A.P. NGO welcomes UN’s declaration of November 27 as Global Day Against Child Marriage

The UN declaration of November 27 as Global Day Against Child Marriages is an international recognition of the sustained efforts of organisations like Just Rights for Children (JRC), said B. Keerthy, president of the Vijayawada-based Vasavya Mahila Mandali (VMM).

JRC is an NGO network working with governments and enforcement agencies to prevent child marriages across the country. Speaking at a media conference on Sunday (September 6, 2026), Ms. Keerthy said VMM was a partner in JRC’s long-running campaign seeking a dedicated international day against child marriage and had been engaged in grassroots campaign against child marriages in NTR and Krishna districts.

She welcomed the UN’s historic declaration, which was a matter of pride for India where the Government had launched the Bal Vivah Mukt Bharat (Child Marriage-Free India) campaign with JRC partners on November 27, 2024. “An international commitment must now be translated into action at the grassroots level,” she said and stressed that the fight would remain incomplete as long as even a single child remained at risk of child marriage.

She said VMM had undertaken awareness programmes in schools, panchayats, and villages, encouraged communities to take anti-child marriage pledges, linked vulnerable families with government welfare schemes and worked to bring school dropouts back into education system.

Through legal intervention, VMM had prevented 2,175 child marriages in NTR and Krishna districts, she said. She said the JRC founder Bhuvan Ribhu had launched the international campaign for a dedicated global day to end child marriage.

In March 2026, he reiterated the call for a UN resolution in the presence of international leaders, including Sierra Leone’s First Lady Dr Fatima Maada Bio, who supported the initiative. Sierra Leone subsequently led the effort at the UN General Assembly, with support from around 67 countries, including India.

The resolution was adopted on September 4. JRC’s Andhra Pradesh State coordinator B. Chandrasekhar said the organisation, in collaboration with partner organisations, worked with governments across 782 districts in India, mobilising communities, schools, panchayats, women, police, religious leaders and political representatives.

The collective effort had helped prevent more than 5.5 lakh child marriages, he said.