300 couples forced' into live-in relationship in Chhattisgarh

Raipur: As many as 297 couples hailing from extremely poor families in Chhattisgarh’s north Bastar district of Kanker have been ‘forced’ into ‘live-in’ relationships for a year after having failed to enter into wedlock, thanks to official apathy.

The local women and child welfare department could not furnish details about these couples to the state government to enable them to attend the mass marriage programme at Koyilibeda in Kanker district on Thursday, thus postponing their official union for at least one year, a senior state government officer disclosed this newspaper.

The couples who could not marry will have to observe the local tradition of ‘paithu’, in which they will live together, till they tie the knot officially, he added.

“We could conduct marriages of only 20 couples and had to return the remaining 297 couples owing to failure of submission of required information on them to the state government,” a senior district officer told this newspaper.

According to him, the state government had set a target for the district women and child welfare department to arrange 317 couples from extremely poor families to conduct their marriage under the ‘Mukhya Mantri Kanyadan Yojana’ in the outgoing financial year 2015-16.

Under the scheme, each couple attending the mass marriage programme is provided a financial aid of Rs 15,000 to start their conjugal life.

The funds earmarked for the purpose to the district for 2015-16 has lapsed as the authorities concerned have failed to furnish details of the other ‘eligible’ 297 couples, forcing them to wait for the next such programme to marry.