the police and reported me as a missing person,” AAS told the court.

She said the police showed up at her place of refuge on January 18 and took her to their station. The officers later handed AAS back to her mother. According to her, this was without her consent.

It took the intervention of a lobby group to free her from the planned early marriage, she said.

AAS, in her case before High Court judge Chacha Mwita, claims her mother then booked her as a mentally ill person at a local rehabilitation centre. She argues that her parent managed to get her way by giving false information about her.

According to the girl, the idea of keeping her in rehab was to block her from escaping.

“The petitioner has been under physical assault and abuse by the respondent who has ill motives and a selfish desire of marrying the petitioner off contrary to the choice of the petitioner,” Justice Mwita heard from AAS’s lawyers.

The facility where the minor had sought refuge was, however, shut over alleged bizarre religious healing activities. The ‘patients’ at the centre were locked in chains in dingy dark rooms without ventilation and were reportedly beaten.

Some of those who were at the centre were not abusing drugs but relatives paid to keep them there, the court heard.

AAS was later handed to a human rights group.

She, however, fears that the same men hired to spy on her are still pursuing her despite being in a safe house.

“The applicant is living in fear and mental anguish because several men are consistently following her with the intention of abducting her. The goal is to marry her off as per the selfish wishes of the respondent,” AAS’s court papers read in part.

AAS wants the court to block her mother and her agents from interfering with her life or intimidating her in order for her to marry a person she does not love.

She is also seeking orders to block the hired men from pursuing her or getting instructions from her parent regarding her life.

Meanwhile, AAS is seeking compensation for alleged torture.

The case will be mentioned on October 23.