New Delhi : Twenty eight per cent girls in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana were married off before the age of 18 and 59 per cent of them gave birth to their first child by the age of 19, a study said.
The study, titled ‘Young Lives’ which interviewed 1,000 children (500 girls and 500 boys) at the age of 19 years in the two states, found that girls who had left school by the age of 15 years were four times more likely to get married before turning 18 than those who continued schooling after 15. “28 per cent of girls in the age group of 8-19 years were married before the age of 18. Only 1 per cent of boys had married before 18 years. “59 per cent of married girls had given birth to their first child by the age of 19. All recorded births had happened in wedlock,” stated the findings of the research which focused on childhood poverty and looked at the aspects of early marriage and teenage pregnancy.
